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The Languedoc Region
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Wine in Languedoc
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French Politics
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Events in Perpignan
Living in Perpignan - Events
Ida y Vuelta
From June to September, Perpignan puts on its cultural clothes to offer to its citizens and tourists music, theatre, literature festivals.
One of the most famous, created in 1997, takes place close to the town centre of the city, in June and is called “Yda y Vuelta” meaning in Catalan “come and come-back”. During 3 days, more than 30 000 people will come to enjoy concerts of all style of music, streets exhibitions and various activities for the young and the older. This festival is the chance for local artists to meet the most famous ones such as Neneh Cherry, Toure Kounda or Sergent Garcia as well as performing in front of a large audience, what they have worked for all the year long with the Casa Musicale, which organizes this festival.
Thursdays of Perpignan – Les Jeudis de Perpignans
Since 10 years, in July and August, there’s a day of the week when the city becomes a big party.
Every Thursday evening, from one street to another, you can hear local bands playing Rock music, Flamenco, Salsa, Jazz, Blues, you can see jugglers, clowns, acrobats, parades and plays.
The Catalan City is during these days, no more than a true southern town, festal, welcoming and lively only for your pleasure.
Early wines festivity – Fête des Vins Primeurs
First, a worthy question of Trivial Pursuit : “Where in France are the first wines to come out just after the harvests ?” Answer : “In the Pyrenees Orientales”.
This event of international range takes place every year on the 3rd Thursday of October and for this rendezvous of the beginning of the autumn season, the early wines arrive in spectacular fashion for a Special Night.
From 6.00 pm, the music notes lead you to the cellars’, restaurants’ and cafés’ doors, winemakers are waiting for you to make you taste red, pink and white wines in a welcoming ambiance everywhere in the streets. Light, fruity, aromatic, these wines will be the favourite partners of Catalan cooked meats, grilling, cheeses. While savouring, you will enjoy winemakers talking about their trade and products.
Music and bands are still a big part of the celebration for you to dance all night long, advice : be on leave the day after !
September, International Photojournalism Festival - VISA pour l’Image
The first goal of the festival is to re-establish the former function of press photography. While technological developments have brought digital technology to the fore, replacing conventional silver-based photography, with news travelling ever more freely via sophisticated equipment and available to the general public, there will always be a great need for work done by qualified people.
Each year, new, ever more enthusiastic, photographers come on the scene.
In Perpignan, thousands of professional photojournalists are offered an opportunity to chat with their peers, talk about their work or their profession (during the symposium), and talk sales with photo agencies.
Free event, Visa pour l'Image attracts thousand of visitors every year. Whether they come from France, Europe or other continents, each visitor or viewer apprehends and analyzes these testimonies according to his/her own perceptions.
Also, the participation of schools confirm that the festival Visa pour l'Image has become an educational tool.
Evening screening and exhibitions are presented in historical and cultural spots of Perpignan, which also enables visitors to discover the city. The evenings are also an opportunity for all concerned, including many professionals, to discover pictures they may not have seen, either because they had never been published or because there was no chance to see them.
Exhibitions are based on different deeply involved themes to make people think about burning questions. Visa pour l’Image is now 19 years old. And these nineteen years have been devoted to promoting a certain type of photography analysing events around the world and going beyond the coverage
presented by the traditional media.
Visa pour l’Image is an event supported by 4000 professionals working in
photography and who come from many countries. 2007 will also be a milestone
year, registering the three million visitors, and this gives an idea of the scope of
the festival and the way it has grown.
Visa pour l’Image is not a festival of glitter, and it must continue to expose all the
dramatic events which, unfortunately, still prevail and spread, while people so
often turn their backs on a spirit of kindness or tolerance to fellow humans,
doing so for any number of reasons (e.g. ethnic, religious, economic or political
reasons, or simply for personal ambition).
Besides the exhibitions, you can also take part in other free events during the festival : meetings, conferences, symposiums which take place in the Palais des Congrès.
Christmas’ Markets – Les Marchés de Noël
Christmas is probably the favourite period of the year and in Perpignan and all the villages around, as well as anywhere else. It is time for cities to wear their sparkling clothes, lights in the trees and around lampposts, shops are showing their decorated windows.
This is also time for Christmas’ Markets to locate in the squares, for craftsmen to set up their stalls, and for visitors to dig out THE gift to put under the Christmas’ Tree !
You would have never seen so many Santa Claus climbing across balconies and chimneys, you are in another world during 1 month, enjoy and don’t forget on the 24th of December to come to St Dominique Church to look up to the Living Crib to bring you back to the year Zero in a fantastic show of 150 singers, dancers, choristers and musicians.
