Looking for something truly memorable to do on your next vacation? Grab your First Aid Kit and head to one of these<\/em> exciting events:<\/p>\n *The Entroida Festival<\/strong> *The Burning Tar Barrel Festival<\/strong> *Las Bolas de Fuego (Balls of Fire) Festival<\/strong> *Bombing Master Handan<\/strong> Me? I think I\u2019ll take up knitting.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Looking for something truly memorable to do on your next vacation? Grab your First Aid Kit and head to one of these exciting events: *The Entroida Festival This festival is supposed to celebrate purification, so you just know angry fire ants will be involved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funny-bits"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":574,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571\/revisions\/574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/brendakearns.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThis festival is supposed to celebrate purification, so you just know<\/em> angry fire ants will be involved. The Entroida Festival occurs in Laza, Spain\u2014it\u2019s a seven day celebration leading up to Ash Wednesday. The earliest parts are pretty boring\u2014just drunk men running through the streets carrying flaming torches and being pelted with mud. But near the end, locals get pretty serious about this purification thing\u2014they shovel fire ants into dirt-filled sacks, douse them with vinegar to really piss them off, then throw them at people\u2019s faces. Bags of fun.<\/p>\n
\nEvery November\u2014for reasons no one seems to remember\u2014the citizens of Ottery, England, collect over a dozen large, heavy barrels, line them with tar and light them on fire. They used to roll the barrels through the streets\u2014but that got boring, so now they run around carrying<\/em> the flaming barrels on their shoulders. Thinking of getting involved in this one? I\u2019d suggest a brush cut\u2014and flame-retardant shampoo.<\/p>\n
\nEvery August in Nejapa, El Salvador, people paint their faces, put on wet clothing, then sling kerosene-soaked fireballs at each other for two hours straight. Locals still argue about what this is supposed to symbolize\u2014I\u2019d suggest just agreeing with the guy who\u2019s making eye contact and holding a flaming fireball. Yes, onlookers sometimes get hit, but the organizers brag that \u201cspectators rarely receive more than minor burns.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nIn Taiwanese folklore, Handan\u2014the God of Wealth\u2014hates being cold, so if you want to have a financially successful year, you need to (symbolically) warm him up by pelting a stranger with firecrackers and bottle rockets. Apparently, that\u2019s why, every February in Taitung, Taiwan, several volunteers strip down to their shorts, stand on chairs and get carried around while hundreds of people throw lit explosives at them.<\/p>\n