00:01It's June in Brazil, and June only means one thing in the Brazilian Northeast.
00:07It's the St. John's Festival, in some places lasting the entire month,
00:12other places starting on St. Anthony's Day, continuing to St. Peter's Day.
00:16But the most important night of this annual holiday is St. John's, and it's St. John's here in Caruaru,
00:22where an estimated 3 million people have come over the last couple of weeks
00:27to eat traditional foods centered around the corn harvest coming from the indigenous tradition,
00:33to dance to Afro-Brazilian rhythms, and to see this mixed with a tradition originally brought over from Europe
00:40by Portuguese colonists celebrating midsummer, even though it's midwinter here,
00:44and this is done with bonfires and lighting off fireworks.
00:47So it's a kind of family holiday in which people of all ages come out to dance, to eat and drink with their friends,
00:56and if they're Catholic, to remember the Catholic saints, if they worship Afro-Brazilian religions like Candomblé,
01:03they know that St. John's Day is also the day that people in Brazil commemorate Shango, the Yoruba God,
01:10and it's just a general holiday feeling.
01:13Schools are closed this week, and everyone's out on the street having a good time here in Caruaru.
01:18Yeah.
01:20Yes.
01:23Yes.
01:24What do you think of Frontif Wild Oats
01:28AreHida?
01:29Yes!
01:31foul
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