I was speechless, so I will now try to formulate words to describe the experience. Right off the bat, I knew waking up at 7am and returning home at 5:30am the next day without sleep would suck, so I jumped out of bed with a good attitude and hoped for the best.
We arrived in Valencia around 11:30am and right away you could see the craziness that occurs when a city of that size triples its population for a day. The streets looked like Times Square on New Year’s Eve. It all went down at Plaza Ayuntamiento, and you could walk towards it up until a certain point, where people could no longer walk and just stood. We waited for an hour and a half in a massive crowd, waiting to see what these “mascletas” (the daytime explosions) were all about. Boy, did we find out. We were close enough to see the actual explosions and my ears would thank me later for not getting any closer. Right at 2pm the explosions started, with
pretty cool, normal-looking fireworks that shot into the sky. Ho hum. Who shoots off fireworks during the day? After about three minutes the noise got louder, and it seemed as if they doubled the amount of explosives going off at once. “Wow, cool!” I could feel the vibrations reverberating off the building behind me. Another minute, and shit hit the fan. It was seriously as if the city was under attack. I gave never heard anything like this before, and can’t imagine I ever will again. It actually felt like someone turned on a huge fan behind me because the noise coming off the building literally blew my clothes forward. I don’t know how else to describe it: it was the loudest 
noise I’ve ever heard. My body didn’t know what to do, and I seriously thought my eardrums might explode. I opened my mouth so they didn’t. I covered my face from the falling particles of explosions falling from the air and hunkered down as a natural reaction. For a good half-minute, no thoughts, no words, no sounds were present except for the deafening explosion. (you HAVE to check out the link...it's only 3 minutes, watch it all.) You could see the sky fill with smoke, and it explosively billowed toward us, toward any outlet it could find, in an eerily-similar manner to the cloud of dust from the Twin Towers on September 11. The noise stops, 
and everyone is in shock. Visibility is maybe five feet. I wondered if I would pass out from inhaling the fumes. You could see yourself exhale, and it looked exactly like what you were inhaling. My risk of lung cancer just quadrupled. After everyone catches their breath, the crowd just goes crazy. And for good reason; it was unbelievable.After that, I knew I had gotten my money’s worth. I could have left right then and been content, but I’m glad that wasn’t an option. OK, only 13 more hours til the bus leaves. What to do? We ended up walking around, consuming anything that fell into our path: ice cream, alcohol, churros,
alcohol, coffee, kebaps, and some beer on the side. Actually, I abstained from drinking for another 10 hours because I knew that 13 hours of drinking would not end pretty for me. Everywhere was packed and moving was a chore. We ended up finding a huge park where a river had dried up, and a couple of us walked through it to the “Ciudad de Artes y Ciencas.” Here we saw what happens when you give a modern architect (Santiago Calatrava, who is designing the new transportation terminal of the World Trade Center in New York) free reign over an area of an old city. It was like we had time-traveled four centuries into the future. I had learned about 
Calatrava in my Spanish class last semester and wanted to see his work. As you can see in the pictures, it is awesome. Definitely worth the 40 minute walk.Oh yeah, so I guess a big part of Las Fallas are the actual “fallas.” We saw those too, and the detail and enormity of them were stunning. I have no idea how you construct one of those things. They cost hundreds of thousands of euros to build, then they’re displayed for a few weeks, then they’re burned down on the last night. This was the last night.
There were fences around them, of course, because fires tend to be hot when you douse huge
wooden structures with lighter fluid. With a string of fireworks acting as a fuse, the whole thing exploded into flames within seconds, like a fire from a power plant explosion or plane crash. Immediately I thought my face would melt off, and I was 20 feet back. The firemen (ironic, right?) quickly pushed back the retaining fences away from the fire, which caused a slight stampede. After 10 minutes of admiring it, the fireman got their hoses and put it out. How weird.The biggest most baddest Falla was in the city center, where the explosions had occurred hours ago. They saved this one for last, at 1am, and people packed in every sliver of space to see. We were probably a half mile away, and I felt some heat on my face. It was like the ignited an oil tanker. I’ve never seen a fire like that in person. Incredible. Then it was followed by an explosive finale that probably included more fireworks in a five-minute span than any fireworks show in its entirety on the Fourth of July. I’m telling you, these
people know their fuegos artificiales!OK, so it sucked waiting around for almost two hours for the buses AFTER the finale, but the poor organization can be overlooked for such an incredible experience. Wow, I got all excited just re-telling the story. Now after a short night’s (day’s?) sleep, I’m off to Madrid to pick up Kels! What an action packed weekend!
Well, I’m definitely glad I didn’t miss this, one of the biggest festivals in all of Spain. Please forgive my giggling at the “fireworks” this July.
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