15 de septiembre (Independence Day)

gathering before the parade started

 Yes, we worked on this federal holiday. We left home at 7:30am (via taxi, which out here is a red van with yellow triangle) and didn't get home until about 1:30pm, but I had a great time! We were in the town parade, and our school (Creativa) was one of the largest and best groups in the parade, so I'm told.

We had our banner at the front (which Jerry helped carry, of which I didn't get a picture- bummer!), then our awesome* band, complete with xylophone and cymbal players, and baton twirlers, and our super mini banda group, plus students and teachers in the traditional dance group.

*Why is Creativa's band awesome? Because all the songs were composed by one (or two?) Creativa seniors, and the whole band was DIRECTED by a Creativa senior. His compositions included not only separate drum parts but also the xylophones and cymbals! Plus, the music was, in my opinion, very creative and not what you might traditionally expect of a marching band. I'll try to post a video here so you can here it, though the viewing part isn't so great (it might be upside down- sorry!).

What is mini banda? This means band of little kids. I, along with 6 other wonderful women of Creativa (teachers, directors, and interns) had word with 30 students grades 1-4 since the beginning of school every day for 45 minutes at the END of the day OUTSIDE on preparing drum beat rhythms and marching while drumming. Let's just say it was sometimes chaotic, especially considering there were 28 boys, and only 2 girls. But the kids did really well in the end; it was exciting!

flag ceremony before the parade

And of course we all wore our red Creativa shirts and blue jeans, so as to be patriotic. (The flag is red, white, and blue! Sound familiar?)

Women Leaders of Mini Banda (and one drum player)