New Year Arrives (ish)

OK, let's finish off 2008.

There was a slight problem in holding a New Years Eve Party in Spain at our place - we don't have Spanish TV, we don't have Spanish radio so technically we don't know when midnight officially arrives. We have our grapes - one grape for each 'dong' and so we elected Danny to be the official 'dong' person.

When the clock suggested mid-night had arrived Danny started his 'Dong-Donging' and we started eating grapes!



Now, abut the tradition of eating grapes - I found this article here: http://www.topics-mag.com/internatl/holidays/new-year/spain/12_grapes.htm



For a long time, Spanish people have had a traditional custom of celebrating New Year's Eve. On the last day of the year, the 31st of December, they wait until twelve p.m. Everybody has to have twelve grapes ready to eat when the clock starts to chime. It is traditional to eat them as you hear the clock from Puerta del Sol in Madrid chiming.


When it is midnight, each time the clock chimes, they put a grape in their mouth. By the time the clock has finished chiming, everybody has to have finished their grapes and the New Year starts, but nobody ever finishes eating the grapes on time.


Eating the grapes is very funny because everybody starts the New Year with a full mouthful of grapes. It's almost impossible to finish eating the grapes by the time the clock finishes chiming. Normally people still have all the grapes in their mouths, and they start looking at each other and have to laugh.


You can imagine what would happen if they laughed with all the grapes in their mouths. It's really difficult to have a second to swallow them. I think you can imagine the rest of the story.


This tradition started in Spain because one year when there was a big grape harvest, the king of Spain decided to give grapes to everybody to eat on New Year's Eve.



However, we had no problem eating our grapes - we had bought ready peeled, seeded grapes from our Mercadona Supermarket - they were in juice so slipped down very easy but were rather tasteless and a little slimy - I think next year we'll have the real things, it will be more fun and taste better.

Anyway dongs over, grapes eaten - it was time to check on the other Spanish New Year tradition - the wearing of red underwear. All the shops had been full of red underwear for the 2 weeks before New Year for both men & women. The tradition is that it must be bought for you and wearing it to see the New Year in brings you good luck!

Derek definitely took the prize for best undies:

By the time we had stopped laughing at Derek's pants and toasted the New Year in with Champagne - it was almost time for the UK to celebrate the New Year so we turned on the TV and watched the fireworks - goodness didn't they go on a long time. We all enjoyed them to start with but after a few minutes there were just too many going off for too long and we were all just waiting for it to end - I wonder how much it all cost, it would have been better if they'd only gone on for half the time.

Anyway, about half an hour later everyone started to wander home and we were left with a bit of clearing up to do. When we have parties of this size we have paper plates and table cloths, plastic cutlery and glasses and clearing up just means tipping it all into a large dustbin - it would wait until morning and we would be all back to normal within an hour.

We all had a fabulous night and I have to say that we have thoroughly enjoyed our first Christmas and New Year in Spain.