Let's Go Fly a Kite at the Gigantic Kite Festival in Sumpango, Sacatepéquez

November 1 is Día De Todos Santos (All Saints Day) and is celebrated in Guatemala in cemeteries. In general, families visit cemeteries to liven up the tombstones (although they look more like colorful cement houses to me) of their relatives. This national holiday is also celebrated by flying kites. There is a noticeable increase in the selling and flying of kites around this time. I've heard the kites symbolize the spirits or souls of the deceased flying to heaven.

One of the most famous places to celebrate Día de Todos Santos is in the small town of Sumpango, department of Sacatepéquez, 25km north of Antigua. In a large soccer field there were probably about 25 different GIANT KITES. And by giant I mean giant! The smallest kites here on display were probably about 8feet tall and the tallest were multiple stories tall (most are more than 13m wide). The most amazing thing is that they are all made out of tissue paper! I cannot believe how intricate they were! The backs of the kites are long bamboo poles. Now not all of these kites are flyable. However they flew kites that were up to 7-8 feet tall. Pretty impressive. It was also highly amusing. They also flew the kites in this same area with all of the spectators so when the kites inevitably came crashing down it was fun to hear the shrieks of the crowd and see hords of people first moving one way to get out of the way and then the other. To quote the Lonely Planet Guatemala guidebook: "Part of the fun is watching the crowd flee when a giant kite takes a nose dive!" They were in no real danger, but it would probably hurt a little bit and I knew at least I didn't want to be the one to ruin a kite by sticking my head through it.  

It was like nothing that I had ever seen and I am so glad that I went! Just remember when looking at the pictures that they are made out of 100% tissue paper!

Kites for sale

Boy flying a kite on top of a tomb

Colorful graveyard

Huge crowd in front of all of the giant kites

This was in the smallest category of kites! These actually got flown

Proud Sumpango

Sumpango 2013!

Kaqchikel (Mayan subgroup) descendents

The backs of the kites - long bamboo poles.

The back of a kite and a kite face down on the ground waiting to be hoisted up

Pulling the kite up

Tzupam - Sumpango in Kaqchikel the Mayan dialect of this region

A close up. I can't believe that this is all tissue paper!

Kites flying in front of a volcano (I think they look like dementors)

When the last animal dies, when the last plant dries, man might understand that you can not eat money

One of the tallest

Walking the kite over

One of the 8-ft kites flying

By the end of the day the wind had gotten the better of a couple of the kites