Diary+Entry+4

Dear Diary

After catching a train from the 'Running of the Bulls' in Pamploma we arrived in the town of [|Buñol] in [|Valencia] were the biggest food fight in world takes place, being young people that we are, this was one destination that we need to see with our own eyes. My dad spoke of it when I was planning the trip and he said that he went when he was young and he had the best time ever and that I'll never see so many people competting in a battle of throwing tomatoes at eacother, so this we had to see for ourselves.

It consist of tens of thousands of people who come all over the world to participate in a battle of throwing over ripped tomatoes at eachother in the streets of Pamploma. The festival is in honor of the town patron Saints, Luis Bertran and the Mare de Deu Desemparats (Mother of God of the Defenseless) a title of the Virgin Mary. Although the event sounded like a pretty ridiculous idea it attracts so many tourist, like us!

After getting directions from an old couple sitting near our hotel they said to me that (in spanish) that the busstop across the road will have a bus come through that takes you directly to batlle field but we should only get on the bus number 402 because its a curtosy bus. I thanked them for their help they were a very nice loving couple.

We arrived at the battle around 6:30pm, I wore my most horrible clothes I could find. What I didn't know that was the day before the tomato fight they have a competition on who can make the best paella (which let me say is one of my favourite dishes in Spain) and after the competition they sell them for almost nothing, I payed €3 which is AUD$5 for this huge plate that I could hardly eat. The next day we got back to the battle field. Everyone was really polite I was a little scared to actually participate in the tomato fight because I thought that the tomatoes would hurt like paint ball but once I started to talk to this lady in spanish she told me that it doesn't hurt and that the tomatoes are very ripe and soft so their wouldn't be any possible way of me suffering, she also warned me that its every man for himself and that I should wear some goggles just so nothing gets in my eyes, so I did. Their were many people wear battle vest, goggles even snorkles. I must have looked like a goose but I didn't care because I was ready for a good time!

The battle was about to begin what happens is a ham is placed on a large greased pole called the cockaigne pole, the point of this is for the first person that climbs to the top and brings it down wins victory and the battle begins. I couldn't believe it their were people every struggling to make it to the top to get the ham down, so many people climbing on eachother for victory, it looked so funny.

A lady won the victory and this is when the tomatoes started flying everywhere. People were running everywhere tomatoes smashing on the ground, walls and people were getting covered in tomatoes. I was having the time of my life!

After about 2hrs a cannon was shot and the battle was over. Everyone started washing themselves in the [|Buñol] river so me and my friends joined them.

After we were cleaned we headed back to hotel I had the longest shower I had tomato leftovers everywhere on my body including my ears. I had a really good day and so did my friends.

Rachael Verdejo

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