Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Carnival and Costa

Didn't make it to Notting Hill Carnival this year. Did however visit the Carnival del Pueblo, supposedly Europe's largest Latin American festival.



Unfortunately the weather was terrible. What is going on with London this summer, it seems like the more exotic the event the worse the weather. Poor old organisers.

Anyway, the Carnival parade runs down Walworth Road, where a couple of days later a teenager is accidentally shot to death by rival gangs. Nice. Anyway, the carnival is good, like a mini Notting Hill, but with more of a focus on South America rather than the Caribbean. Float after float of Bolivians, who would have thought there were so many of them in London?! Cue piles of ultra-cute kids dressed up in traditional costume.


Why don’t they shut the whole road?!



Plenty of Peruvians and Bolivians, along with some Chileans and Brazilians.



Music provided by large conch shells on wheels with speakers inside them. Inventive but not quite up to the sound systems of W11!






Strange instruments



Strangest sight of festival - someone turning a bicycle into a Llama! Kinda like an over-grown tea-cosy really..


Llama bicycle


Spicy dancing


The rhythm section

Inside the park there were lots of food stalls, selling empanadas and other Latin fare.


Yum

Then we discovered… the Churros stalls!



Churros are thin donut-like strips that one dips in a thick chocolate sauce.


They don’t last long


The stage

Most of the stage PA was in Spanish, with a smattering of English. Multicultural London, this is what it's all about, chicos!


Performances


The rains start again..

With the rains coming down, we leave the festival and head out to have a few beers in pubs back towards civilisation, wrapping up at the Fire Station next to Waterloo.


Elaine and Costa exchanging suspicious glances

No comments: