I cursed as the zipper on my jacket refused to move, leaving me exposed to the frigid rain. It was late. Or early. At 2am, it was not the time you want to be wandering around a tiny impoverished village looking for an inn for the night. Ironically it was Christmas morning, so I guess I was in the finest of company in my plight. In a moment of carelessness, I had decided to trust Google Maps which told me that the trip was only 5 hours. Except that it wasn't. It was a hearty 12 hours. Thankfully a schoolteacher from Arequipa had decided to lend the gringo a hand at finding a place for the night, although he hinted the the quicker the better. I didn't catch it all, but it definitely included warnings about the locals robbing me because, since I'm white, its assumed I carry loads of cash.
We knocked on another door. Still full. Eventually, after far too long searching, we found a grimy hotel that I'm sure most working ladies would find disagreeable and offensive. To me, it was dry. It was warm. The moth eaten (God I hope it was just moths) sheets looked inviting enough to pay the $5 for the night and crash out. Ahhh the things I do for a Christmas adventure in the Andes!
I had come specifically to witness the Takanakuy. The Takanakuy is an obscure festival at best. Taking place in the tiny village of Santo Tomas in the high plains region of southern Peru, it has its roots in the days after the Spanish invasion. Every year on Christmas, the whole town gathers in the bullring to watch the young men and women of the area settle any bad blood between neighbors the old fashioned way. With fists.
Of course, no Peruvian festival is complete without plenty of beer (truckloads of the good stuff, Cusquena brand) and terrible mountain music called Wyno. The singers have a breathlessness and lack of pitch reminiscent of a drunk lady, and the dancing looks suspiciously like it was modeled off of the drunken stumbling of the locals. What a great coincidence!
After wandering around town Christmas morning, picking up some fresh flat bread and grenadillas for breakfast, I meandered my way through the (surprisingly) busy street market until I found the site of the festivities, the Plaza del Toros. It was fairly empty, but with nothing else to do I hiked up to the stands and watched as locals worked furiously to drain the several inches of standing water that had gathered here during the nights rain. The progress was slow, but as the water began to slowly drain, the stands began to fill at a slightly faster pace.
Mothers, fathers, grandparents, children. All ages and walks of life began to crowd the stadium and a sense of hushed excitement pervaded the air. Music began from the bandstand. The excitement grew, and beers began to change hands. Finally, the first several masked fighters half strutted half danced their way into the ring. Their small circle was the center of attention until the rest of the fighters began to trickle, then flood, in. They rushed over to the grandstand, every movement a part of their stiff legged macho looking dance. From the bandstand came the news we all awaited,"Let the festivities begin!"
The fighters began to form a circle, with refs wearing large hats and swinging whips cajoling them back to make space for the fights. For a while, the circle would melt into the drunken dancing of the prospective fighters as each one tried to take center stage for a moment long, only to be driven back in a scattering of colorful masks by the fierce crack of the whips. Eventually, the circle became relatively stable and the fights could finally begin!
The men removed their masks and put on colorful, hand woven belts before squaring off in the center of the circle. You could almost hear the creaking of their leather chaps as they danced circles, looking for an opening to strike. The sizing up seemed to last an eternity, as the crowd grew quiet waiting for the first blow to fall... Like two roosters in a barnyard, they circled, and circled.... then. BOOOM! One of the men took his fight to the opponent, seizing the initiative. A flurry of fists and kicks ensued and the ring closed in around them in the excitement of the other fighters. After about 30 seconds, or whenever it was clear a man was losing badly enough, the refs broke it up and drove back the fighters.
So the cycle started, and continued unabated for several hours. The refs bring out the two fighters, they dance like roosters, then the sudden strike of a fist as fast as the darting of a swift brought the action to bear. The refs stop the fight and restore order before the cycle repeats itself, flowing and ebbing like waves upon a beach. In the stands, the crowd bought beers or sandwiches from old women plying their goods as they walk along the hard concrete benches. The mix of music, fighting, and alcohol seemed to generate quite the cheery Christmas air.
Around four in the afternoon, a second circle seemed to spontaneously generate itself to the left of the other. People streamed to the other side of the stadium. Fights started, but from my perspective what I witnessed was strange since one fighter was wearing pink... Oh. It was the women's fights! They had begun, so I jostled my way amongst the local crowd to get a good vantage to snap some pics of the chaos.
Unlike the men's fights, the women discarded the idea of circling and went straight into the fight! Fists flew, hair was pulled, kicks and knees made solid impact. These fights were far more vicious than the those the men had engaged in. Hell hath no wrath like that of an Andean mountain woman. I eventually decided to get into the circle myself, and managed to get a couple of shots before my camera battery died. At this point, it was late. I was sunburned and a little tipsy.
I made my way out of the plaza and back to my dingy hotel room, where I crashed onto the grimy bed. I was exhausted from my travels the day before and the exciting day I had experienced. My eyes opened with about an hour of daylight left, so I got up and went in search of a decent Christmas dinner. I chose the restaurant on the corner, where I enjoyed a quarter of a fresh roasted chicken and Chinese fried rice before I wandered off towards the main square and the town's cathedral.
I sat on the low stone walls of the open courtyard in front of the cathedral, its hulking walls slightly menacing in the quickly fading light. Children rushed into the courtyard, lighting and throwing fireworks at one another as their parents watched in resignation. The bright sparks and sharp "CRACK" shook me out of my thoughts, and I noticed that it was starting to sprinkle. I headed back towards my hotel, but before I got out of the main square, the heavens opened up with a torrential downpour. The rain blew sideways as I hunkered down against it, my jacket failing to keep my pants (the only pair I had) even remotely dry.
In a last ditch effort to preserve my pants, I dashed into a dark general store where several townspeople huddled as well. Their faces were shadowy in the dim store. The power had gone out across town and two candles provided the only light. The rain slacked off slightly, and two women dashed out. I braced myself and followed them, hugging the walls to take what little protection I could from the leaky eaves along the old roofs above. With one last dash, I made it up to my hostel and into relative dryness. It was early, but I assumed that the rain would put a damper on any Christmas parties. So, I slept restlessly on a rather lonely Christmas night.
I awoke early and found a bus to go back to Cusco... It left at 12 and it was only 8am. So I do what I do best. I wandered the town. Everywhere I went, people pulled me over to ask if I was one of the two gringos who had fought the day before. "No" I chuckled. At one point, I wandered towards a less savory part of town on the outskirts and I found myself drawn into a circle of four older men, with about 8 teeth between them. They were drinking beer from their communal glass as is traditional in Peru. You pour a bit of the pale lager, drink it, shake the glass, then pass it on to the friend next to you. Not exactly a sanitary alternative to sharing a bottle, but its the only acceptable way to drink with friends in Peru.
They began to question me about why I was here, whether or not I had fought, whether I was the brother of the other gringos, whether or not I was going to the other fights today in the next town over. The questions came mostly from one old man speaking Quechua, which his friend across the circle translated into Spanish for me. I answered the questions casually, looking for a way to extract myself from the circle before the glass reached me and I was obligated to drink. As it inched closer I eyed the lack of teeth in the men, not an enticing thought when one was about to have to share a glass...
I didn't manage to escape in time, so I mustered my best smile and graciously accepted and poured myself the requisite amount. Look, some of you will wonder why I didn't just decline. I'm in a small, extremely isolated mountain town where their favorite way to celebrate Christmas was to beat the hell out of each other. Offending someone here was not in my best interest. My participation in the drinking circle seemed to satisfy the old men and I excused myself and wandered back towards the center of town. Here, on a dusty backstreet off the main square, every single gringo in town just happened to run into each other.
Laughing at the odd coincidence, we stepped into a small cafe for breakfast as we swapped tales about our travels and how we all came to be in the little town of Santo Tomas. We were a motley crew. One Icelander who had fought the day before, two Italian photographers who live in Jamaica, a Norwiegan fellow, an Aboriginee Australian, and a local Peruvian the others had met the day before the fights. We enjoyed our breakfast and said our goodbyes as we all headed off into the bright day to seek our own adventures.
It was finally time to leave, although I was skeptical of my bus since the company had told me it would only take eight hours to return when the journey out had been closer to twelve hours. Well, it turns out, when you take little tiny, poorly maintained dirt mountain roads, its a faster journey indeed! We tore along the loose dirt roads, stopping once in the very high plains to snag a bite to eat from a roadside family restaurant. The road wound its way to the plains so high that only the heartiest clumps of grass could manage to grow, and little thatch huts housed farming families that had presumably lived much the same way since time immemorial.
After a long and dusty journey, I finally arrived back in Cusco. I was tired, but happy. This was not a comfortable Christmas, or a rich one in things or food or friend. It was, however, the most interesting Christmas I have ever had. So, my friends I wish you all a (belated) merry Christmas, and a happy Takanakuy!
