|
|
Article: Dieciocho: Chile's month-long Independence 'Day'.(CULTURE)
- Article from:
- The World and I
- Article date:
- September 1, 2006
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2006 News World Communications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
When Chileans wake up on Independence Day (September 18), chances are many of them have already celebrated some parts of this holiday on previous days, or even as far back as the beginning of the month of September. Dieciocho (pronounced dee-ay-see-OH-cho) comes from the words diez (ten), y (and), ocho (eight) and is the name of the national holiday on September 18 that commemorates Chile's first moves in 1810 towards winning independence from Spain. Chile celebrates the day when the country began to be governed only by people from Chile, although Spain continued as overseer until 1818, when complete independence was won.
Nowadays, Independence Day is encased in ...