Tomatina 2011: Buñol Tomato Fight Paints The Town Red

The streets ran red during Buñol's annual tomato fight on the last Wednesday of August. Following opening shouts of "Tomato! Tomato!" at 11 this morning, tens of thousands of participants had exactly one hour to pelt each other with over 120 tons of tomatoes.

The Spanish town in Valencia is perhaps best known for the street food fight Tomatina, which attracts tourists from around the world. This year's attendance exceeded the town's expectations, as over 40,000 revelers took to the streets. Trucks drove by slowly, throwing tomatoes at the crowd below while shirtless festival-goers bathed in a sea of pulp.

The event organizers recommend wearing old clothes and goggles to protect against the acidic tomato juice, which may sting the eyes. Nonetheless, this year 26 people received medical assistance for minor injuries, heat stroke, and eye irritation, according to Europa Press.

As attendance increases each year, the local city council imports increasing quantities of tomatoes from Extremadura, where lower-quality, cheaper tomatoes are grown especially for the festival.

Check out photos from this year's Tomatina below.

Comments

[Daisytoo]

08:26 PM on 09/04/2011

Disgusting.

[Joe Bigg]

07:49 PM on 09/04/2011

Love it.

[Aristontoles]

10:32 AM on 09/04/2011

Hey, Americans: Did you know that, on average, the US wastes way more food than Spain every single day of every single year --and has been doing so for decades? And a question for you, Americans: do you know the citizens of what country are the fastest ones to open their big, fat, judgmental mouths to utter their very uninformed opinions on things they absolutely ignore?

[Uncle Rico]

08:41 AM on 09/04/2011

Any country or group of people that can waste 120 tons of food on frivolity simply has too much.

Shameful.

[Lynn Maar]

11:20 AM on 09/03/2011

Hey - you have to figure that this country also has a day when people get chased by wild bulls every year. The same country that messed up Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, the Phillipines... and more?

[Joe Bigg]

07:50 PM on 09/04/2011

Florida?

Oh wait they did that on their own.

[M J1]

02:43 AM on 09/03/2011

Looks fun but I can't help but think about those starving in Somalia and other parts of the world. An even better headline would have been about this country donating food to those who are starving. It's just hard to see food going to waste when people are dying of starvation.

[jascain]

06:22 PM on 09/03/2011

My thoughts--exactly!!!

[MajorKong]

09:59 PM on 09/02/2011

I know it's tradition and all, but isn't this a waste of some really good tomatoes?

[Redhunteur]

03:45 AM on 09/02/2011

Good thing most third world famine-stricken people don't have television or they'd have a new reason to cry themselves to sleep.

What utter borscht.

[netzwerg]

04:46 AM on 09/02/2011

Don't forget all the corn wasted in ethanol fuel production so that a few tofu lovers can feel good about themselves.

[Redhunteur]

05:09 AM on 09/02/2011

Using servicable food to make gasoline... yet hemp is illegal? That's just so wrong.

[Yank in France]

03:55 PM on 09/02/2011

Typical oversimplification. It was Boy George Bush who pushed massive ethanol subsidies! Was he actually eating tofu all those years instead of steak?!

Now, here's your idea for the day, if you can handle it: Total farm subsidies amount to between $10 billion and $30 billion each year after accounting for crop destruction relief due to weather. And that excludes the humongous subisidies for ethanol production!

The vast bulk of these subsidies go to the mammouth corporate farms, not the small farmers.

And all this in a world where food prices are skyrockeing.

Virtually all the farm states vote for Republican Congressmen who then vote to maintain the subsidies with no reduction whatsoever!!

http://www.downsizinggovernment.org/agriculture/subsidies

[xdiesp]

10:42 AM on 09/02/2011

Those tomatoes are being used, not thrown away, at the producers' expense. Also it's an old tradition from way back when peasants did the harvest.

Probably just the action of getting a full refill at the gas pump causes more suffering than a few hundreds happy spaniards throwing each other tomatoes in the face.

[Redhunteur]

04:18 AM on 09/06/2011

It's food that isn't eaten, it's used in a food fight. What does a hungry person care who grew it, how it was wasted and for what reason?

[MobahoJoe]

01:42 AM on 09/02/2011

Isn't there a famine happening right now?

[Richard Aron]

09:59 PM on 09/01/2011

Apparently Spain is so rich that it's wasting food like there is no tomorrow. If they don't like to feed the poor Africans, why not send those tomatoes to the Greek who are suffering from imposed austere measures and would love to have those tomatoes for supper.

[Yank in France]

03:56 PM on 09/02/2011

No, I can assure you that the Greeks only like green, very unripe tomatoes!

[Aida Benitez]

03:38 PM on 09/03/2011

Actually, Spain is undergoing a deep financial crisis, but some people don't even care as long as they keep on enjoying their tradition. Leave it to the Comunitat Valenciana government who are extreme right-wingers ( the remnants of the Franco Spain) who want to keep the party going and then blame President Zapatero for everything wrong in Spain.

[tod47]

09:01 PM on 09/01/2011

don't like tomatoes
just don't start throwing kit kats cuz i love em

[Readbetweentheelevens]

06:12 PM on 09/01/2011

The land of goats.

[Deegoodhand]

04:59 PM on 09/01/2011

3rd world countries starving and they are having a 120 ton food fight???? Can anyone say wrong wrong WRONG with me???????

[rda1911a1]

07:17 PM on 09/01/2011

well I'm sure you could orginize an event to ship them to the country of your choice. i'm sure if you can generate the revenue the event does thay can sell you the produce instead

[Uncle Rico]

08:43 AM on 09/04/2011

Misses the very valid point.

[Minister X]

01:06 AM on 09/02/2011

Agreed. This and the yearly competitive eating contests are two traditions that have never sat well with me.

[Sansculotte]

04:25 PM on 09/01/2011

Weird. Very, very weird.

[KMBerger]

01:39 PM on 09/01/2011

That looks like more fun than the food fight in the movie "Animal House". I know this is a local Spanish tradition, but I have to agree that the waste of food is a bit unconscionable....