Sunday, October 5, will see the celebration of the World Championship (mundial) or, more modestly, Championship of Catalonia in the assembling of human towers (concurs de castells). As of tradition, the competition will be held at Plaça de Braus in Tarragona and starts at 10.00.
The list of participants is impressive. Ruling champions the Castellers de Vilafranca (Visca el Penedès!) are clear favourites, but can expect a good match at least from the Colla Vella dels Xiquets de Valls, the Colla Joves Xiquets de Valls and the Capgrossos de Mataró.
I can not help considering it a shame that a Catalan high profile event of this class is not better promoted in English or, at least, in Spanish. Most of the practical information is only available in Catalan and, honestly, I think it was luck rather than logic in my search which lead me to the organisers’ official web-page. There, after a while, I realised that information about ticket purchases (venta d’entrades; € 4, or € 5,50 if you make them in advance through ServiCaixa) can be found under the headline Serveis. Further down on the same page you will find descriptions on how to get there and links to relevant maps (veure mapa).
An alternative way of following the competition will be through the live broadcasts from 12.25 on Catalan TV 33. However, although I am convinced that I would learn a lot by listening to the commentators there, I have decided to go to Tarragona. This is, after all, a bi-annual event and an experience I certainly do not want to miss.
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Technorati tags: Catalonia, Castellers, Human Towers
The list of participants is impressive. Ruling champions the Castellers de Vilafranca (Visca el Penedès!) are clear favourites, but can expect a good match at least from the Colla Vella dels Xiquets de Valls, the Colla Joves Xiquets de Valls and the Capgrossos de Mataró.
I can not help considering it a shame that a Catalan high profile event of this class is not better promoted in English or, at least, in Spanish. Most of the practical information is only available in Catalan and, honestly, I think it was luck rather than logic in my search which lead me to the organisers’ official web-page. There, after a while, I realised that information about ticket purchases (venta d’entrades; € 4, or € 5,50 if you make them in advance through ServiCaixa) can be found under the headline Serveis. Further down on the same page you will find descriptions on how to get there and links to relevant maps (veure mapa).
An alternative way of following the competition will be through the live broadcasts from 12.25 on Catalan TV 33. However, although I am convinced that I would learn a lot by listening to the commentators there, I have decided to go to Tarragona. This is, after all, a bi-annual event and an experience I certainly do not want to miss.
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Technorati tags: Catalonia, Castellers, Human Towers
3 comments:
Erik - enjoy the show on Sunday. Do you know of anywhere there is an explanation, in any language, of the various castell configurations? I have been trying to figure it out from observation but I've not got it yet. I always count one less level than they seem to claim - I suppose they must be counting the 2 kids at the top as 2 levels?
Thanks for the info about the TV coverage on 33. We can watch it online at tv3.cat even if we don't understand everything that's being said.
Iain,
I consider Wikipedias entry on castells to be very good in English http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castell
...and even better in Catalan
http://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casteller
The two children at the top count as two levels, which is fair, isn't it?
Finally, you might want to doublecheck on the time for TV33 broadcast. I can't understand why a live broadcast would start so much later than the exhibition, but that probably just reveals my lack of experience.
//Erik
hello,
to I. Forrest, unfortunelly there are a little information in english, but some "colles" have parts of theirs webs traduced in englist, for instance:
http://www.collavella.com/dossier/collavella_english.pdf
or
http://www.castellersdevilafranca.cat/index.asp?carpeta=historiaidiomes&web=en_glosari&tipus=htm&m=18
there are also a special edition of magazine "castells" in english
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