Photo: Hebert Edgardo Huamani Jara
Today Cusco celebrates the Cacharpari, saying goodbye to Carnaval. Its central point is carried out in the Plaza de Armas, the Main Square. It is also, experienced, however, in its streets and popular neighborhoods.
In the Main Square your can enjoy a delightful festival of colors and allegories. All the people present, children, youths, and adults, have fun sharing smiles, playing with colored sprays, and balloons filled with water as well as buckets filled with water. The play refreshes and creates fun as people say good bye to this annual feast of Carnival.
Our municipal districts make their presentation with traditional dances where they style and dexterity of the dancers make people fall in love. Their costumes are an explosion of colors. The feast also is present in the popular markets of the whole city. Spectators receive each one of the dances with applauses and shouts greeting all the known dancers.
Our national and municipal police take responsibility for maintaining order and avoiding excess in the play. The music that is found throughout the plaza maintains a rhythm of drums, cymbals, and natural instruments which spreads to people and raises their energies to make a good feast of departure for Carnival.
This tradition comes to us over the generations, although with each passing year the feast seems less intense. Nevertheless, the feast of Carnival and its Eighth Day is an explosion of colors, laughter, and dances.
All of the dance troupes in the Plaza participate in order to be ranked by a jury of judges who will give out prizes for the best dances. They look at the skill and choreography of the dances, the coordination of steps, costumes, and group organization. This feast takes place from 11 in the morning till 4 in the afternoon. Then bands will present Carnival music and make everyone, locals and foreigners, vibrate with the fun of the celebration.
