Fiestas de la Calle San Sebastián, Not The Largest, Just The Best!

Comparsa at Fiestas de la Calle San Sebastián. Original cabezudos.

Com­parsa at Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián. Orig­i­nal cabezudos. 
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The 2025 edi­tion of the world famous “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”, known to many as SanSe 2025, will take place on Jan­u­ary 16–19 in Old San Juan, Puer­to Rico.

I must admit that I sim­ply hate that “SanSe 2025” moniker! The actu­al name of the event is “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”, but mar­keters have man­aged to shoe­horn the “SanSe” thing into the Island’s col­lec­tive psy­che and it seems to have sticked. Per­son­al­ly, I feel like it dimin­ish­es the pres­tige of an event that’s decades old. But that’s just me. You can call it what­ev­er you want.

And while we’re on the issue of longevi­ty, some argue that the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” only cel­e­brate their 55th anniver­sary, but in my opin­ion that’s also wrong. It’s actu­al­ly their 70th anniver­sary. You’ll see why in a few paragraphs.

So, why is the “SanSe” term in my title? Sim­ple, because it’s click bait. Yup, I’m guilty! But that’s what the young crowd is going to be search­ing for. So it needs to be in the title and front loaded into my first para­graph; even if I hate it.

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This year my wife Zory and I are going to attend the four-day fes­ti­val for the first time after the Covid-19 pan­dem­ic. So I got the lat­est boost­er for the Pfiz­er vac­cine just to be on the safe side. After all, what could go wrong at an event that gath­ers over ¼ of a mil­lion peo­ple over a loooooong weekend?

This morn­ing I was invit­ed to par­tic­i­pate in a local TV pro­gram called “Alian­za Al Día” where I spoke about “Las Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián 2025” from the point of view of a long-time par­tic­i­pant and observer.

There was a time when Zory and I would attend the fies­tas every year to make pic­tures and videos for our sites Puer­to Rico Pho­tog­ra­phy and Puer­to Rico By GPS. This year our objec­tive is to update those col­lec­tions, spend some qual­i­ty time and get some well deserved R&R.

Many locals refer to the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” as the largest cel­e­brat­ed dur­ing the month of Jan­u­ary. Well, they are wrong. The oth­er day I even saw a TV ad refer­ring to the “fies­tas” as the “largest in the world”. Who­ev­er pro­duced that one was sim­ply ill informed. The “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” are only the largest in Puer­to Rico, ‘but they are the best in the world’.

As you might imag­ine, I’m biased.

To set this issue to rest once and for all —and for the ben­e­fit of my fel­low Puer­to Ricans— the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” gath­er around ¼ of a mil­lion peo­ple over a 4 day peri­od. Last year the “Sin­u­log de Cebú” — a reli­gious event cel­e­brat­ed in the Philip­pine Islands on the third Sun­day of Jan­u­ary— brought togeth­er over 2 mil­lion people.

And that’s just dur­ing Jan­u­ary. At a world­wide lev­el you have fes­tiv­i­ties like the Río Car­ni­val in Brazil (49 mil­lion peo­ple), Octo­ber­fest in Ger­many (6.7 mil­lion), Diwali in India (1 bil­lion), Mar­di Gras in New Orleans (1.4 mil­lion) and San Fer­mín in Pam­plona, Spain with 1 mil­lion, just to name a few. All in all, there are over 20 street fes­ti­vals around the world that are larg­er than the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”.

So which is my favorite? The “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”, of course. And why am I telling you all this? Because I believe in accu­ra­cy. Hell, my main busi­ness oper­a­tion is called Accu­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions. We sim­ply can’t go around spread­ing infor­ma­tion that isn’t true! I know that in Puer­to Rico there’s a pop­u­lar say­ing: “pueblo pequeño, cam­pana grande” (“small town, big bell”), but some things are just misinformation.

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Now that the mat­ter of “size” is out of the way, let’s talk about the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”. This year’s edi­tion starts on Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 16 and extends to Sun­day, Jan­u­ary 19. On this occa­sion the hon­orees will be José Vega San­tana (Paya­so Remi), a local singer and clown that ded­i­cat­ed his life to work­ing with chil­dren after win­ning the OTI Inter­na­tion­al Song Fes­ti­val; Jas­mine Cama­cho-Quinn, a track and field olympic gold medal­ist and boricua rap­per Vico C.

A younger version of me having fun with the cabezudos | San Sebastia Street Fiestas

A younger ver­sion of me hav­ing fun with the cabezudos
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The “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” where start­ed back in 1954 by father Juan Manuel Madra­zo as a fundrais­er for San Jose Church in Old San Juan. Back then the event was a lot sim­pler with a pro­ces­sion walk­ing up San Sebastián Street. The cabezu­dos, which pret­ty much have become the inter­na­tion­al sym­bol of the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” didn’t exist either. Instead the pro­ces­sion car­ried poles with the images of Fer­di­nand II of Aragon and Isabel­la of Castile, king and queen of Spain dur­ing the arrival of the Spaniards in Puer­to Rico back in 1493.

Father Madra­zo cel­e­brat­ed the fies­tas until he was trans­ferred to anoth­er church. After that the fies­tas pret­ty much died until 1970 when Ricar­do Ale­gría, who direct­ed the Puer­to Rican Insti­tute of Cul­ture at the time, asked Mrs. Rafaela Bal­ladares de Brito to reboot the fiestas.

Some people have attended so consistently throughout the years that they have become staples of the event. | San Sebastian street Fiestas, Not the largest. Just The best.

Some peo­ple have attend­ed so con­sis­tent­ly through­out the years that they have become sta­ples of the event.
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Doña Rafaela”, as the “san­juaneros” used to call her, brought back the event with the help of local artists from the “División de la Comu­nidad”. Only this time the fies­tas became a fundrais­er for the “Cole­gio de Párvu­los”, an ele­men­tary school near the east­ern end of San Sebas­t­ian Street that was man­aged by the Catholic Church and served low income chil­dren from San Juan Islet.

The “División de la Comu­nidad” was an insti­tu­tion cre­at­ed in Puer­to Rico in 1949, dur­ing the gov­ern­ment of Luis Muñoz Marín. Its objec­tive was to reed­u­cate the rur­al and urban pop­u­la­tions of the island, and inte­grate them into the Island’s eco­nom­ic plan. It also served as a breed­ing ground for many of Puer­to Rico’s most pro­lif­ic artists and painters.

Many of those painters became the ear­ly ven­dors at the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”. They would sim­ply lean their easels along the walls of the dif­fer­ent build­ings and sell their cre­ations right there on the street. Today many of those artists are ranked among the best on the Island and their work is on dis­play at pres­ti­gious muse­ums both local­ly and abroad.

So what about the cabezu­dos? How did they come to be? Well, they were the brain­child of doña Rafaela.

El General, the first cabezudo.

El Gen­er­al, the first cabezudo. 
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The cabezu­dos were inspired on fig­ures from the Island’s folk­lore; not con­tro­ver­sial fig­ures or politi­cians. The first was “El Gen­er­al” a local char­ac­ter that decid­ed one day that he would direct traf­fic at the cor­ner of San Jus­to and Com­er­cio streets in Old San Juan. So, he put on a uni­form, hung a bunch of medals on his chest and got to work. No one paid him. he wasn’t a munic­i­pal employ­ee either. He was just a fig­ure of Old San Juan folk­lore that stood at the same cor­ner for years.

Oth­er fig­ures that where bestowed the hon­or of becom­ing cabezu­dos were “Don Choli­to”, a local come­di­an and TV per­son­al­i­ty; “El Coquí”, the small frog that sings in every cor­ner of the Island every night; “Juan Bobo” and “La Puer­ca”, folk­loric char­ac­ters; “Max­im­i­na la Loca”, a lady (from the town of Loíza) who love to dance and wore dozens of a small bowties in her hair; “Toribio”, the best “guiro” play­er in Puer­to Rican his­to­ry; “La Jíbara”, rep­re­sent­ing the peas­ant Puer­to Rican woman; “Dip­lo”, con­sid­ered by many the best come­di­an in Puer­to Rican his­to­ry; “Maso Rivera”, Puer­to Rico’s best “cua­tro” play­er at the time and Alfon­si­na Vil­la­m­onte Vera “La Bil­letera”, a local lady who used to sell lot­tery tick­ets on a cor­ner in Old San Juan.

I shot this image on January 20, 2006 without realizing that I was capturing all the original “cabezudos” except one. From left to right: Don Cholito, El Coquí, La Puerca, Juan Bobo, Maximina La Loca, Toribio, la Jíbara, Diplo, El General and Maso Rivera. Alfonsa Villamonte Vera “La Billetera” died in 2008 and her cabezudo was made later.

I shot this image on Jan­u­ary 20, 2006 with­out real­iz­ing that I was cap­tur­ing all the orig­i­nal “cabezu­dos” except one. From left to right: Don Choli­to, El Coquí, La Puer­ca, Juan Bobo, Max­im­i­na La Loca, Toribio, la Jíbara, Dip­lo, El Gen­er­al and Maso Rivera. Alfon­sa Vil­la­m­onte Vera “La Bil­letera” died in 2008 and her cabezu­do was made lat­er. (click on image to see it larger)

Doña Rafaela was adamant that in order to be bestowed with the hon­or of becom­ing a cabezu­do you had to be a promi­nent fig­ure of the Island’s folk­lore. No con­tro­ver­sial or polit­i­cal fig­ures were considered.

In fact, after 28 years of pub­lic ser­vice as may­oress of San Juan some­one pro­posed mak­ing a cabezu­do for “doña Fela” (Felisa Rincón de Gau­ti­er) and she (doña Fela) refused emphatically.

One lit­tle known fact about the cabezu­dos is that the per­sons inside are actu­al­ly chil­dren. I’m not quite sure why that is. Maybe it has to do with the fact that the sec­ond iter­a­tion of “las fies­tas” got its start as a fundrais­er for the “Cole­gio de Párvu­los”. Who knows.

Ribbon cutting, San Sebastian Street Fiestas

Rib­bon cut­ting, San Sebas­t­ian Street Fiestas
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Every year the cel­e­bra­tions start with a rib­bon cut­ting at the cor­ner of San Sebas­t­ian and Bar­bosa streets. Many per­son­al­i­ties gath­er for the event, includ­ing the cur­rent may­or, a priest, oth­er gov­ern­ment fig­ures and the media.

After the rib­bon cut­ting a “com­parsa” dances down San Sebas­t­ian Street until they reach the cor­ner of San Sebastián and Cristo streets, in front of San José Church. Sev­er­al hun­dred patrons kick off the “com­parsa” at one end of the street and sev­er­al thou­sand arrive at the oth­er. And, in case you’re won­der­ing, a “com­parsa” is a group of peo­ple with musi­cal instru­ments that sing and dance their way through­out the entire street.

Comparsa, San Sebastian Street Fiestas, Old San Juan, Puerto Rico

Com­parsa, San Sebas­t­ian Street Fiestas
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Com­parsas” hap­pen sev­er­al times through­out the four-day week­end and late­ly they have spread to oth­er parts of the city as well. This has been part of an effort, by the munic­i­pal gov­ern­ment, to “spread out” the fies­tas instead of hav­ing every­thing hap­pen at San Sebas­t­ian Street.

I have mixed feel­ings about that. After all the event is called “Las Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” (the San Sebas­t­ian Street Fies­tas). So it stands to rea­son that they would hap­pen sole­ly on San Sebas­t­ian street. But believe me, I par­tic­i­pat­ed in sev­er­al of those orig­i­nal fies­tas and I felt like “a canned sar­dine”. I could hard­ly move. In fact, on one occa­sion it took my wife and I over an hour to get from one cor­ner of San Sebas­t­ian Street to the next.

And giv­en the fact that we’re liv­ing in a post Covid-19 pan­dem­ic era, I’m not sure that I’d like to be so close to oth­er people.

Spread­ing the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” to all parts of the city has had oth­er effects. For one, it has made the event larg­er. Gone are the days when it was all about artis­tas (main­ly painters) sell­ing their work off the walls of San Sebas­t­ian street. Now there are hun­dreds of arti­sans every­where. Espe­cial­ly at the Bal­la­já mil­i­tary bar­racks, where the entire cen­ter court becomes one giant mar­ket with hun­dreds of vendors.

Three wise men wood carvings | San Sebastian Street Fiestas

Three wise men wood carvings
(click on image to see it larger)

You can find almost any­thing at the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”, includ­ing art, leather­work, ceram­ics, glass, wood­work, books, paint­ings… you name it! If it has to do with Puer­to Rican art, you’ll prob­a­bly find it at the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”.

And then there’s the food. There are hun­dreds of street ven­dors offer­ing every imag­in­able Puer­to Rican dish, drinks and can­dy. San Juan restau­rants also work extra hours dur­ing the fies­tas. But be advised, they’re usu­al­ly packed to the rafters dur­ing this peri­od. So don’t expect fast ser­vice or to linger at your table way past your dessert.

Get­ting in and out of the city can also be tricky. First, for­get about dri­ving in. It’s not going to hap­pen. Old San Juan is basi­cal­ly closed to non-res­i­dents dur­ing the entire four-day peri­od. The only way in or out is by taxi, Uber or bus, and frankly all three can be a lit­tle chaot­ic at times.

Rag Dolls | San Sebastian Street Fiestas

Rag Dolls
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So what do my wife and I do? We park our car at a pri­vate park­ing lot way out in the San­turce or Con­da­do areas and take a bus into Old San Juan. Then, on our way back, we catch what­ev­er is avail­able to get back to our car.

Old­er peo­ple tend to arrive and leave ear­li­er, which makes the whole “trans­porta­tion” thing eas­i­er. But if you’re one of those that stay until the last band plays its last num­ber, be pre­pared for large crowds all try­ing to catch a bus at the same time. It’s crazy.

And what about safe­ty? Well, I’m not going to tell you that every­thing goes on with­out a snarl. Things have hap­pened in the past. But, like most major events —both in Puer­to Rico and in the Unit­ed States— there’s an increased police pres­ence. And yes, there’s secu­ri­ty that you will see and secu­ri­ty that you won’t see. All in all, there has nev­er been any major inci­dent at the “Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”, and that’s a good thing.

 

So there you have it. The 2025 edi­tion of “Las Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián” is about to hap­pen, between the 16th and 19th of Jan­u­ary and they’re going to be fun! And here’s a final piece of advise. Leave those brand new shoes at home. Instead, put on those old worn-out sneak­ers that fit you like a glove. Why? Because you’re going to be walk­ing a lot and the last thing you want to do is break in a new pair of shoes. You’ll be crip­pled the next morning!

Have fun and see you at “Las Fies­tas de la Calle San Sebastián”!

Orlando Mergal | Puerto Rico By GPS

©2025,Orlando Mer­gal, MA
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Bilin­gual Con­tent Cre­ator, Blog­ger, Podcaster,
Author, Pho­tog­ra­ph­er and New Media Expert
Tel. 787–750-0000, Mobile 787–306-1590

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