Lunes, 26/12/2016: More parades, Tranvía load tests, Ancestral medicine at the hospital, 25 Christmas babies

Hola, Todos –

Pagina cultural –

Happy Boxing Day!

Ongoing and undated agenda events –

Casa de los Arcos – As part of the Bienal, artist Luis Chenche is showing his work at the Casa de los Arcos with hours from 9-19:00.

Bandas de Pueblo – Local and community bands, including the banda San Luis de Cuenca, are marching in the pases del Niño such as the one in the El Lazarato barrio. (You thought the Pase del Niño Viajero was the last of the parades?  Think again – neighborhoods are still parading.)

Creatividad en los Sagrados Corazones School – Part of this season are the celebrations in schools where parents, teachers and students display their creativity with costumes an festivities.

Extensions of CCE in the cantons – The goal of the CE del Azuay is to have a branch in each of the 14 cantons in the province.

Articles about –

Máchica – Upcoming chefs, interested in rescuing traditions and promoting creativity, organized a competition, “Yo si como máchica” (I like máchica – the word looks like magic, but isn’t.  Google says máchica is the mafia.  It’s a flour made of toasted wheat or barley with added panela and spices.)  Ivanna Paredes, who won the contest, made a trio of dishes – broasted chicken with ginger and máchica, a drink that mixed tequila with máchica, and máchica truffles which were cheese and pork balls covered in máchica.

Sounds of the Andes – Vigil Jaramillo plays a “cromática” (the picture is of one of the Andean wind instruments with a lot of pipes) on the bus as a way to earn money.

El baile de Tucumán (The Tucumán dance) – Luis Tacuri is the director of a childrens’ dance group called “Tercera Generación” which performs the dance at the traditional parades. It looks like a maypole dance, and the different steps will weave different patterns around the pole.

Don Rosendo Benalcázar – The 81 year old luthier makes stringed instruments and his favorite is small guitars to introduce children to making music and “rasgando las cuerdas” (scraping the strings – which is a good description of most kids’ first attempts.)  He used to make full size guitars but can’t compete with cheap imports (plastic guitars from China?), so he makes the mini guitars.  It takes more than a day to make one so he can’t sell it for less than $10. (Which sounds like a bargain for a hand made instrument.)

Otras cosas – 

Titular – Se ultiman pasadas para tres Niños más (Finishing parades for 3 more Niños) – the Pases for the Niño de Praga, Niño Rey, and Niño Migrante will take place in the streets of Cuenca.

25 babies – Between Christmas Eve and Christmas 25 babies were born in the Vicente Corral Moscoso Hospital.

Drunk drivers – 7,650 drivers were fined in the past 3 years “por manejar ebrios” (for drunk driving).

Latin mass – The Santa Marianita del Arenal Church in the Yanuncay parish in the south of Cuenca offers two masses – one in Spanish and the Misa Tridentina (Tridentine Mass) in Latin. The Misa Tridentina is offered at mid-day on Sundays. The priest said the rest are offered at traditional times known to the faithful. (So if you have to ask when mass is, you are obviously insufficiently faithful.)

Trade – Now that the Acuerdo Multipartes with the EU has been signed, the Ministry of Foreign Trade is working with the CAN (Comunidad Andina de Naciones) to continue negotiations with European countries that are not EU members.  It is also looking at partial agreements with China, especially to be able to export things like shrimp without paying high duties.

Tranvía – The bridges over the Yanuncay and Tomebamba Rivers were tested for resistance to the weight they will have to carry.  The test consisted of putting dump trucks filled to capacity on the bridges to measure any deformation.  The measurements were taken from under the bridge structure.  (An act of faith by the engineers and technicians that the design is adequate.  I hope the trucks were moving.  There’s a difference between a static and a dynamic load.)

Concurso de Años Viejos (Old Year Contests) – Registrations opened today from 17-21:00 to enter the Año (don’t forget the tilde or squiggle  – if you do forget, the translation becomes the Old Anus (or Asshole for adult readers not easily offended) instead of the Old Year.) Viejo contest at the Amistad Club (Pres. Córdova y G. Torres)  The cash prizes for the contest which will be judged on 31/12 are $3,000, $2,500 and $2,500.  Neighborhoods accustomed to building their displays along Gran Colombia and Lamar need to stay 200 meters away from Tranvía work.  (It would be embarrassing to complain about the progress of the tram and then have your burning Año Viejo fry the electrical system.)

Ancestral medicine – The José Félix Valiviezo Hospital in Santa Isabel has been offering ancestral treatments on the 2nd and 3d Thursdays of each month for the past 5 years.  8 practitioners treat from 80-100 patients each month.  One of them has 50 years of experience and uses treatments learned from his great-grandparents.  (No, I don’t know how you get an appointment. You’re a grown up now and need to start doing things on your own.)

Internacional –

Chile – A 7.6 earthquake “sacude” (shook or jolted – your word for the day from the verb sacudir – to shake or jolt) 5 regions in southern Chile.  No victims were reported and tsunami alerts were cancelled.  There were at least 9 aftershocks from 3.5 to 5.2.  The highway that crosses the archipelago of Chiloé was severely damaged. (From the photo it looked like the right lane just broke off in chunks at the expansion joints and slid, along with the underlying fill, towards a river.)

And that´s all for today so Hasta Mañana –

Jeanne