Yellow Underwear and Burning Dolls = New Year’s

What marks the New Year here in Iquitos, Peru? Well wearing yellow underwear and burning life size dolls in the street of course. What, you guys didn’t do that on New Year’s? Okay well, neither did I. But a lot of the locals here did. The unofficial color here for New Year’s is Yellow. Everywhere I went I could see yellow balloons, streamers and ribbons hanging in the doorways, in the streets, and even on mototaxis. See if you can find the yellowness below…
















In the weeks leading up to New Year’s I began to see the marketplaces filling up with yellow underwear. Everywhere I looked, underwear, yellow, hanging, folded, boxed, everywhere. Apparently it is a tradition to wear a pair for good luck and prosperity on New Year’s.






I didn’t actually see this happen but apparently people use old clothes and stuff them with paper and then burn them on New Year’s. The reasoning behind this is to burn away the old year and start with a new beginning. Sounds good to me. I was only able to capture a few of the dolls on a drive through town, too bad I didn’t get to see one burning!