San Vicente Prepares Its Largest ??ande Reko Festival in Memory

The city of San Vicente is preparing for the ??ande Reko festival, the biennial celebration of Guaran?? cultural heritage that has anchored the region's civic calendar since 1978. This year's edition, running from 30 May to 3 June, is expected to draw around 12 000 visitors, the largest attendance organisers have projected for the event.

At the centre of the 2026 programme is a new initiative: the Memoria Viva archive, a structured effort to record the oral histories of elder community members whose first language is Guaran??. The project is a collaboration between the San Vicente Municipal Culture Office, the Tierra Verde University's linguistics faculty, and the federal Cultural Patrimony Secretariat in Meridian.

Organisers say the archive will collect recorded testimonies, transcriptions, and annotated translations, with the full collection to be deposited in both the municipal library and a federal digital repository. Participation by elders is voluntary, and community consent protocols were developed with input from the Guaran?? Cultural Council of Tierra Verde.

The festival's traditional programme ??? music, dance, communal meals, craft markets, and the ceremonial planting of the first winter yerba mate seedlings ??? remains intact. What has changed, according to festival director Amara Quispe, is the scale of cross-regional participation. Delegations from at least six other provinces have confirmed attendance, a number she attributes in part to the growing profile of Tierra Verde's agricultural and cultural identity within the republic.