There was quite the atmosphere yesterday in Santa Gertrudis, which has just opened its patron saint celebrations this weekend. Yesterday the festa pagesa of the Grup de Balls Tradicionals de Santa Gertrudis was celebrated. The mass of attendees was very good with more than one hundred tickets sold before noon to taste the star dish of the day, the frita de matances. The president of the organizing colla, Maria Roig, is also optimistic: “I think we will have enough people because the weather is good and Santa Gertrudis always hooks people. Hopefully there will be enough with the amount of frit de porc that we have prepared, which will provide about 300 servings”.
Preparations of the ‘frita de porc’. Vicent Marí
Roig explains that the festa pagesa, a celebration which for a long time had been held at the Pou d’en Gatzara, had not been celebrated since 2019 due to the pandemic. “That year, as now, the celebration was held in Santa Gertrudis, coinciding with the patron saint festivities,” she points out after explaining that with this event they raise funds for the group’s annual activities, including its folk festival, “which turned twenty years old this year.”
Very close to the president of the Grup de Balls Tradicionals de Santa Gertrudis is Neus Torres, from Can Rei, and other colleagues who make bunyols. The recipe they follow, she says, was given to her by her maternal grandmother: “They have flour, water, apple, potato, orange juice, anise, lemon peel and brewer’s yeast,” she says while a very interested customer takes note on her cell phone of all the ingredients to make this sweet at home. Her name is Pamela Spaciuk and she is Argentinian “with a Ukrainian surname and an Ibizan partner”. It is the first time she has attended this celebration. “It is so nice that they hold parties like this so that the traditions are not lost,” she says before buying a ration of bunyols, which they serve her strung on a rosemary branch as an alternative to the plastic containers.
The bunyols strung on rosemary branches. Vicent Mari
In front of the big tent, the little ones are entertained with traditional games prepared by the Santa Gertrudis group. They have started with the sack races.
Celebrations between bowling and bonfires
Upstairs, on the grassy area behind the church, there is a group of people playing bowling. Among them, some youngsters, like 11 year old Paula who is playing for the first time in her life. She is from Mallorca and is on Ibiza with her family “for the weekend”. The highest scoring player so far is Jordi Riera, “six points in two rounds”. He and his partner, Marina, are crossing their fingers so that nobody beats him in the rest of the day and they can win the first prize, a night in an agritourism establishment.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.