Quincenera

15 years old…it is the big landmark for an Ecuadorian girl. As is common in many Latin cultures, girls have a large birthday celebration called a Quincenera in honor of their 15th birthday.
This year I should be experiencing my share of Quinceneras as many of the AREvista youth are getting close to this milestone.
The first Quincenera was about a week ago for one of the most active members of our youth group. It was the talk of the month between all the girls in the group, what colors she was choosing, when she was going over to Agua Verdes (the Peru side of the border with cheaper clothes) to get her dress, what they were going to wear to the event, who they were going to go with, and all the details of high school gossip… all while we were really trying to plan for our meeting with the mayor but you know minds were elsewhere.
Quienceneras are more than a regular birthday party, they are extravagant all night festivals, in which parents and family members work for weeks to pull it off. And they can be quite expensive as well, since it´s all about impression.
At this Quincenera, the theme of the night was fusion pink. Everything was pink from the dress to the entrance sign to the ribbon wrapped around the plastic glasses. It is actually pretty incredible what they can pull off with homemade décor, much more talent that I will ever have with these materials.
So leading up to the party, I was told probably.. I don’t know 10 times, now remember be there at 8 pm en punto! (on the dot!) But after living here for 8 months I know better. If someone tells me a birthday party will start at 8 that means maybe if they are really running on time it should start around 10 pm maybe 10:30. So to show up in good fashion I got there at 9:45 thinking I would then cut my awkward wait time in half, as everyone else that missed the don’t show up on time memo also sits around in a silent circle. But even showing up almost 2 hours late, I was still early, you have to love that.
Around 10 pm the grand entrance was made. There´s a pretty established tradition for a quincenera, first you have the flower girl and a girl carrying a pair of heels enter, followed by the parents. Then the quincenera, birthday girl, enters with her chaperone for the night, usually a brother or close relative. She makes her entrance and sits in the front of the room facing all her family and friends. The parents then remove her slippers and each replace them with a pair of heels. Then another relative comes up and puts makeup on the birthday girl. This signifies leaving behind being a girl and becoming a young women, although really these girls have been wearing makeup and heels for many years now, but it’s the idea at least.
After the representation of becoming a young women, the birthday girl makes a speech thanking her parents and the first dances start. Followed by an all night dance party, in which about ¼ of the invitees may dance, while the rest still sit in the awkward circle watching. Later on the best part came when the borther was blind folded and the best friends of the birthdaygirl had to line up in the center of the room. The brother then had to remove a guarder from his sister`s leg, like one of those you have at a wedding, and move it to the thigh of one of the friends, repeat this for each of the 6 guarders on the birthday girl`s leg, all while being blindfolded and the crowd cheered on sube sube, ¨higher higher. ¨That is a Quincenera...the elaborate 15th birthday marking the beginning of being a young women. Needless to say I was in that awkward circle watching group, but I can know say I`ve been to my first Quincenera here and I`m sure there will be more to come!