Carnival is a Catholic blowout before Lent. It is pre-fasting bacchanal that the Americas reshaped with African and Indigenous rhythm until it became far bigger than the church calendar.
San Francisco's version ditched the calendar altogether, landing in the Mission in 1979 and parking itself on Memorial Day weekend for the better odds at sunshine. It's since grown into the largest multicultural celebration on the West Coast, built on Latin American and Caribbean traditions.
Saul Sugarman
This year's parade brought fútbol to the feathers.
The 48th edition ran under the theme "La Copa del Pueblo," the People's Cup, a celebration of the soccer played in dusty fields, neighborhood parks, and city streets where the game belongs to everyone. A herd of lowriders led thousands of dancers, bands, and floats down 20 blocks of the Latino Cultural District. But true to the theme, the smaller moments hit hardest: performers fixing one another's makeup, the public library handing kids free books from the curb.
These are photos we found from Reddit users, and credited to them accordingly. These ones from the user chimbori.
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And from Individualchaotin:
From beans688:
From 88ning:
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