ABSTRACT
It was still dark as we approached the house of the bride’s family. We were warmly welcomed by about twenty to thirty people, among them a few young men who were so drunk that they could hardly stand up straight. That Sunday morning, Sergio, his sixteen-year-old son José, a couple of family members whom we had picked up on our way out of the village, and I had just arrived from Zumbahua. We had set out at 4:15 am and, after a ten-minute drive, Sergio showed me where to park my pickup truck on the side of the road. While I was trying to figure out exactly where we were, Sergio and his family members were already descending the slope just north of the road, down through the fields, and toward a small settlement which is part of a community called Guantópolo. A few roosters were crowing but, other than the lone lit house we were heading to, all the homes in the community were dark, and their inhabitants were all asleep. I had been told that there was going to be a big party in Zumbahua. A couple
of days before, Sergio had invited me to the wedding. He had also showed me an invitation to a baptism to be held on that same day, which (so Sergio explained) was a popular day for celebrations. I was excited about attending my first fiesta in Zumbahua as an “insider.” My expectation that this was going to be a really big event had been confirmed once again the day before: the weekly Saturday market had ended slightly earlier than usual, and Plaza Rumiñahui, the main square in the center of Zumbahua, was cleaned somewhat more thoroughly than usual. After the plaza had been swept and the leftovers of market day removed, three platforms of scaffolding pipes and wooden boards were set up where bands would play the following day. But before the “public” party at the plaza started in the afternoon, on this Sunday morning people were preparing for their own ceremonies and celebrations at home and at the town’s church. In order to not to miss any of the upcoming events, we had to get up around 4:00 am. In addition, because of the crowded schedule, I had been asked to serve as a chauffeur for Sergio and his relatives (which I was certainly happy to do). We were led into one of the two rooms of the brick house. Women were
seated on the ground. José and another boy sat on a double bed (in which
three small children were still asleep). The father of the bride sat on a chair, while Sergio and I were seated on a small wooden bench. Some other family members and godparents were seated in an adjoining room,1 either on the ground or beside a second double bed. Everybody was decked out in their Sunday best. Some of the men were wearing striped red and blue – or solid red – ponchos made of thick wool, while others sported more Western-style clothes. The women wore colorful skirts and stockings that matched their beautiful blouses and shawls, and all had their hair tied back into a single braid. All of the men and women were wearing some form of headgear, whether a baseball cap (a few men and all the boys) or (in most instances) traditional Ecuadorian Andes hats.2 As soon as everyone was seated, breakfast was served: a bowl of chicken soup, followed by a plate of noodles with some vegetables and a boiled egg. The few leftovers were carefully collected by some of the guests. While we were eating and chatting, the three small children I had seen sleeping in the bed when I arrived woke up – along with two other children and two teenagers hidden beneath the blankets – and suddenly jumped out of the bed. After they hastily gobbled up their food, we all left. As dawn broke, I could now see some pigs and chickens scratching around,
the lights of all of the nearby houses were on, and the drunk men outside, who all reeked of alcohol, were hanging on to one another to keep themselves from staggering or falling. All of us, about forty people now, started to climb the slope back to the main road, which ran from Latacunga to the Pacific Coast, through the parish of Zumbahua. As soon as we reached the car, those who had accompanied me and Sergio from the start decided to come with us, while the others, including the bride, continued walking to a nearby sector of the same community of Guantópolo. Because the main road meandered uphill with a lot of curves, and those who were walking had taken a straight line through the fields, we arrived at the neighboring settlement, where the groom’s parents lived, at almost the same time. Although the young couple had been
living together for a while in Quito, where they both worked, they had decided to marry in the parish where they both had been born, and where their parents still lived. I was told that the couple had decided to marry in a “traditional” way in Zumbahua mainly to comply with the wishes of the groom’s father. This tradition prescribes a formal meeting between the bride and groom’s
extended families (Bonaldi 2010: 97). So, when we arrived at the house of the groom’s parents, our group of forty people was welcomed by an equally large group comprising the groom’s extended family. This cordial welcome was accompanied by a hearty breakfast that featured vegetable soup, chicken, rice, and potatoes. And here too, I was embraced by a couple of drunk men. The reception was held outside the house, and the guests ate their meals while standing. Since I had already had breakfast less than one hour before, I only ate a bowl of soup, which I mainly used to warm my hands, which were chilled by a stiff morning wind as I enjoyed a beautiful view of the extensive páramos (natural high-altitude grasslands) of the parish. Meanwhile, within a courtyard between the adobe and brick buildings of the settlement, the parents of both the bride and groom were seated on a bench, while the couple themselves kneeled before them after removing their headgear in order to receive parental counsel. Since I had grown accustomed to Andean people always wearing some kind of hat, seeing the couple without any head covering came as something of a surprise.3
