Why Carve Radishes for Christmas?

In Oaxaca, Mexico, a pre-Christmas tradition has hundreds of artists carving radishes into fun and festive figures every Dec. 23. Learn about La Noche de Rábanos in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://people.howstuffworks.com/culture-traditions/holidays-christmas/mexicos-night-of-radishes.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey brain Stuff
Lauren Vohllebaum. Here. December is jam packed with holidays and
holiday related parties, and one you don't want to miss
out on is Mexico's Noche de las Romanos, or the
Night of the Radishes. Every December twenty third in Wahaka,

(00:24):
the main Square comes alive with sculptures of dragons, balligators,
local celebrities, religious figures, and even politicians, all carved from
huge wonky shaped radishes in shades of deep purple to red,
with contrasting creamy white interiors revealed by the carvings. The
Night of the Radishes is a one hundred and twenty

(00:45):
seven year old Christmas time tradition in this predominantly Catholic city,
where artists vie for the best sculpted radish display, which
can earn cash prizes worth several hundred bucks and year
long bragging rights. The radishes are native to Mexico. They
were brought over by Spanish colonizers back in the fifteen hundreds,
and these and other European crops and livestock spread among

(01:08):
the many indigenous peoples already living there during the colonial period.
Wahaka was a very small city situated in a lush,
fertile valley. Harvests from local farms were so plentiful that
farmers brought much of their bounty to sell at the
city market. At the time, the market was set up
near the cathedral in what's now Wahaca's main Square. This

(01:31):
story goes that at some point in these seventeen hundreds
or so, the crop of radishes was so abundant that
a portion of them weren't dug up during the spring
harvest and were instead left to continue growing. And radishes
will grow far past the cute, round, ping pong ball
sized things that you usually get in the grocery store,
with limbs and bulbs growing off of that main tuber,

(01:54):
so that December, someone possibly some Dominican monks finally pulled
up those and thought these look weirdly like people or
like demons, and were so entertained that they showed them
off that year at the Christmas market in that main square,
possibly leading to intentional copycats in the following years. The

(02:15):
tradition of carving radishes may have started as a way
for clever farmers and other market sellers to lure customers
to their stalls. Wahaka had even at the time, a
long standing tradition of beautiful, intricate wood carving, and it
weirdly makes sense that local wood carvers took a fancy
to the giant radishes on display and decided to carve

(02:35):
them into, for example, Nativity scenes to entice Christmas market shoppers.
In eighteen ninety seven, Wahaka's municipal president decided to make
the Ratish carved Nativity scene tradition official and created a
competition to be held on December twenty third. It became
a yearly thing and expanded to include a greater variety

(02:56):
of figures. To participate in the Night of the Bratish's
Carving competition, entrants need to use specific radishes cultivated by
the government on land near the city's airport. The city
plants them over a three month period so that by
harvest time they come in different sizes. Some are small,
but they can get quite big, up to around thirty

(03:18):
inches long that's eighty centimeters and weighing over six and
a half pounds or about three kilos. Some can be
as big around as a human head. Each entrant is
assigned a plot number based on the order in which
they signed up. Then, four days before the event, entrants
are allowed to harvest the ratishes in their assigned plot.

(03:39):
As of twenty seventeen, fourteen metric tons of radishes were
harvested for the festival from that land. Once the ratishes
are harvested, participants spend the next few days and sometimes
sleepless nights, cleaning and carving them. On December twenty third,
they head over to the square to assemble their often
elaborate m piece Ratish displays. Again, in twenty seventeen, one

(04:04):
hundred and forty three Ratish crafters displayed their carved works,
including eighty two kids. Visitors who now come by the thousands,
stroll through the square to watch the artist's fine tune
their root vegetable masterpieces, among music, food and fireworks. Around
nine o'clock that night, judging takes place based on beauty,

(04:24):
technical skill, and creativity, and then three winners are named
in each category. The two primary categories in the modern
day Night of the Rats's competition are traditional or free.
The traditional category requires the Ratish displays to reflect Wahwking culture.
In the free category, your radishes can do whatever you want.

(04:46):
There are additional categories for scenes made with corn husks
and scenes made with dried flowers. The masterpieces these artists
create would be impressive even if they were not made
of vegetables. Look them up when you get a chain,
but think intricate, mission style, architecture, Egyptian gods, scenes from Mezcal,
production replicas of Michelangelo and Da Vinci's works, and yes,

(05:10):
many Nativity scenes. Radishes are, of course, a perishable vegetable,
and one of the biggest challenges besides having the skill
or talent to carve radishes, is keeping them fresh so
that they're still perky and bright red and white throughout
the night of the competition. Participants have different techniques for this,
but it usually involves regularly doubting them with water. Today's

(05:38):
episode is based on the article Mexico's Night of the Radishes,
a quirky Christmas predition on how Stuffworks dot Com, written
by Jennifer Walker. Journey brain Stuff is production of by
Heart Radio in partnership with how Stuffworks dot Com, and
is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts my Heart Radio,
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