Festival Guelaguetza in Oaxaca

Festival Guelaguetza in Oaxaca

For more than 40 years, traditionally the "Fiestas de los Lunes del Cerro" are held in the city of Oaxaca, on the two Mondays following July 16 and the parthy is carried out in the capital of the state of Oaxaca.

The Guelaguetza Festival is a celebration in which representatives from the many communities of Oaxaca come together and celebrate the diversity of their traditions and cultures. The state of Oaxaca is home to 16 different ethnolinguistic groups and is incredibly diverse. For the Guelaguetza, members of these groups gather wearing their traditional clothing and perform folk dances that are particular to their region. At the end of the dancing, they throw items to the crowd, products that come from the region they represent.

The word Guelaguetza means "offering" in the Zapotec language, and its meaning goes far beyond the festival. In traditional Oaxacan villages when there is an occasion for a celebration, such as a baptism, wedding, or the feast day of the village patron saint, the people attending the party will bring items necessary for the celebration: food, alcoholic beverages, etc. Each person's offering or "guelaguetza" allows the party to take place and becomes part of a reciprocal exchange and is one of the ways social ties are reinforced and maintained through time.

in the festivity you can find stalls that sell Oaxacan tamales, grasshoppers, yolk bread, the famous tlayudas and a mezcal fair where you can sample different varieties of this alcoholic drink.