Festivities in Jocotepec

The annual festivities are taking place in Jocotepec this week. We managed to make it out Friday night for the big night - Banda San Miguel and Banda El Pueblito were performing, as well as a chick band from GDL, which I didn't catch the name of (but the tuba player was pretty fly). Though banda music is not really my "thing", I admit that the groups were pretty tight and dancing was fun. Plus, who can resist twenty some dudes in matching suits, white boots, and a plus-sized tuba?

Go ahead, just try to resist.

So we left the Goblin King home with grandma and enjoyed the good times to be had at the festivities: street food, tequila mixed with Squirt, and dancing.

Jocotepec is a lot more cowboy than San Juan, so the tight jeans, cowboy hats, mustaches, and belt buckles the size of kittens were out in full force. By local standards, we're experiencing arctic temperatures, so nearly everyone was also sporting winter coats, gloves, scarves, and ski caps. (If we ever make it back to the States we're guaranteed to be total pussies, and your mockery will be anticipated.)

Groups of men stood around passing bottles of tequila back and forth, and for those who didn't think to BYOT, cantaritos were for sale everywhere. Couples danced. Babies slept in strollers. People huddled under their zarapes and exclaimed that they might die of the cold.

The local report is that Jocotepec (cowboys) doesn't like San Juan (squash growers), and that the cowboys go to the festivities packing. San Juan folk warned me multiple times to dive under a car or around a building if I heard gun shots, but nothing of the sort occurred. Of course there were fist fights, but none of them involved us.

Good times in Jocotepec.