There's No Place Like Foam

Report from the world's craziest Carnival!

I had a nightmare where I was shoved onto a stage unprepared and told to give a speech. The was a large audience and none of them spoke English. Then I looked down and saw I was wearing a giant red bib with a cartoon guinea pig on it.

Only this wasn’t a nightmare. It really happened.

Welcome to Pasto, Colombia

My Nightmare: Mario shoved me onstage without warning to give a speech.

A month before, in New York, I’d met Mario Chamorro, The World’s Most Persuasive Man. He bought me a cup of coffee, and before I’d even finished it, he’d convinced me to spend a week in a town I’d never heard of.

Pasto is a pretty, little, batty city, tucked deep in the Andes. It has an arts community to equal Taos and restaurants to rival Santa Fe. And yet, for some mysterious reason, Colombians consider Pasto a ‘hick’ town. That’s like calling Los Angeles ‘walkable’. Or New York ‘clean’.

Pastusos, as the locals are called, are the national butts of jokes:

Q: Why did the Pastuso put an empty bottle in the fridge?

A: In case he had a guest who didn’t want a drink.

Pasto even hosts a comedy festival where locals make fun of their own city. I’d love to attend this, but I don’t speak a word of Spanish. Nada.

Because it’s a small town, Pasto’s parade features one-man walking floats.

I’d come to Pasto for Carnival. I’d been to Rio’s Carnival, where I got robbed twice and dysentery once (you’ll read that sad story in next month’s Substack). Still, tiny Pasto’s celebration beats New Orleans’ Mardi Gras, parade for parade, puke for puke. And Pasto has one bit of pre-Lenten lunacy that no other city has.

Foam.

For one week a year, from New Year’s Eve to January 6, everyone in the city squirts everyone else with foam. This wasn’t some cute party favor: people carry industrial strength aerosol cans the size of mortar shells. They spew endless gobbets of soap suds, fast, far, and hard. “Carnaval” is Spanish for “Fun with Fire Extinguishers”.

People shoot friends, friends shoot strangers, and armed kids shoot everyone.

Of course, we do the same thing in America, but we use guns.

Foam!

My host Mario explained, “People can spray anyone: police, homeless, even the Mayor!” But mostly, they sprayed me. One night a car approached, the driver doused me with foam, then sped off shouting, “Welcome!”

A drive-by foaming.

The next day, Denise and I were in a taxi with the windows open. Big mistake. When we stopped at a light, teens with spray cans converged on both sides and let fly. We were trapped. It was the last scene of “Bonnie and Clyde”. We were Sonny Corleone at the tollbooth.

There’s one scant defense from all this. On every street corner in Pasto you can buy ski goggles – the soap foam stings your eyes – and polyester aprons to protect your clothes. They come in a wide range of designs, from garish to… well, they’re all garish: a Day-Glo bear, a rainbow-colored lion, a psychedelic gorilla. I unwisely chose a cartoon guinea pig in a cowboy hat. I didn’t realize this would be my costume for the week. This was what I wore in every photo that made the papers.

(As I’ve mentioned in a previous Substack, people in the Andes find guinea pigs both adorable AND delicious – it’s both a regional mascot and the national dish. For us it’d be like eating bald eagle for Thanksgiving.)

Guinea pig: beloved mascot that’s fun to eat.

I’m not sure how aerosol assault made its way into a religious holiday -- there are few spray cans mentioned in the Gospels. Wikipedia also ducks the question – they wrote 10,000 words about “Carnival Pasto” and foam isn’t one of them.

Maybe this custom is the product of oxygen deprivation – Pasto is 8000 feet above sea level. They’re half a mile higher than Denver, and those people are nuts.

Secret to a happy marriage.

We loved every crazy minute in Pasto and plan to return for the Pastuso Comedy Festival. But I really need to learn some Spanish. During Carnival, a reporter accosted me with rapid-fire questions.

“No habla Espanol,” I replied.

An hour later, the same reporter barraged me with more questions.

“NO HABLA ESPANOL!” I shouted.

“Still?” he asked.

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