Episode 104: Costumbres - Monigotes in Ecuador

In Quito, entrepreneur Paúl Mendez updates his community’s New Year’s custom — burning effigies, or monigotes — to make it healthier for the environment.

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Transcript

Martina: It’s New Year’s Eve in Quito, Ecuador, one of the biggest holidays in this Andean country. Paúl Mendez is 32 years old and ready to celebrate the end of 2020. All across the city, people have taken to the streets with life-size figures that look like puppets. They’re called “monigotes.” People add a mask to the effigy and then light it on fire, or lo queman! Soon, the sky is filled with black smoke as thousands of monigotes burn.

Paúl: En Ecuador, tenemos una costumbre: el 31 de diciembre se quema un monigote. Es una representación de los malos momentos que vivimos durante el año y que queremos olvidar. También representa las cosas que queremos atraer para el próximo año.

Martina: The ritual symbolizes getting rid of the old and bringing in the new by literally burning the old year away.

Paúl: Y, alrededor de esta tradición, hay muchas fiestas y celebraciones.

Martina: But as people burn their monigotes, Paúl celebrates this custom in his own way. His figure is much smaller, the size of a doll. And it’s made of different materials, so that when it burns, it doesn’t release toxic chemicals into the air. He says this version of the tradition is healthier for the environment, or medio ambiente, and still keeps the spirit of this custom alive.

Paúl: Mi idea era hacer un monigote más pequeño para contaminar menos, pero, al mismo tiempo, mantener la tradición. Yo quiero que en el futuro la gente siga quemando sus monigotes, pero respetando el medio ambiente.

Martina: Bienvenidos and welcome to a special season of the Duolingo Spanish Podcast. I’m Martina Castro. This season, we’re exploring customs, or costumbres, from the Spanish-speaking world, to help you improve your Spanish listening, and to learn more about daily life in other cultures.

The storyteller will be using intermediate Spanish and I’ll be chiming in for context in English. If you miss something, you can always skip back and listen again. We also offer full transcripts at podcast.duolingo.com.

In today’s episode, we’re headed to Ecuador to learn more about a new take on a popular New Year’s Eve custom.

Martina: As a kid, Paúl enjoyed every New Year’s Eve. His parents would gather him, his two brothers, and his sister to make a large doll that represented the Old Year. Then, just before midnight, they would place the family’s homemade New Year’s Eve effigy, or monigote, on an altar of eucalyptus leaves.

Paúl: El eucalipto es una manera de quemar las malas energías. Es muy tradicional y parte importante de la cultura en la Sierra del Ecuador. Normalmente, mi familia compraba o hacía el monigote del Año Viejo. Luego, lo vestíamos, escribíamos una lista de deseos y finalmente lo quemábamos a las doce de la noche.

Martina: Right before they burned their monigote, each family member would say what they wanted to leave behind and burn away…then they would share their desires for the New Year.

Paúl: Nuestra familia se reunía y cada miembro expresaba sus deseos. Por ejemplo: “¿Qué quiero este año? ¿A dónde quiero irme de viaje? Este año quiero abrir un negocio. Este año quiero una pareja nueva”. Con todos esos deseos compartes las buenas energías que hay en tu familia.

Martina: As a kid, Paúl’s wishes for the New Year were…fairly simple.

Paúl: De niño, mi deseo para el Año Nuevo siempre era tener muchos perros. ¡Y ahora, es una realidad!

Martina: Families like Paúl’s in Ecuador have been celebrating the New Year with monigotes for a long time. The custom dates back more than a century, when the city of Guayaquil suffered an outbreak of yellow fever and people burned the clothes of the sick. The costumbre also includes ancient indigenous elements, like jumping over the burning effigy as an act of spiritual cleansing.

Paúl: Una tradición es saltar sobre el monigote mientras el fuego se apaga para atraer las cosas buenas. Estas costumbres son parte de las fiestas y celebraciones que se hacen en Ecuador para recibir al Año Nuevo.

Martina: Now the custom is celebrated throughout Ecuador. It often varies, region by region.

Paúl: En Quito, el monigote se hace de manera diferente, pero siguiendo la misma tradición. En Guayaquil, se hacen con otros materiales y son muy coloridos. Muchas personas lo queman al lado de una piscina o en la playa porque en Ecuador mucha gente viaja a la playa para fin de año.

Martina: As he got older, Paúl saw the monigotes evolve to include more pop culture figures for fun, like Mickey Mouse and Spiderman. There were also monigotes representing politicians, especially the unpopular ones. Many people would buy their effigies at a store, though Paúl’s family often made them at home, stuffing worn out clothes with sawdust, or aserrín.

Paúl: Se usa ropa vieja y se rellena de aserrín. Luego, se pone una máscara, que puede ser de un político o de un personaje famoso. Y, finalmente, se quema.

Martina: But Paúl also saw the custom change in other ways, ways that worried him. Artisans, who often worked all year to construct the figures, built monigotes that kept getting bigger…and bigger! As tall as several stories high! And the bigger the monigote, the more toxic fumes it burned off. About 10 years ago, in 2012, Paúl looked at the smoke-filled sky and wondered what was happening with the supersized monigotes.

Paúl: Con el tiempo, los monigotes se han hecho más y más grandes. En Guayaquil, a veces puedes ver un gorila gigante en la calle, como en las películas. ¡Es algo increíble! Los monigotes son tan grandes que los queman con la ayuda de la ciudad y de los bomberos.

Martina: In case of an accident, firefighters, or bomberos, had to be on hand. Paúl realized that burning thousands of monigotes throughout Ecuador wasn’t the best thing for the environment, something he really cared about. Experts and engineers warned in news reports that the smoke from sawdust and other commercial materials in monigotes created dangerous pollution. One study found that in Guayaquil alone the burning accounted for a quarter of pollution for the whole year.

Paúl: Es parte de la cultura y yo lo entiendo, pero quemar a tantos monigotes contamina mucho el medio ambiente.

Martina: It also wasn’t healthy for people to breathe the toxic fumes. Doctors had been warning about it even more in recent years. As an entrepreneur, Paúl wondered how his community could make the custom of monigotes more sustainable, or sustentable. He wanted to celebrate while also protecting the environment and people’s health.

Paúl: Entonces pensé: “¿Podemos seguir la tradición, pero de manera más sustentable y usando materiales reciclados?”.

Martina: As he saw monigotes get bigger and bigger with more toxic fumes, Paúl wondered how to solve this problem. He wanted to safeguard the environment…and update the custom of the monigotes, to limit air pollution.

Paúl: Los monigotes estaban dañando al medio ambiente. Los materiales que se queman generan gases tóxicos que contaminan el aire. Estos materiales pueden ser aserrín, periódico o telas.

Martina: But there was something else. Paúl didn’t want the custom to be just about the biggest or most fantastic monigote. He also wanted to preserve the tradition’s family roots, keeping it personal and intimate. That was the part that he treasured most growing up.

Paúl: Era algo que toda la familia compartía. Todos nos reuníamos en la casa para hacer nuestro monigote, solo uno para toda la familia.

Martina: That’s how Paúl came up with the idea of a more sustainable, miniature effigy. He called it a minigote, instead of a monigote. They followed the spirit of the custom. But these figures were only a few inches long and burned cleanly, emitting less toxic fumes. Paúl believed in the idea so much that in 2012, he launched a company to create these minigotes.

Paúl: El minigote se hace con materiales reciclados y se quema más rápido. La ventaja es que tiene un impacto mucho menor en el medio ambiente.

Martina: Paúl stuffed these new figures with sugar cane residue and used other recycled materials. When they burned, the smoke, or el humo, would have a smaller carbon footprint than monigotes made from sawdust and commercial materials.

Paúl: Un monigote tradicional genera humo negro porque se quema con gasolina u otros combustibles similares. Pero con un minigote, el ritual se puede hacer con diferentes fragancias.

Martina: They used aromatic fragrances like sandalwood, rosewood, and incense.

Paúl: Y no genera gases tóxicos. El resultado es que hay mucho menos humo porque se quema más rápido y el olor es mucho más agradable.

Martina: To craft the figures, Paúl connected with artisans in various provinces near the Andes.

Paúl: Nosotros hacemos máscaras artesanales y nos preocupamos mucho por los detalles.

Martina: Paúl quickly saw interest grow in the new monigotes. His first order started with just 300 figures, but it soon grew to 1,000. His team had to work around the clock to meet it, and they did. He found that people liked having their own minigote, instead of sharing one large effigy among the whole family.

Paúl: Lo bueno es que cada miembro de la familia puede tener su minigote y llevarlo a cualquier lugar.

Martina: As Paúl’s business grew, he added another twist to the custom. They crafted minigotes who could represent specific individuals, like family members who couldn’t be present for New Year’s Eve. Other minigotes were more symbolic and represented desires for things like wealth or health.

Paúl: Por ejemplo, ¿quieres tener una pareja nueva? Puedes tener el minigote del amor. ¿Quieres un mejor trabajo? También hay un minigote para eso. El trabajo, la salud y el amor son deseos muy importantes, y los minigotes están llenos de energía positiva que atrae esos deseos.

Martina: Paúl feels his minigotes are not changing the custom of New Year’s Eve celebrations in Ecuador. He sees them as an evolution of the costumbre, one that’s more practical and sustainable.

Paúl: Sí, creo que es una evolución porque la costumbre no se pierde. ¿Cuál es la esencia de esta tradición? Representar quiénes somos, las cosas que tenemos, lo que queremos olvidar y, sobre todo, nuestros deseos.

Martina: Recently, Paúl has found that people prefer to skip the burning altogether. Instead they collect minigotes, especially the figures that represent love, health, and work — things that many Ecuadorians want for the New Year. That wasn’t part of his original idea. But he’s happy people are finding their own ways to celebrate the custom.

Paúl: Esa es la gran diferencia porque muchas personas no queman los minigotes. Hay coleccionistas que tienen más de 30 o 40 modelos y no los quieren quemar. Es lindo porque puedes decidir si quemas tu minigote o lo coleccionas. Entonces, eso puede ser el comienzo de otra tradición que se mantiene a lo largo del tiempo. Y lo más importante es que la costumbre no cambia, solo se adapta un poco.

Martina: Paúl still sees the minigotes bringing families together for New Year’s Eve, just like his family celebrated with the large monigotes. Except now, each family member can have their own figure, representing their personal hopes and dreams. And Paúl makes sure that his minigotes always have a smile, or una sonrisa, to bring positive energy to people’s lives.

Paúl: Son personajes que tienen una sonrisa y siempre están felices. Eso representa algo muy importante: no importa qué pasó durante el Año Viejo, siempre hay que estar feliz porque sabes que el próximo año puedes tener cosas nuevas y mejores.

Martina: Paúl Mendez is a young entrepreneur based in Quito, Ecuador. He hopes his company can bring the custom of minigotes to places beyond Ecuador in the future.

This story was produced by María Martin, a reporter and producer based in Antigua, Guatemala.

We'd love to know what you thought of this episode! What was the most surprising thing you learned about Ecuador’s culture? You can write us an email at podcast@duolingo.com and call and leave us a voicemail or audio message on WhatsApp, at +1-703-953-93-69. Don’t forget to say your name and where you’re from!

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The Duolingo Spanish podcast is produced by Duolingo and Adonde Media. I’m the executive producer, Martina Castro. ¡Gracias por escuchar!

Credits

This episode was produced by Duolingo and Adonde Media.