Mexican Independence Day
Mexican Independence Day and we did a real tourist thing today, a trip to see Indigenous Villages San Juanhamula and San Lorenzo Zinacantan (Village of the Bat Man). The church is unlike anything I’ve seen before, Catholic on the outside, a strange and interesting place on the inside. The priest is banished except for baptisms. This is the only time the villages have a use for him. Baptisms are the point a baby becomes a person, before that they are “Monkey Men”! The priest was told in no uncertain terms to get out and watch the door didn’t hit him on his holy ass on the way out a hundred or so years ago. You cannot take pictures inside the church. You are greeted by the smell of pine needles which completely cover the floor making it look initially like growing grass. The needles are cleared in odd circles across the floor where family groups or individuals sit (sometimes with a shaman) and set out a bizarre selection of objects as offerings. Aside from this, the tables around the sides of the church can be covered by hundreds or thousands of candles. I don’t think I’ve seen as many candles in one place before, enough to make the air shimmer and send clouds of smoke rising. The clearings in the pine needles with the people sitting around them and the offerings.. these were usually more candles, eggs and drinks, one man had a bottle of San Migeul complete with a slice of lime in the top. I think the important thing was the symbolism as clearly the San Migel had been drunk and replaced with water previously!
Years ago, when rediscovered, by silly people, the church and people were known as the people who worshipped Coca Cola and sure enough the strangest thing in this scene, possibly, were the little bottles of Coke and Fanta in amongst the offerings.
Statues of the villages saints lined the inside walls all in glass cases and dressed in amazing clothes and ornaments except for a forlorn bunch of about 8 saints all still in glass cases but dressed in plane clothes and decidedly blingless. These saints were the saints from the only other church in the town. This burnt down 100 years ago and they have been in this remaining church being punished for letting the church burn down ever since. The bells from that church, that will never toll again are on the floor in front of them. Altogether a strange sight.
