Not long to go ...
Not long to go ...
Last saturday, The Swede, Lars Ingvar Jungefors, was awarded the III "Guiri del Año" (‘Foreigner of the Year') Award which Kukuxumusu grants each year to a foreigner who has shown their passion for the Sanfermin fiestas. The award was handed over by Mikel Urmeneta, a founder-member and the creative director at Kukuxumusu, at an event which was attended by many members of Peña Los Suecos With just two weeks to go before the "txupinazo" inaugural rocket goes off to commence the Sanfermin fiestas, Mikel Urmeneta, creative director of The Drawing Factory, handed over the award - a map of the world with horns - to Lars Ingvar Jungefors.
This is the third successive year that this award has been granted to a foreigner. Mikel Urmeneta talked about the special connection of Lars Ingvar with Sanfermin and Kukuxumusu -the reason why he got the prize- and highlighted that is "an homage to all the members of the Peña Los Suecos, but also to all the Swedish that has contributed to create the modern Sanfermin festivals". Lars Ingvar gave thanks for prize and said that was "looking forward to take part in his 37th Sanfermin festival". After the award ceremony, Xabier Ariztegi, an "aizkolari" (woodcutter) from Navarra, gave a demonstration of tree-trunk cutting in homage to the prize-winner who has spent all his working life from 1968 to 2002 as manager in the Wetterlings hatchet factory, one of the oldest firms in Sweden.
In fact, this summer it celebrates the 125th anniversary of its foundation. After the homage all those attending the ceremony sat down to a lunch; friends and family of the awarded, along with some members of the peña, as: "Gallito", Britt-Marie, Rolf Lübeck "Gora Blanca" and Kent Holmberg "Bombero" among other ones. Lars Ingvar Jungefors, a member of Peña Los Suecos over the past 28 years, is the third person to receive "Guiri del Año" award, after Puerto Rican, Carmen Margarita Alicea in 2004, and the North-American, Lore Monning in 2005.
The aim of the award, states Mikel Urmeneta, is to help change the concept of the foreigner as an intruder in the fiestas and to see their presence as a good thing for the fiestas. In fact, Kukuxumusu, the tee shirt company, has been organizing a "Guiri Day" (‘Foreigner's Day) each year over the past ten years with the aim of paying homage to the foreigners and to vindicate their presence because "thanks to the foreigners the Sanfermin fiestas are bigger and more universal." Peña Los Suecos was set up in 1975 in Madrid and its first president was Lars Sward. Some of its members formerly belonged to the Peña Sueca and have been coming to Pamplona for nearly 40 years now.
They enjoy everything about the world of the fighting bull and especially the bull fights. They attend the afternoon bullfights and these also serve as an excuse to celebrate the birthdays of some members of the Peña. They also try to organize an annual conference on the bullfighting world while in Pamplona and they publish a pamphlet "El Cartelito", with articles in both Spanish and Swedish, about the bullfighting world
