Imperial Parades on the Plaza

I woke up on Saturday morning, the 18th of June, and figured I would get up, and make my way down to the Plaza for a meal and to spend some time writing blog posts. My walk started out as any other walk to the plaza, passing a few dogs and being offered quite a few “masajes.” As soon as the Plaza came into sight, I was almost taken aback by the sheer amount of color, movement, and noise that filled the Plaza. I had stumbled upon a series of parades, circling the main Plaza de las armas in Cusco. A few main “groups” were segmented and separated in their own lines in the streets, distinguished by their uniforms, dances, and more, all behind a leader, who often carried a banner denoting their group name and location.

As a foreigner, this was yet another custom or tradition that I had not seen before arriving in Cusco. Men of all ages danced and paraded through the streets, wearing knit masks that left only their eyes exposed, which seemed as if they could have been featured in movies. The same men wore costumes with boxes that almost seemed as shrines, some even carrying baby alpaca or llama pelts in abundance on their lower backs. Some carried what seemed to be freshly passed away alpaca youth in their arms with brightly colored decoration fabrics, as they danced through the streets. Others toted whips and staffs, while a loud, booming, and incessant voice rained down upon the plaza from a set of speakers near the church. Whistles and tunes also graced the air, while I stood on the side of the street, silent, hoping to even begin to understand what was going on. Other people who I’d assumed were visiting Cusco stood in lines behind fences, cameras out, recording, hoping to show their friends and family a glimpse of what was going on in Peru. Large feathers atop hats caught my eye, as I watched professional photographers crouch down in between bouncing men waving flags and their swinging, brightly colored costumes.

Children and other onlookers danced and cheered along the sidewalks and inner plaza, while visitors looked down from pub balconies as well. As I stood in awe, I began to process, and realize that the daily world in which I often find myself is one that is quite a bubble, and one that had never exposed me to the true culture of South America. I felt in this accidental parade viewing that I had learned more about the homages paid to Andean and Inca culture than I could have from any book. Seeing such demonstrations of cultural and group identities in person, painted against the background of the Plaza and the Andes mountains left me wishing I could know more, about each group’s geographic origins and their ties to the original Inca empire. Such a parade also taught me about the flags I have seen during my time in Cusco, highlighting that the Inca empire was in itself a melting pot of cultures and groups, and also that the empire’s influence manifests itself in more ways than seen at the surface level.