Brittany McGee

Yellow is the lucky color for New Year’s in Peru. According to tradition, anyone who wears yellow underwear going into the New Year will have luck the entire year. But, the underwear has to be brand new, and it’s better if the underwear were received as a gift. Any more yellow that one can wear just increases the luck. While I bought new yellow underwear from the market for New Year’s, and I wore even more yellow, I’m still waiting to see what luck 2015 will bring me. But then again, I have participated in many US traditions like eating black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day that didn’t necessarily come to fruition—or at least I didn’t notice them. Many Peruvians spend New Year’s Eve with their families. I spent mine with my host family in El Ingenio, a district in the Nazca province, state of Ica. Similar to Christmas Eve, everyone rested until 10 or 11 that night, and then the drinking circles formed. The children ran around, oblivious to the holiday, absorbed in their new toys from Christmas. As the clock stuck midnight that night, we all hugged and wished each other a “Feliz Año Nuevo.” We hurried outside to watch various fireworks exploding in the night sky. And then we feasted. After the feasting, the drinking continued and people went to the discoteca to dance the night away. Some partied until 7AM that morning before calling it a night. Side Note: If you’re looking to travel more in the new year, according to Peruvian belief, you should run around the block with a suitcase on New Year’s Day. While I didn’t run around the block with mine, I did walk about a mile with it that day.