Religious Festival in Antigua...

Religion is very much a part of life here in Guatemala. Ancient churches...functional and ruins...are everywhere. There's a mixture of Catholic tradition with the old religion of the Maya. It is perfectly normal to see statues of saints alongside likenesses of less-saintly Mayan deities (my favorite is Maximon, to whom they offer cigars and alcohol. He looks a bit like Hemingway).

I noticed that something was up this week when I saw people walking around town with the sign of the cross on their foreheads. It was Ash Wednesday! I don't know much about this tradition other than it means that Easter is around the corner. When I lived in Philadelphia, many of my Catholic coworkers would get up early in the morning for Mass. They'd get the mark on their foreheads and wear it all day. It was always tempted to lick my thumbs and rub the smudges clean...but wasn't sure if they might take offense.

Anyway, Miguel and I went shopping in the morning for new chairs. We enjoy sitting on the roof of our Guatehouse and watch the world go by. The chairs that Kimberly relocated from the courtyard were weathered, and both of them were split. Getting a bit of arm fat pinched between the broken arms of a plastic chair is quite painful! Time for new chairs!

Miguel bought a blue one, and mine is green. We had to carry them from one end of Antigua to the other! I wanted to get a taxi to haul the chairs, but Miguel wanted a good work-out. Mission accomplished.

We stopped along the way to buy a couple of steaks. It seems that Elsa received a new electric grill as a reward for selling a certain amount of makeup in her side business for leClaire. It hasn't been used, and we were determined to break it in properly.

On the way home, we encountered the beginnings of the religious processions through town. Each church sponsors a float that is adorned with a scene from Christian mythology. Male parishioners carry the floats on their shoulders through the narrow streets. I was told that they do their best to find guys who are approximately the same height, but it never works out. As a result, some of the taller men have to hunch over while the short ones have to reach above their heads.

A marching band follows each float, playing rather somber music. As it gets dark, the floats are lit by floodlights. They literally trail a long extension cord behind each float...followed by some poor guy (presumably a big-time sinner doing penance) with an gas-powered electric generator.

The final destination for all of the floats is the town's central park. At midnight, they light the floats on fire and sacrifice a virgin. At least that's what I heard they do; I didn't stick around for the ending.