FESTIVALS IN SEPTEMBER

MARO,         1st week-end  Feria

ALGARROBO,      2nd Saturday  Flamenco Night

SAYLONGA & CORUMBELA,       7th,    Day of the Candlemas (Lumbres).      This day is a popular holiday. At night families come together in their houses in the countryside on the outskirts of the village. They enjoy the evening beside bonfires which light up the hillsides. There they sing folk songs, dance, eat and drink, enjoying the party until the night ends.

COMPETA,    7th,  Noche de las Lumbres.         After finishing the first cropping of the vines and when the grapes spread out to dry are just beginning to turn brown, September's festival arrives. This is another agricultural festival linked specifically to the harvesting of the grapes. It has been celebrated on the farms around Competa for time immemorial and is called "La Noche de las Lumbres" (The night of the Fires). The day before the festival the inhabitants of the cortijos (houses in the countryside)  collect all the old and broken bits and pieces which are not any use any more: things like boxes, baskets and planks, together with the off-cuts from pruning the vines, and build a bonfire ("lumbre") in honour of the Virgin Mary.  It is a family festival, carried out around the bonfire when it is traditional to drink anis and to eat roasted peanuts. In olden days, these victuals would have been obtained by exchanging a certain amount of the products from the harvest, following the age old concept of barter.       Some see in this ritual an invocation to the sun to keep shining on the raisin drying beds ("paseros") until the cycle is finished.     On the other hand, what the Church celebrates on this day is the birth of the Virgin Mary, as she is the door through which the light of Jesus Christ arrived in the world.    Those with a good imigination, claim to see her image in the flames, which signifies a good harvest.    Burning the old useless things helps to clear the houses ready for the next year and at the same time serves as a rite of purification.

SALARES,   18th, 19th, 20th,          Festival Arabe Andalusian 

VELEZ MALAGA,     29th- 3rd Oct.    Real Feria de San Miguel

COMPETA,  15th, A SPECIAL DAY IN COMPETA,