This week dance will dance for two days in Etxarri-Aranatz, but what is dance?

The pilgrimage is a dance. It was formerly a kind of boys' rivalry. They wanted to show who danced better or who had more ability to dance. It is a kind of pasacalles in which the person who sometimes takes the rope strives to dance other steps.

Who pulls out the rope?

In the past, the volunteers took it out. When I ran, what I wanted came out, I took the scarf and I pulled the dance out, and the rest followed. But then there came a time when almost no one would dance. There were only three people coming out, two cousins, the two Pello Artieda and myself, but we saw that it was difficult to go on like this.

So he proposed to the fifths, right?

Yes, the city council at the time was wrong to propose to the fifths, the young people who are 18 years old. It was about 27 years ago. They were informed that in order to hire the festival txaranga they had to dance the verbena in exchange for receiving a subsidy.

Did you accept it?

Yes, but the first few years were disaster. Most of them didn't want to dance, they were dancing, but they were wrong. But now, years later, the situation has changed. Children see it from a young age, and now there's another awareness. They see you have to be fifth and dance, and they take it with a lot of enthusiasm and enthusiasm. It has been maintained thanks to the fifths and has not been lost.

You said it was a men's dance for a long time, but it's time that you left, right? Have you been the first woman to pull out the rope?

Well, I think so, but I don't like to say so! ja, ja, ja! Then, when the fifths started, more women started.

What drove him out of the dance?

I always liked to dance, my father was also very good dancer and I lived at home and left without the other. My father often told us things about his youth dance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What did he say?

There went who raised the most legs and who jumped the most. They felt it, and when you feel something, it goes very well inside. Even if you get up with a few legs, it goes well and you transmit something else. People live it differently. I believe that what I was dancing gave everything and that it is now also being done on that path.

So do the young people of today dance inside?

Yes, the fifths have internalized dance and make great efforts. In addition, dance is offered to someone and thought beforehand to whom and how to dance. She was dismissed and followed before, but now they hug with her. Someone told me that hugging was a bad fad that was put right now. I think the dance is every dancer's, and he has to do what comes out to everyone.

As for the steps, it's a pretty simple dance, but the dance says a lot, right?

I think it's very simple for someone who comes from outside, it's kind of a handrail, it's nothing from the other world, but she dances with feeling and when she knows she has to offer someone a lot of her, and that's what you see. The locals live a lot, we are waiting, to see who is dancing, to see who is offering it to... The nervousness of dancing in front of the people is also there, it is very nice.

How did you learn?

I studied in romerías and seen in the plaza. Then we did some course, we were also with the altsasuarras and I was also in the village dance group. But group dance didn't learn, street dance.

And then you've taught the fifths.

I started when the City Hall proposed the fifths. However, today it is not necessary, you know. I will review or clarify any doubts in two or three days. They have more problems with dance than with the porrusalda. Especially boys.

The consequence of losing the culture of dance of yesteryear, right?

That's it. We used to do everything in the plaza, we just walked into the bars looking for a drink. In Etxarri, however, the habit of dancing in the square is quite maintained. It costs them the jota and the porrusalda, but you see it's easier than it was a few years ago. And the dance is danced by everyone. When the people arrived in San Adrián, everyone danced. This entrance to the village is spectacular.