Aneya & Lorena: La Pequeña gigante.

Lauren: So that marionette show we went to? Pictured above is the marionette. She´s, I don´t know, thirty feet tall, and a few tons? She´s held up with a crane and strolls the streets of Santiago, looking for her uncle, the scuba diver. She has many costumes, and travels in a boat that has water squirting everywhere.

Aneya: Ya, Daniela had told us of this Pequña Gigante before we left the States, but I didn´t really know what to expect. But not all this. This is out of control! Yesterday, we went to see this, this parade of sorts, and there had to be thousands of people lining the streets, all running madly in one direction or the next. To catch up with the Gigante! They ran and ran, children hitched on to their shoulders, some carrying flags, with pictures of the Pequeña and a "Bienvenidos a Chile!" sign. And when they finally caught up with her? It was like they´d just won the lottery. People yelped for joy, jumping up and down, waving, proudly holding out their flags. It was unbeleivable.

Lauren: There were so many people at this marionette show. Daniela said reports were of one million people in attendance, skattered through the streets, following La Pequeña Gigante as she strolled Santiago looking for her uncle. It´s a play put on by a French company, and it´s a few days of this story. An orphan is travelling the world, looking for her uncle (the scuba man), and along the way she stops along Santiago. Yesterday she was in the park for a picnic and got her gigantic feet wet. Residents were invited to picnic along with her in the park. Que tierno.

Aneya: The amount of things this puppet can do is quite astounding. She can lick a lollipop, change clothes, dance, (that was the best part, really. They hoisted her up on a crane and made her dance, her legs and hips moving, her little head shaking. Everyone loved the dance.) Oh, and there´s a live band behind her ship, blasting music up and down the streets of Santiago. And then there´s her uncle, the submarine man. We haven´t seen him yet, but apparently he takes off his scuba gear, and she sits on his lap, so happy to finally be reunited at last. (I mean, she did travel the world to find him!)

Lauren: Aneya has excellent video of this, to be posted later when we have internet at the house.

-- Aneya & Lauren