Throwing Colors/Tomatoes on each other.

La Tomatina Festival - Spain.

Although the Tomato Festival in Bunol, Valencia has no religious connections and was only started in 1945 this festival along with the Pamplona Bull Run is one of Spains most famous and well known festival.

The Festival La Tomatina is one huge tomato fight and each year around 30,000 people turn up to take part.

The festival starts early in the morning when everyone turns up and dines on a breakfast of Chorizo and Rose wine.

By 11am in the morning everyones inhibitions are loosened and five huge tomato filled rockets are sent into the skies above the town.

From this point it is every man, woman and child for themselves as the event turns into a tomato slinging war. Everyone is supposed to adhere to a small number of rules: You must squash the tomato before throwing it and you are not allowed to throw anything other than tomatoes.

Each year the Tomatoes throwing Festival last fro around two hours and in total some 125,000 kilos of tomatoes are squashed and thrown.

The festival also brings out a good community spirit where everyone involves helps out with the cleaning up and hosing down.

You can easily get to Bunol by flying into Valencia Airport. If you are flying to Valencia from the UK then you can find well priced flights and deals through Easyjet.

La Tomatina Festival, The Tomato throwing Festival, is held on the last Saturday of August every year and has been a regular event since 1945.


Rangpanchami or Festival of Colors. - India.

Colours will fill the atmosphere as people throw abeer and gulal in the air showing great joy and mirth in the arrival of this Spring Festival.
Holi marks the end of the winter gloom and rejoices in the bloom of the spring time. It is the best time and season to celebrate; Holi provides this opportunity and people take every advantage of it.

Days before Holi, the markets get flooded with the colours of every hues. This aptly sets the mood of the people till the actual day of Holi. It is such a colourful and joyous sight to watch huge piles of bright red, magenta, pink, green and blue every where on the streets. Buying those colours seems as you are bringing joys and colour to your home and into your life.

Children take special delight in the festival and demand every colour in loads. They have so many plans in their mind. They have to be the first to apply colour to Mama, Papa, siblings and a big bunch of friends in their colony. Nobody could miss being coloured by them and of course, they need colour for that.

These days it is easy to buy colours from the market but still some people do take up the task of making colours at home, usually from flowers of tesu and palash. These home made colours, have a special fragrance of love in them.

The other option is to buy gulal which comes in bright shades of pink, magenta, red, yellow and green. 'Abeer' is made of small crystals or paper like chips of mica. This is mixed with the gulal for a rich shine. Mischievous ones, however, go for silver and gold paints on which no colour could be applied.

Whatever be the choice of colour, nobody remains in their original texture at the end of the play. And everybody takes delight looking at the other. Really, the other name of the festival is FUN.

And, it is not just children, but the young and the old alike who take delight in this joyous festival of colours. Seniors too, move in their tolis. Their enthusiasm is at times greater than that of their children as they forget the bars of age and follow their hearts. To youth, holi gives a chance to explore the heights of their enthusiasm as they climb the human pyramids to break the pot of buttermilk and to express their love to their beloved by applying colour.

For, Holi knows no bars, everybody feels it is their right to enjoy and enjoy they do. Songs, dance, drinks, food everything goes in excess when it is time for Holi. It can be said, "Life turns Colourful" when it is time for Holi.