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August 30, 2006
Red all over as Spaniards revel in tomato frenzy
BUNOL, Spain (AFP) - Some 40,000 Spaniards and visitors gathered in this eastern town to drench each other in 100,000 kilogrammes (220,000 pounds) of tomatoes in the annual Tomatina festival.
Madcap participants, including thousands of mainly British, French and German tourists, turned themselves into a 'human gazpacho' in a riotous display of self-indulgence at one of the world's messiest festivals.
Most donned waterproof capes to stave off the onslaught of juice and pulp in a manic free-for-all believed to have begun life as an argument between two carnival participants in 1945.
In keeping with local tradition the tomato throwers opened the fun and games on the stroke of midday, when five lorries piled high with the fruit moved into the central plaza of the town just outside Valencia, an AFP photographer said at the scene.
That was the signal for everyone to hurl tomatoes -- which had been squashed up a little in advance to make them all the mushier -- at all and sundry for an hour, turning the streets into a red pulp.
As always, revellers clad in the oldest clothes they could find then made use of showers placed at their disposal for the occasion or else jumped into a nearby river to clean themselves up while the fire brigade moved in to hose down the streets and sweep up the debris.
So popular is the event, which reputedly sprang from the ire of a would-be local serenader whose lute-playing found scant favour with residents, that Spanish authorities have recognised it as a "festival of international tourist interest".
Posted by ronnie at August 30, 2006 02:01 PM