Kingdom of Spain; Kingdom of Festivals Shoko Miyagishi

Festival is an event that makes every people happy and enjoyable by participating. It usually occurs annually, which each of them is different and unique depending on countries. Kingdom of Spain, located on Iberian Peninsula, is a country known for festival kingdom. Fiesta, means festival in Spanish, is not only very popular among people in Spain, but also famous and popular among the people across the world. In the first blog, I would talk about one of Spain’s festival. Of many celebrations that exist in Spain, Las Fallas is one of the festivals that is well-known and thus a traditional events commenced and organized annually during March by the cooperation of people of Valencia and the Valencia Community.

In English, Las Fallas means fire. The name of the festival is very simple since they use fire to celebrate the event. Las Fallas, or fire festival, takes place in Valencia. Valencia is one of the prefectures of Spain and the name of the celebration derived from Valencian language. This even is a celebration of commemorating Saint Joseph, a father of Jesus Christ. Las fallas continues for 5 days (Spain Travel Guide). During these days, people gather for parties and enjoy throwing fireworks.

Nitos is the huge monument or puppet used at this festival. It is indispensable items in the Las Fallas. The nitos are creates according to the theme. The group is formed of variety of artisans, sculptures, and painters who contribute large amount of time constructing this huge puppet. Las Fallas is composed of three processions, which are historical, religious, and comedic processions (Euro Residents). Each procession is very outstanding that catch people’s eyes.

The festival begins from 8:00 am every morning with brass bands marching downs streets. At 2:00 pm, fireworks with decorations are displayed to the observers. After ten days, the event called L’Ofrena floral takes place. In this event, each monument, known as fallas, receives an offering of flowers to Saint Mary (Wikipedia, 2012).

La Crema is probably the most famous event happens in the festival of Las Fallas. What happens is that on March 19^th, all fallas are burnt with fire in the midnight. The name comes from the word “crema” which means to burn down or burning. La Crema is the climax of the celebration and is the end of Las Fallas. The fireman in the last douse water to houses that were placed near where fallas were burnt to make sure fire does not spread to houses (Wikipedia, 2012).

The history of Las Fallas is still not certain. There are many other suppositions however; the most convincing fact is that it began during the Middle Ages. It was first started by the artisans who burnt disposable woods or leftovers to celebrate the coming of the spring season. As the time changed people started to combine the celebration of coming spring and commemoration of Saint Joseph (Why Go Spain). The festival plays important role for people in the Spain, particularly people in Valencia, as it is indispensable episode of their life.

"Las Fallas." Spain Travel Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 June 2012.

<http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/festivals/las-fallas/>.　　

"LAS FALLAS." LAS FALLAS. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 June 2012.

<http://www.euroresidentes.com/Fiestas/fallas.htm>.

"Festival in Valencia: Las Fallas." WhyGo Spain. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 June 2012.<http://www.spaintravelguide.com/festival-in-valencia-las-fallas.html>.

Map for English by Shoko

In the class on April, we were asked to draw the map of the world on a piece of paper. What I drew first was the picture of China then Korea, Japan, and etc… Although the task given by the instructor was very easy, I struggle to draw a complete map of the world and took me times until the instructor say stop. Looking at my map, I didn’t have any confident because my drawing was not really good since I had difficulty imagining the geography of the certain countries, especially the countries in Middle East and East　part of Europe.

              After we drew the map, we were asked to share the map to other classmates. I was quite embarrassed to show my map to other classmates because as I said, my map did not look complete. When I saw the map drawn by my friend next to me, I felt strange and wired because she drew the map differently than what I have drawn and moreover, I was really surprise to see a lot of people draw the map differently than me.

              From what I have seen so far, no one drew the map “exactly” same with other class mates. There was a map of Korea in the center and also I found a map that was hardly recognizable which continent he or she has drawn. The map that most surprised me was a map drawn upside down. First, I did not understand what she drew because I never seen this kind of map before. I did not recognize until a person said that is a map of the world drawn upside down.

              For what I have drawn for my map, I centered Japan like other official maps that are sold in Japan. Like me, most of other Japanese students did the same drawing Japan as the center of the map. To compare my map to other non-Japanese students, it was quite different. Most of the people put their mother country as the center of the world map, while few of them centered the United States. For those people who centered the United States were not from that country but they said that because they have life experience or learned American based education: is the reason why they drew the United States as the center of the map. This made me realize that each people have different image of map and draw the country that they think is the most valuable or have influence on. For example, I am born and raised in Japan so I have only seen a world map with Japan in the center of the globe. Because I grew up in this environment, which Japan being in the center, I never thought of a world map that looks like the map drawn by my classmates. Education in this case plays a huge role in people’s imagination. Like other foreign students, if I was born and raised in outside of Japan, I would probably did the same and it would be same even if I was a Japanese who got educated in another country.

            In conclusion, people have different ideas and perspectives and its mostly depends on the place where they were born and raised. People educated or raised surrounded by country’s atmosphere, will follow view -points of that country. At last, as a world map drawn in the class indicated, no one has exact same image or can create a same idea with others.

Shoko