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5 of the Biggest and Best Places to Celebrate Cinco de Mayo This Weekend

Cinco De Mayo Denver BeLatina

Cinco de Mayo is a truly Mexican-American holiday, celebrating not the history behind the holiday — the humble Mexican defeat of a well-equipped French invasion in the town of Puebla — but rather the spirit and pride of the victorious underdog. Interestingly, it’s really not a big holiday in Mexico, while north of the border it’s widely celebrated as an excuse to drink terrible margaritas.

If you’re looking for an excuse to legit connect with Mexican culture, food, and communities though, there are proper Cinco de Mayo festivals happening near just about every major Mexican-American community in the country. Here are five of the biggest and best places to celebrate Cinco de Mayo the right way this year:

5 San Antonio

Viva Market Square! Celebrating Cinco de Mayo

Friday through Sunday

Hometown to Democratic presidential candidate Julián Castro, San Antonio has one of the biggest Mexican-American populations in the country — so it’s no surprise that it hosts one of the biggest Cinco de Mayo events in Texas, drawing in tens of thousands of festival goers each year. You’ll get everything you expect from a good festival, including live entertainment, food, art. And on Sunday, there’s a mariachi competition.

4 Chicago

Cinco de Mayo Festival at the Lake County Fairgrounds

Friday Through Sunday

The first annual Chicago’s Cinco De Mayo festival at the Lake County Fairgrounds is a multicultural celebration of Latinx identity. “The festival will integrate Mexican and Central and South American culture and tradition with the American people,” one of the organizers explained to the Chicago Tribune. The event will feature food, music, and handmade wares representing a broad swath of Latin America, and will also feature dance, performance, DJs, reggaeton, Lucha Libre, and carnival rides. Tickets range from $5-10 for entry.

 

3 Bushwick, New York

Cinco at House of Yes

Sunday

Cinco de Mayo in New York City is so big that it can’t be contained in one cohesive event. There’s the parade by Central Park on Sunday, the annual 116th Street block party in Spanish Harlem, and parties basically everywhere. Possibly the most cutting edge celebration will be happening at Brooklyn’s House of Yes, which will be hosting a free “fiesta fiasco of cross-cultural pollination” all day Sunday. They have one simple request for attendees: “Just please do not wear Mexican culture as a costume.”

 

2 Denver

Cinco de Mayo Celebrate Culture Festival

Saturday and Sunday

Denver’s Cinco de Mayo Celebrate Culture Festival is the biggest gathering in the country, bringing nearly 400,000 each year to the Civic Center Park. The festivities begin on Saturday morning with a big parade around the Civic Center. After that, you can catch dance and musical performances on the hour every hour, or take your kids to the carnival. If you’re feeling competitive, enter yourself into the taco eating contest. If you love dog racing, check out the riveting Chihuahua races. The festival is sponsored by a local nonprofit that promotes economic development in low-income communities and expands access to affordable housing for low- to middle-income families.

1 San Diego

Fiesta Old Town Cinco de Mayo Festival

Friday through Sunday

This massive three-day free event brings in over 100,000 people each year to San Diego’s Old Town. Start your Cinco de Mayo weekend off with happy hour Lucha Libre after you get off work on Friday. Save up your stamina, though, for Saturday; it’s a full 12-hour marathon of entertainment, food specials, a Folclórico competition, children’s events, and an entire lineup of vendors. Don’t forget to catch lasso artists Rojas Charros on Sunday for some seriously awesome lasso acrobatics.

 

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