New York Times reporter Paula Sadok experiences Qoyllur Rit’i, the Snow Star Festival, last summer and shares her experiences in this article. Qoyllur Rit’i is an annual pilgrimage that draws indigenous Peruvians from all over the country. It’s almost time for this year’s event to begin.

I stopped, again, to catch my breath in the thin Andean air, struggling to ease the dizziness as I inhaled from a portable oxygen tank. I must have been a curious sight to the Peruvians passing by. My friends, Andray and Louise, stood beside me, concerned. Realizing we were blocking pedestrian traffic, I pressed myself into the side of the mountain to let the other pilgrims pass.

At about 15,000 feet above sea level, we still had farther to climb to our destination, the Sinakara valley in southern Peru’s Ocongate province. We had come to participate in Qoyllur Rit’i — the Snow Star Festival, the annual midyear Andean pilgrimage, which attracts tens of thousands of Peruvians who travel from all over the country, the largest festival of its kind. They divide themselves into nations — groups with distinct traditions — and are invited by the Brotherhood of the Lord of Qoyllur Rit’i, a volunteer body that organizes the event. During our trip last June, our guides, whom we hired from the tour office at the Casa de la Gringa hotel in Cuzco, told us that as many as 500 nations had sent delegations.

Despite the moments that made me cringe, this is a pretty interesting video about a little known Andean tradition. Thanks Paige Cornwell, an intern at Vice, for turning me on to this video.

You have got to love men dancing in elaborate costumes and wearing chucks, but I definitely do not love the hammering nails into tongues part.

While I don’t know if I’ll make it to this remote Andean village to see scissor dancing for myself, I hope to see many ancient traditions like it while I’m in Peru.