Lumaradas

I remember that a few days ago I lived in the neighborhood of Agra do Orzán in the city of Coruña San Xoan, rapazada everything managed to fire to face the lumaradas. Each crew, from each location, fired artillery at those more or less prepared structures in areas where they could be burned within their own city that were still occupied. As lumaradas, as we called them, some cases were huge and some even competed with others. In all the neighborhoods there was this tradition that came from behind the neighborhoods and out into the streets to enjoy desa noite de moi diferentes mómos with the purifying light as the main reason and the roasted sardines as the star flavor, “San Xoán polo to sardina pinga or pan”. This night of June 23 is the most special in Galicia’s holiday calendar, and especially not in A Coruña to the point where the 24th has been a local holiday in recent years, in response to a deep popular clamor. Today, the lights are centralized on the beaches of Riazor, Orzán and Berbiriana (Matadoiro) where in the previous days they began to share spaces to enjoy the light and the two rites of the magical night. I must say that I especially understand the decision to move everything to parts of the city, but I think that I have lost that family and clan essence that pollutes our neighborhoods. At the same time, there was an important disconnect with the origins of the ritual itself, which was more closely related to macroconcentration. This festival of devanceira devanceira de orixe pagá is directly related to the summer solstice and in Galicia it has a wide and rich nomenclature: lumaradas, luminarias, fogeiras, cacharelas, cachelas, lumieiras or laradas, are some of the denominations that can be found in different places of our geography. And with that ancestral expression cheugo connected us, as one of the most deeply rooted forms of the cult of light, where tradition expresses with maximum power and symbolism or a ritual of purification and protection from meigallos. Associated with this are rites such as bathing in the sea or a bouquet of 7 magical herbs that must be kept in the water all that night to wash the face the next day for protective and apparently purifying purposes. Long live San Xoán and don’t lose the tradition.