Trip to Italy and Spain

The second procession yesterday was really a blockbuster. Many in the procession are of all ages, including small children and babies in arms. There were more floats (called tronos or pasos), and many more bearers called costerleros or costeleras. Many were barefoot and bearing the floats through the city for hours. It takes a whole crew of costeleros and a lot of replacements. Many walk barefoot through the whole procession, so the local street cleaners are actually out vacuuming the streets by hand in advance of the processions.

We sat by a woman with two young kids yesterday, and she helped interpret several things for us. A vendor was selling some kind of wafer sandwich cookies to benefit one of the confraternities. Our parade neighbor explained that one kind was sandwiched with honey, and the other was just plain. You can guess which was more popular. She broke off a bite for us to try. She also interpreted who some of the processioners were. She said, for example at the end of each parade is a representative from each Confraternity in their robes.

We watched three parades/processions in person and the last one on TV as we were tired and it was getting late. The tronos are decorated with carvings, flowers, and even real fruit and vegetables. Some have real lit candles on them. Yesterday, the theme was mostly Jesus entering Jeruselum. Tonight, there will be two processions through our plaza.

We went to a laundromat this morning. We have a washer in our unit, but there is no dryer, and it is harder to get things dry on the rack with it being damp as a result. We'll head to the store shortly to stock up on things since the stores were closed on Sunday.

Not as much noise last night as the discotheque was not open, but I got up at 5 am to use the bathroom and still heard people in the street at that time. Amazingly, although there is a lot of alcohol around, you do not see a lot of public drunkenness. It's considered very bad manners to get drunk. Most of what we see is socializing. We did try the Leon Lemonade yesterday, which is kind of like a sangria and very low alcohol.Leia mais