This major event was the last of the celebrations which began two or three weeks ago celebrating 170 years of Urubamba.
Nohemy and I got up early so that we could get a picnic ready - I went to the market for three chicken breasts which she roasted in the oven along with potatoes and we also made spaghetti and a salad with lettuce, tomatoes and red onion, sprinkled with salt and a couple of limes squeezed over it at the moment of eating. We had sent Alfredo on ahead to Plaza de Armas to bag seats for us and we left the food keeping warm and went to join him. We were delighted to see he had bagged seats right at the front which meant I got some great photographs.
The festivities began with the arrival of the band, all dressed in Peruvian costumes, about 18 musicians playing and walking fast into the arena, then setting up on stage. Then loads of warriors arrived - all of them secondary school students beautifully dressed in costumes. There was music and dancing and then the arrival of the Inca Manco Capac on his throne carried by bearers along with all his courturiers. All the speaking part was done in Quechua, the ancient Inca language, and was very powerfully done. I could see that Nohemy and Alfredo were really impressed (and of course understood as Quechua is their mother tongue). Nohemy told me that the photo of her parents seen in the photo exhibition two weeks earlier was of them participating in the same re-enactment, around 50 years ago – look out for the photo I took of that black and white photo which features her Mum right at the front and her Dad walking behind. The show lasted a couple of hours and then headed off in the direction of the cemetery and we headed off home to warm up the food and pack a bag with it all.
We then took two motos up to the cemetery, where we realised the second part of the show would not take place just yet, as all the participants were having a rest. Right in front of the cemetery was Manco Capac´s palace which dates back to Inca times - something I did not know about. I have passed the building before but never noticed it was an ancient Inca palace.
We went into the cemetery into an area with seating where people gather after funerals. We laid out a tablecloth on one of the benches and servd up our picnic and we all really enjoyed it in the open air, with the sun shining down, and two or three dogs sitting nearby waiting for thrown scraps. It was the first time ever that Nohemy had been on a picnic in Urubamba, although she has been on loads in Spain with her daughters. After we´d eaten we went into the cemetery proper to visit the grave of their daughter Ruth who died in infancy (twin sister to Mabel who lives in Spain). We also visited the graves of Nohemy´s parents. Graves here are a shrine behind a glass door which opens and is secured with a padlock, with the coffin slotted into a concrete space behind it. I took some photos as it is so different than back home. It makes sense because 6 people can be buried in the same space that two graves side by side with no space in between would take up. Some of the graves included photos of the deceased and included beautiful ornamentation, poems etched into copper or silver plaques, floral arrangements and ornaments etc. Beautiful flowers and shrubbery all around the graves and birds singing, it is a very peaceful place. From the cemetery we could see when the second part of the show began and hurriedly made our way round to get a good view. It was very impressive with the participants scattered all along the battlements of the palace, with amazing music provided by the band. I took some fantastic photos of the whole day which will appear in the next photostream entry. Walking back we went into a little shop with tables and shared two litre bottles of beer, which rounded the day off nicely.
