Culture & Community | Arts & Culture | Arts & Anti-racism
Top: Erika Cajamarca and members of Puricuna perform. Bottom: Kevin Stoffan, Stephanie Castro, and Delilah Vargas look out onto Church Street as Yanara Fierro drives. Lucy Gellman Photos.
Families settled into driver's seats and truck beds, ready with flags of all sizes. Motorcycle engines revved in time with the music. Members of the dance group Puricuna smoothed down their skirts, zamarros and embroidered blouses and got ready to move. A speaker blared from somewhere, and the words sailed over the street. El Ecuador! El Ecuador. Es mi país! Es mi país. Within seconds, Church Street was awash in blue, yellow and red stripes, bobbing and billowing in the warm breeze.
It marked New Haven’s seventh annual Ecuadorian Civic Parade, a project of the Comité Cívico Cultural Ecuatoriano de Connecticut that began at the Ecuadorian Consulate downtown, traveled up and down Church, Elm, Temple, and George Streets, and ended at the New Haven Green for a celebratory flag raising and short speaking portion. Over 150 Ecuadorians and Ecuadorian Americans came out to celebrate.
The mid-August timing commemorates Ecuadorian independence from three centuries of Spanish colonial rule. Ecuador first declared independence from Spain on Aug. 10, 1809. It took another two decades—and a war—before the country formally became independent from Spanish forces in May 1822. Sunday, that commemoration also felt like a homecoming: the parade has been on a three-year pandemic hiatus, waiting to rumble back to life.
Gianina Serrano (in top photo): “Today, it’s about culture, it’s about people, it’s about us."
“Today, it’s about culture, it’s about people, it’s about us,” said Gianina Serrano, one of the organizers of the event. “It’s about Ecuador. So we really enjoy being with people, who still, no matter what we are, we’re still being Ecuadorians. I think we’re a really hard working people. We like to do our best to live our lives the best way. No matter where we are, we are trying to do our best.”
For Serrano, it’s personal. Twelve years ago, she came to Connecticut from Macas, a city close to the densely rainforested region of southeastern Ecuador, to study at the University of Bridgeport. After finishing her undergraduate work, she stayed there for a graduate degree in business, and then remained to work in Connecticut.
Along the way, she discovered a tight-knit, surprisingly large Ecuadorian community in New Haven and the surrounding region (Connecticut is home to roughly 35,000 Ecuadorians and Ecuadorian Americans, according to the 2020 census). She now lives in Milford, but is frequently in New Haven and Bridgeport for events.
Sunday was about celebrating Ecuador’s regional diversity, she added. While the South American country is just under 110,000 square miles, it claims dense rainforest (El Oriente), the cool Andes Mountains (La Sierra) and a glorious Pacific Coast (La Costa). In the parade, members of Puricuna, a dance group based out of Danbury, celebrated La Sierra as they danced down Church Street and kept going as they rounded the bend onto Elm.
Top: The Pinos family: Jasmin, Klever, Ashley, Silvia, and Derrick. Bottom: Marcos Cali and Liz Cruz.
Well before the procession to the Green began, friends and families assembled close to 1 Church St., where the Ecuadorian Consulate rises from the sidewalk with bolded silver letters and a huge, gold, blue and red coat of arms. Some gathered with parents, kids, cousins, and aunties; others came out with their pets in tow. From every direction, hand-held and full-sized flags peeked out in brilliant color. A giant copper-colored guinea pig wove through the crowd, lifting his white paws to the crowd every so often to say hello. Referred to as Cuy, the small animal is Ecuador’s national food.
Just yards from the consulate, 17-year-old Jasmin Pinos draped an Ecuadorian flag over her shoulders, knotting it in front to make a superhero cape. A student at East Haven High School, Pinos said that she’s proud to show off her Ecuadorian heritage—and to have a space to gather with fellow Ecuadorian teens and adults to celebrate the country’s independence. Her dad, Klever Pinos, hails from Azogues, a city of roughly 40,000 in the south-central region of the country. Her mom, Silvia Pinos, has Italian, German, and Ecuadorian heritage. Jasmin and her siblings grew up in New Haven, making visits to their second home when they’re able to.
“It’s fun!” she said as she minded the family’s two bulldogs as they sniffed curiously at passers-by.
Nearby, Silvia Pinos showed off a huge Ecuadorian flag that had a rolling soccer ball and dribbling player in place of its coat of arms. Over two decades ago, she and Klever met through Silvia’s uncle at a baptismal party, and hit it off (“He called me,” she said with a laugh Sunday). For years, they've run a soccer league, the Club Social Privado Ecuatoriano, out of their backyard on Quinnipiac Avenue. Three days a week—sometimes more—the space comes alive with players eager to connect to both the sport and to each other.
She called the parade a chance to show off the work they do in the community, and gather with fellow Ecuadorians to celebrate independence. “It’s like the Fourth of July for Ecuadorians,” she said. That visibility is important to her: when she takes in the city around her, “it doesn’t feel like New Haven cares about Latinos,” she said. Sunday marked an opportunity to remind city officials that Ecuadorians are very much present in New Haven and in Connecticut.
“I’m proud to be Ecuadorian,” Silvia Pinos said. “Don’t put us to one side. We’re equal. Every person is equal.”
“This is my life,” added Klever Pinos as the family posed for a photo with their new puppies, Hazel, Scarlett, and Max. “This reminds me of where I’m from.”
Top: Marshals as the parade begins. Bottom: Yanara Fierro with Kevin Stoffan, Stephanie Castro, and Delilah Vargas.
As they slipped into place as parade marshals, City Clerk Michael Smart and Connecticut Department of Housing Commissioner Seila Mosquera-Bruno seemed to heed that message. Mosquera-Bruno, who for years championed housing in New Haven, is herself Ecuadorian; she moved to Connecticut 23 years ago from the large port city of Guayaquil. At the front of the procession in dangling Ecuadorian flag earrings, she held a corner of the Ecuadorian flag, chatting with Smart and organizer Luis Morales as panpipe and cununo sounded from a speaker somewhere behind her.
Behind them, cousins Delilah Vargas, Stephanie Castro, Kevin Stoffan and Scarlett Fierro fastened Ecuadorian flags in the bed of a truck, joking with each other as they prepared for the parade. A student at Hamden High, 16-year-old Stoffan slipped on a knitted, wool mask in rainbow colors and became Aya Huma, prepared to drive away evil spirits from the space. It was only when he leaned down and spoke that he became a sweet teenager once again, answering questions methodically as he praised his heritage.
A creative writing student at Cooperative Arts & Humanities High School, Castro said that this year’s parade made her proud to be Ecuadorian—which wasn’t always the case. As a kid, she was embarrassed to be Ecuadorian, to the point that she hid her culture and heritage from her friends. That was also true for Vargas, a freshman at Metropolitan Business Academy. “We’re different from other families,” she said.
For instance, Castro said, she didn’t want people to know about the tradition of eating guinea pig—which a lot of her classmates know only as a cute and furry pet. But the more she and Vargas learned about the richness and history of Ecuador, the more proud they became. After three years away, she called it good to be back.
Downtown/Yale Alder Alex Guzhnay (third in from the left) with his parents and extended family.
So did Downtown/Yale Alder Alex Guzhnay, a student at Yale who grew up in Fair Haven. As he gathered with members of his family around an Ecuadorian flag, Guzhnay remembered growing up in a vibrant Ecuadorian community in New Haven, centered partly around St. Rose de Lima (now Our Lady of Guadeloupe) on Blatchley Avenue. The child of Ecuadorian immigrants, he made history when he joined the Board of Alders for his first term last year.
During brief remarks on the New Haven Green, he thanked his parents for the sacrifices they have made for him.
“I think it [the parade] says a lot,” he said, trying his best to speak over the music that filled the street. “It’s a mix of people who are immigrants and people who grew up here, calling back to where home is originally and where home is now.”
As the parade lurched to life, cheers and cries of “Viva Ecuador!” sailed through the crowd and over Church Street. Toward the front of the procession, members of Puricuna stayed to one side of the street, a blur of bright skirts, embroidered blouses and chaps called zamarros. To a loop of “El Ecuador es mi país,” dancers filled the street, bringing the tradition of Sanjuanito hundreds of miles to the heart of the city. 
The parade roars and dances to life!
“It helps me feel close to home,” said Danbury-based member José Gallego, who grew up in the La Sierra region, and moved to Connecticut in 1998. “It shows us where we come from. Sharing my culture makes me proud.”
“I feel like it is a very proud moment to share our culture,” added dancer Erika Cajamarca, who moved to Connecticut 16 years ago, when she was just 11 years old. While she lives in Danbury, her feet take her all over the state as a member of Puricuna.
Sunday, she had prepared carefully for an hour of folkloric dance in the street, with a deep, pleated orange skirt, embroidered white blouse, espadrilles, and a dusting of glitter on her eyelids. As she spoke, they shimmered in the midday sun.
Back at the Green, attendees assembled around the flagpole, singing along to the Ecuadorian national anthem "¡Salve, Oh Patria!"” as the flag began to rise. The words wrapped around the crowd—Oh Patria! Gloria a ti! Gloria a ti!—forming a sort of protective shield from the traffic whooshing by on Chapel Street, the occasional cheer from a new student moving into Yale a few blocks away. 
Oswaldo Torres and Martha Perdomo.
As they watched, partners Oswaldo Torres and Martha Perdomo reflected on the support they have received from—and now been able to give back to—Connecticut’s growing Ecuadorian community. Raised in Cayambe, Ecuador, a town named after the volcano that rises above it, Torres moved to Connecticut when he was 19 years old. After working for Century 21 for two decades, he was able to open his own real estate firm in Bridgeport.
“Today is about being proud to be Ecuadorian, and being proud to be American,” he said. “There are wonderful people who have helped us along the way.”
Learn more about the Comité Cívico Cultural Ecuatoriano de Connecticut here.