The Learning Curve: Festival of the Geese

"El Día de gansos' in Spanish or 'Antzar eguna' in Basque is a festival/game that has been a constant in Pais Vasco since the beginnings of the 18th century. "The game of the geese", as its translated from Spanish, originated as a contest for all of the young men in the region to compete and to introduce themselves to the women of the region. Showing off their medal as it was. The original game itself was quite easy to understand. Each strapping young gentleman was mounted on horseback with nothing other than the clothes on his back. Then, an undetermined quantity of live geese were tethered to rope on the side of a path or road. The objective of the horseman was to gallop his horse at full speed and separate the geese's head from its body at the neck using nothing more than his bare hands. Simple huh?

However, like every good sport, there has to be some form of evolution to keep the sport more interesting, challenging, and more/less barbaric. Consequently, in 1824, after what seems to have been a rough year of merchandise sales and overall discontent with the melancholy of the game, the town hall decided that they were going to ditch the reliable steeds for oars and a boat. Needless to say the town overcome with joy and were reinvested in this new found challenge. The new track required the teams to row out and around the island, eventually reaching the point at which the goose was hung and the captain of the ship attempted to once again separate the head from the body with his bare hands.

In 1818, the festival began to be celebrated in Lekeitio. Where it was moved from a maritime to a landlocked game in one of Lekeitio's "plazas". However, even with the move the objective continued to remain the same; catch the goose and separate the head from the body. Shortly after about the 1850's the towns people thought it a good idea to add alcohol, specifically wine, which became a constant ever since. I suppose they thought it would make the games a bit more interesting when the participants were slightly impaired.

During the 1920's the barbaric practice was brought under review. Moreover, a local new reporter argued that using a live goose was overly barbaric. Now sometime between then and now it was decided that the geese should be sacrificed and dead prior to getting their heads separated from their bodies. The present day "game" takes place in Lekeitio's harbor where boats full of Spanish "cuadrillas" (loose translation: tight-knit friend groups) attempt to separate as many heads from the bodies of geese that hangs suspended from a rope/wire that traverses the harbor. Once the man dressed in white grabs the goose, they wrap their arms and body around the neck and drop themselves into the water. Once the wire has cleared the boats path, a group of men who are holding the rope at one end (the other is tied to a fixed object on the other side of the harbor) run forward, catapulting the goose wrangler a good 50 feet into the air. It seems like a great time until you realize that what goes up, must come down. Coincidently, with great reward comes the possibility of great sacrifice (or at least a day or two in the hospital). Needless to say that this gruesome festival is a must see and I recommend it to all