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Heino Kalis / Reuters
Revellers throw tomatoes during the annual "Tomatina" (tomato fight) in the Mediterranean village of Bunol, near Valencia, August 31. The origin of the tomato fight is disputed - everyone in Bunol seems to have a favorite story - but most agree it started around 1940, in the early years of General Francisco Franco's dictatorship.
Heino Kalis / Reuters
A reveller is covered with tomato pulp after the annual "Tomatina" (tomato fight) in the Mediterranean village of Bunol, near Valencia August 31.
Heino Kalis / Reuters
A reveller on a truck throws tomatoes into the crowd during the annual Tomatino festival.
Alberto Saiz / AP
A reveler is pelted with tomatos during the tomato fight fiesta in the village of Bunol, near Valencia, Spain, Wednesday, Aug. 31.
Alberto Saiz / AP
A reveler throws tomato pulp during the annual "Tomatina" tomato fight fiesta in the village of Bunol, near Valencia, Spain, Wednesday, Aug. 311. Bunol's town hall estimated more than 40,000 people, some from as far away as Japan and Australia, took up arms Wednesday and pelted each other with 120 tons of ripe tomatoes in the yearly food fight known as the 'Tomatina' now in its 66th year.
Manuel Bruque / EPA
A young man rests over a tomato covered ground during the Tomatina feast or 'tomato fight' in Bunol, Valencia, Spain, 31 August. 120 tons of tomatoes were thrown in the event.
This looks like a lot of fun. Is it lunch-time yet?
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It is encouraging that not all the "nuts of society" live in New York, California and Florida!
Wow, and here's another one of those judgemental, hypocritically pretentious boring person. Chill out.
It certainly beats torturing bulls to death.
I take my grass clippings to the city brush and yard waste center regularly. Around this time of year, mixed in with the waste are scads of culled tomato plants that folks have planted with numerous, normal appearing tomatoes still on them. So the contention that this is wasteful is quite unproven and likely wrong. Some of us work 50 weeks a whole year so that we can take off the other two, and I'll wager still not have exhibit the joie de vivre that these Spaniards are showing us. More power to them! Get a life.
2Lanny-4001310 Nope, their just liberals. And liberals love to give away everything that doesn't belong to them. The conservative Americans respect and take interest in other country's traditions while they value their own. Just don't believe we all think like that, because we don't.
I am a proud liberal and I LOVE this tradition. I have done extensive traveling and respect different traditions around the world. Please don't lump everyone into your narrow minded groups. And maybe you, as a conservative American, respect others, but many of the conservatives I have met (not all) have no respect for anyone else.
omg so funny hahaha!!!! TOMATOES part GROSS part funny what am i saying all funny HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I live in Reno, NV and we had the same exact tomato throwing festival this past Saturday. It's for fun and charity, i highly doubt we're gonna end world hunger by saving a few thousand tomatoes. I'll be participating next year and the year after that for as long as I can. It's all in good fun, plus the proceeds that comes from buying these tomatoes go to charities all over our city, so if you figure it costs $10 to join the festivities and thousands of people attend, I'd say it's well worth it.
I really must object to the "Debbie Downer" comment associated with my name - I have never been or shall be a Downer/Party Poop!!! In regards to the Tomato Festival - looks like great fun and all these comments about "wasting food while millions starve" - please...1 day of fun in the name of tourist dollars is what it's all about and why get down on them for doing it - I live in the US and I do my share of throwing away leftovers and yes my heart hurts seeing those starving children - what I don't understand is their parents and older bros/sis sure look well fed so whats up? Why is just the babes starving? I live on the Oregon Coast where fishermen have to throw back their fish if the catch is over their quota, makes me sick knowing the fish could go to food banks etc - if you want to bitch take it up with our own government and let the Spanish have their day of fun.
People that would travel to Spain to see and enjoy this stupidity are in serious need of professional help.
Wasting food is wasting food no matter what a tradition might be. If you have ever been hungry you will know what I mean.
This is fun, wasting tomatoes. Why is it no one wants to grow up? I guess I've always believed that food should be eaten, and not worn. I hope that there will never come a time when they actually need tomatoes as a food source. Have fun!
Wasteful. Eventhough the food is tomatoes, food is becoming scarce in some areas.
Juice, soup, salad, salsa, etc.
Wasteful. Eventhough the food is tomatoes, food is becoming scarce in some areas.
Juice, soup, salad, salsa, etc.
mmmmmm.....Steak and maters...
I think in this world today, its good to have an on going tradition, that started years ago and makes people happy. We need more happiness in this world. All these negative comments are coming from negative people, who know nothing about tradition. Why cant people just be happy for other people?? Every single person in those pictures are having fun and for some reason, that makes other people miserable. With everything going on in this world, its nice to look forward to a yearly tradition, where you can relieve stress and let loose for a day and not worry about all the problems in this crazy world.
THIS IS ABNORMAL!!!! There is millions of people in the world that would need a couple tomatoes.
People are starving while some morons waste food!!
Grow up!!! It's about time to let go of stupid traditions!!!!
Wow some poeople... US people esp... Do you guys really think at all before posting? I mean wow... Your blaming on country on a once a year tradition they have had. That's like them blaming us for celebrating Halloween and all that candy! Think about it. How many kids throw away the candy they don't like?! Yeah wow you are all great! and to all you people thinking about giving people Tomatoes.. Give them food that will actually fill their stomaches not some thing that won't do anything at all! Send them good food people! Do you not have fun? Okay next time you have fun with your family and friends I am going to critisize you on every little thing you have done and see how you feel! Stop being so stupid and hypocritical and let the people live and have fun!
Looks like a lot of fun. They have something like that in the US too. MSN won't let me post the link but google "Tomato Battle."
They use tomatoes that are going to be thrown away so they are making use of something that otherwise is going to be wasted.
I'm from Valencia. The tomatina started as a joke, some kids threw riped tomatoes to a gentelman wearing an impecable white suit. I guess they decided to repeat it the next year. It caught the attention of people outside Valencia and now, after 66 years it's attracting a lot of tourists from all over the world and generating a much needed income for the city. How many poor people or beggers do you see in the streets over there? None. We take care of our own, we are very generous people, even when the economy is so bad. We also take care of people other than Spaniards when we send humanitarian help to underdevelopped countries. During the first years of the Irak war a plane full of Spaniard doctors and other medical personnel crashed killing all of them, but who remembers that? Spain is the country in Europe with the largest number of organ and blood donors so I think we are doing our share when it comes to help others with food, medical care or even organs. Did someone said that this would be the reason for Spain to default? How come? Can you explain what just happened to the US this last month, loosing its AAA? What about all those pumpkings wasted on Halloween? I would never dare to critize that. I love Halloween, it's a very fun American tradition and you all know it's a business, you "waste" pumpkins but you make money too. No one ever say anything about feeding pumpkings to the poor. What you saw in those pictures is people having fun for one day and I hope that doesn't change because the day we stop having fun THAT WOULD BE THE END OF CIVILIZATION!
People are starving all over the planet, and the future product yeild doesn't look that promising, but go ahead and waste more food.
With all the people in the world starving, that is such a waste.
They are not food tomatoes.
Think of it as natural grown red-water throwing device.
Instead of using plastic container filled with synthetic gel.
All made by oil that could instead be used to power a waterpump for the starving.
Millions of people are dying from hunger and here we have people playing with food. Is humanity cursed or what?
I think ALL WARS should be decided in this fashion.
Why are we celebrating this bullsh*t?!!? There's starvation all over the world...and we're wasting food on sh*t like this, so that grown adults can act like spoiled little sh*t-children?? Are you f*cking kidding me?? And to anyone who'd support this crap, the next time you think to justify abortion because of "overpopulation" "not enough food," just remember how much food you waste (because apparently we *do* have enough) with your stupid, childish food fights.
Jeepers! You are just a bit too uptight! They are having fun. Try it sometime. I don't know for a fact, but the tomatoes are probably not fit for human consumption. Even if they were, by the time they got to starving countries, they would be spoiled. And there is no reason to try to bring abortion into the discussion, unless you just like to cause fights.
Those tomatoes are too ripe to be sold in the stores even less shipped far away. They need to be that ripe so they kind of explode when you throw them. If the tomato is not ripe like that it would hurt you. So you are right: they are not fit for human consumption. They just have some fun before they get rid of them.
Wow. What a waste.
People talk so much S.H.I.T. on the Internet, please if you are going to say something please go to the internet and check the FACTS... Someone said that they waste milloins in Tomato, come on please, you know how many tomatos you can buy with 1 million euros ??? Its a little town, this town does not have more than some thousand euros to spent, plus more are from famers that give it away. (Farmers sometimes give away what they grow in Spain because big supermarkets have the control and they don't get pay for what it cost to produce, but thats another story)... Plus I don't think you can feed somalian children with only tomato right ?
About the bullfights, the meat from this bull its eaten, all from it its used later, pleople in Spain from hundreds of years ago see the killing as art, as a fight of man against animal. Have you seen how chicken are killed in a factory by hundreds every day ??? The geneology of the kind of bull is the one of the ones more preserved in the world and these bulls live like kings 'till the day they go to fight.
I could talk a lot more about this but I have more things to do, and there are certainly a lot more horrible things happening in the world right now just to worry about than some girls with with white shirts (no underware) getting wet in a tomato fight... hahaha (how many now don't think is so stupid?)