Dia de San Pedro y San Pablo

In honor of July 4th, I thought I'd share some photos from a local festival here, el Dia de San Pedro y San Pablo (the Day of St. Peter and St. Paul, June 29th). To start, every street section gets together and puts up a tree, and hangs it with prizes (small toys, clothing, underwear, etc.).





Here's the one in front of my office/house (newly painted!):



That evening, a huge crowd of people gathers; they move along the street, from tree to tree, at each one dancing around the tree to music played by a traveling band. One of the celebrants carries an axe, and passes it around among the dancers, each of whom takes a turn chopping at the tree.







Eventually, the tree falls, hopefully missing the crowd, and the crowd of dancers fling themselves on top of the tree, trying frantically to grab prizes for themselves before they're all snatched away. Then they all move down the street to the next tree, to do it all over again.



You can tell this is an important festival (apart from the number of people), by the fact that all the streets in the city come pre-installed with tree fixtures, once or twice a block, for trees to be stood up in once a year. I'm not sure how widely this celebration is held, but it was definitely huge in Moyobamba.