LA FERIA DE ALASITAS

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EVENING

In the evening we headed down to the Feria de Alasitas. This happens once a year and consists of a square full of vendors selling hand-made miniatures of anything you might like a bigger version of, in the coming year. You can buy just about anything as each one of the hundreds of vendors specialises in a different thing. There is everything from farm animals and agriculture related things, shops, diplomas from all universities, driving licenses, passports, (frogs, elephants and buddhas all representing fortune), cars, all types of food, fruit and vegetables – anything you can’t afford now but you want to be able to afford within the next year. Once you buy the miniatures you put them together on a plate creating your vision of the future. The people then burn incense around it (I saw some taking their Alasitas up a hill to be closer to God and then burn incense) as a way of blessing it and then they take it to their house, leave it there for the year and wait for their dreams to come true – the dream being to be able to buy or gain the real life things represented by the miniatures they bought in Feria de Alasitas.

I got hooked immediately when Ronald took me to the market this evening. Not only was it a great way to make me think about my future and my priorities (I love anything that makes me think), but I really think it might work. I don’t know until I’ve tried it and I don’t want a blessing from God but for sure I want one from Pachimama, the mother of the earth. I’m going to light incense around it when I get back to the UK.

As I went from stall to stall buying miniatures, my vision of the future was becoming more and more certain and elaborate. I bought a horse as I want to learn to horse-ride and do lessons every week, I bought a statue of a couple swing-dancing as I want to learn to swing dance (after seeing them dance it in Chile), I bought a spade as I want to do more gardening and be more in touch with the earth, I bought a brown dog with a cute face as I want to own a dog (I wanted a dog like Winston but after looking for an hour I couldn’t find one as handsome), I bought a telephone with a cord as I need one for my job whereever I work, I bought a little packet of porridge and a bottle of tonic water as I want to eat and drink more of those things and also bought a miniature juice maker as at the moment I only own a hand held lemon juicer. When I’d finished buying I realised all these pence I’d been spending had added up. I realised I needed to be aware of my spending and of course I began thinking about how stable my job was back in the UK - not very. So I then went out looking for a money frog to bring me fortune, or an elephant, or Buddha, or a wad of pound sterling notes (but there were only euros and dollars.) After racing around all the stalls as they were closing I finally found a money frog. I was relieved.

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