La Feria de Abril

My second spring break was so much fun, I can hardly believe that I travelled to three countries in a week. From Madrid, to Dublin to London, I can't even decide which one I liked the most. I had so much fun exploring Madrid with my grupo de interest and then adventuring through the cold and rainy but oh so gorgeous Dublin and London with Zoe and Gilana. We had so much fun, met so many new and interesting people and I developed a new found love for good hostels. However, I can honestly say that one of the best and most exciting moments of that week was when we got off the bus from the airport at the doors of the Universidad and it just felt right. The smell of the orange blossoms and horses, the familiar streets and most of all the lack of rain and warm weather all came together and I was reminded that Sevilla had become my home, and that I had missed it. All of the places I travelled to were fantastic but Sevilla is the place for me. That day I got home, had a delicious lunch with my Señora and told her all about my travels. She was especially interested in my trip to Madrid because she loves the Prado and theatre so she really enjoyed hearing about that. I was so happy to be back in my own bed with her good cooking and of course Pantera. I did a little bit of homework that night and then pretty much crashed but that was okay because the next day Zoe, Gilana and I were planning on heading to one of the final days of La Feria de Abril.

La Feria de Abril or April Fair is a special holiday that is unique to Andalucía, the region of Spain in which I was staying. It is a week long event, usually occurring about two weeks after Easter, that everyone gets vacation time for and it is basically a week long party, but it didn't start out that way. When Feria was created in 1847 it was originally a livestock fair that took place on the outskirts of the city and was really just for farmers from el campo or the country who had livestock to sell. After a few years some of the more wealthy patrons such as the Casino de Sevilla built casetas or tents to watch the proceedings in comfort. By 1920 the livestock aspect of Feria had completely disappeared and it was transformed into the week long celebration that it is today.

Modern day Feria consists of everyone dressing up in the clothes of el campo, which means traje de flamenco or flamenco dresses for the girls and traje corto or short jacket, tight pants and boots for the men, and drinking manzanilla all day while eating at one of the many food stands, riding the amusement park rides, playing fairground games or dancing in one of the casetas.

The huge beautiful gate at the entrance to the fair.

A row of casetas, complete with Mickey Mouse. 

Horse butts plus men and women in traditional dress. 

Donkeys and that pull the carriages with pompom headdresses. 

Some girls in our program borrowed flamenco dresses from their Señoras who had daughters or granddaughters who were their size, however, Zoe, Gilana and I weren't that lucky and since flamenco dresses can cost anywhere from 200-1000 euros we decided to do what everyone else does if they don't have a flamenco dress. Wear a nice dress with a big flower in your hair and huge earrings. So we put on our nicest dresses and headed over to a "fancy" chino store to find the biggest and most obnoxious accessories we could. What is amazing is that some girls have a dress for all SIX days of Feria, and most get one to two new dresses each year! Similar to prom dresses you can tell what year a flamenco dress is from based on how the color of the dress, how tight it is, how many ruffles are on the bottom of the dress, if it has sleeves or not and how puffy the sleeves are. 

No mirror? No problem. We used the car to put in our flowers. 

Zoe and I modeling our Feria looks. 

The back of my Feria look with Flamenco dresses in the background.

After getting all dressed up we walked across the bridge to the Feria grounds. There are hundreds of casetas on the grounds, some are private and some are public. You can't go into the private casetas unless you are invited by the family who owns that caseta, it is very hard and expensive to get a caseta on the fairgrounds but once you have a spot it stays in your family forever. One of the main things Spaniards do during Feria is go from tent to tent visiting their friends. It can be like a big reunion for friends and families who don't get to see each other often. The public casetas are different. They are usually run but large businesses or the city of Sevilla and they play music for dancing, sell food and most importantly rebujitos. Rebujito is the drink of Feria, all the people love it. It is a mixture of Manzanilla wine and 7-UP. It is very refreshing and delicious. You can buy it by the pitcher and share it with all of your friends, but most of the young Spanish people make their own and then sneak it in. 

Our pitcher of rebujito and "La Guita" glasses, which is the brand of manzanilla wine that we were drinking. 

Me and Gilana in the caseta with the rebujito and eating some olives as a snack.

While in the caseta we also got to witness men and women dancing in the traditional flamenco style and we also attempted to dance with them. It was amazing how good they were, it put our attempt to shame, even though they were so nice and encouraging. We also saw a lot of beautiful flamenco dresses, it is funny because the girls were so proud of their dresses they were dying to get their pictures taken by us, so we got lots of good shots of them. We soon found this to be a theme, everyone was dying to show off their outfits, so prepare for an onslaught of pictures right now. 

Young girls in their traditional dresses. 

Men and women from the country bring their horses and ride from caseta to caseta. 

Adorable Feria family. 

A perfect example of traditional male Feria dress.

After spending a few hours in the caseta we decided to explore the rest of the fair and found all the games and rides. It was so funny to see all of the girls in their nice dresses riding the rides and playing fair games. We also found a yummy little snack of caramel apples and buñuelos which are basically like mini donuts. 

Some girls crowding around a fair game. 

Yum! Caramel apples. 

Rides, buñuelos and caramel apples.

Just as it started to get dark it started to sprinkle a little bit. We debated between just going home and taking refuge in the nearest caseta. We chose the nearest caseta and I'm so glad that we did. The hours we spent their were my favorite of the day. We made friends with some Spanish girls who were very into Feria and were having a great time showing us their flamenco moves. Gilana and I even tried it and the older people we were sitting next to were encouraging us and telling us that we were pretty good for americanos. 

Our imitation of intense flamenco faces.

Flamenco dancing. 

Some of our new friends in action. 

The inside of our favorite caseta. 

We were still pretty tired from our week of adventures and it was starting to get cold so around 12 AM we decided to head back to our houses. It was so fun to see the change from day to night on the Feria grounds. They were almost unrecognizable. 

Looks like it could be a poster for Feria. 

The laterns that hung over all the streets in the fairgrounds. 

Me and Zoe on our way out. 

Me and Gilana striking a flamenco pose. 

Me, Gilana and Zoe by our caseta. 

Other people saw our photo shoot and wanted to join in. 

The entrance to Feria at night. 

There were beautiful lights everywhere. 

The three of us in front of the gate to Feria. 

It was so crazy, as we were leaving at midnight hundreds of people were still arriving to Feria. I couldn't believe it! This was just another experience I had in Sevilla that made me further appreciate the opportunity I had to come to this wonderful place and how lucky I am to have chosen Sevilla. I have experienced things here that some people can only dream of.