Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas

     This last week, Esquipulas was overrun by thousands of religious pilgrims who had made the trip to Esquipulas to see the Black Christ.  During the week long festivities I saw pilgrims from every country in Central America and Mexico, some from Jamaica and Ecuador and, of course, at least one Estadounidense.  I have a huge amount of respect for the faith that these people have that compels them to travels hundreds or even thousands of miles in often very uncomfortable buses and over questionable roads to worship God.  However, despite my great respect, I have never truly understood the idea behind a religious pilgrimage.  It seems to me that an omnipotent god would be present everywhere in the world, not just one special corner of Guatemala.  And, even if we accept the paradigm that God prefers to operate more profoundly in certain places, wouldn’t she probably chose one of the more awesome places that she spent all that time creating on earth… like at least place with awesome beaches?  That being said, I definitely understand the concept of traveling many miles for a good party, and that is essentially what Esquipulas experienced this week.  As can be expected, thousands of pilgrims bring with them lots and lots of money.  Lots and lots of money attracts people who want to alleviate these travelers of the need to carry that extra weight back home with them.  Hence, a giant street festival complete with food, a carnival, outdoor bars, and vendors selling every product you could ever imagine wanting to buy was born.   When I say anything you could imagine, I mean it; during this festival, one could find almost anything they wanted to blow their money on.  Pots and pans, socks, lighting fixtures for houses, lingerie, tequila shots, gambling, and even supporting the arts (through the medium of the mass amounts of street performers).  It originally struck me as odd that bars were popping up all over the street corners with gambling booths spread liberally throughout the city during a religious holiday but then I realized that these vendors were serving a very useful purpose.  Imagine making the trek all the way to Esquipulas only to realize that you are fresh out of sins to confess.  That would be a tragedy!  Fear not, however, for in one city block you can get brain meltingly drunk, blow your last month’s pay on gambling AND try out your skills at the add-hock shooting range!

    Needless to say, there are a decent amount of people from Esquipulas who do not like the festival very much.  And often with good reason: Esquipulas is full to the brim with pilgrims and salesmen, the sheer quantity of people stealing electricity causes mass blackouts to dominate the town for the majority of the week; a very non-negligible number of people were killed by the crazy driving habits of stressed (and possibly drunk?) people from all corners of Central America; and there are nowhere near enough bathroom or trash facilities in this town to facilitate the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims, meaning that waste (both the normal kind and the human kind) was deposited unceremoniously throughout the city.  Despite these setbacks, the festival brought with it a very fun environment, with everyone there in high spirits and enjoying the week.  And I've heard estimates that this week alone brings in around 40% of the money made in Esquipulas in a year... strangely I didn't hear anyone complain about that.

     At this point I am completely incapable of further explaining the sheer number of people, so I'll leave you with some stats, then lots of pictures.  For the around 10,000 pilgrims who saw the Cristo Negro each day, there was around a 7 hour wait in line.  Given that there is only one Cristo Negro, 10000 pilgrims and 86,400 seconds each day, that means each person averaged 7 hours in line for 8.64 seconds of Cristo Negro time.  Truly unbelievable. 

     I would also like to offer my sincerest apologies for last week's blog to all of my friends who struggle reading all the way through the name of their cereal every morning, and those of you who have asked for less words and more pictures (here's looking at you Eddie).  As my act of contrition for the egregious number of words unaccompanied by pictures in the last blog, please accept these 30 pictures of Esquipulas under the siege of the pilgrims.

These following pictures are of the streets of Esquipulas during the "feria."  On the right is during, on the left is the Monday after the holiday.  

Above, on the left, is the bar selling tequila shots.  

Below are pictures of the carnival that came to town.  There have been three carnivals in town (for about 3 weeks each) since I came to Esquipulas.  All three have played "we no speak americano" without stop for their entire stay here.  I never want to hear that song again. 

The front lawn of the Basilica was transformed into a makeshift campground. 

   

The night leading up the the 15th, they have a concert in the main plaza of the Basilica.  They call it the serenade of the Cristo.  It was completely packed, and a lot of fun.

To use an old, tired platitude; there was "standing room only" for the mass at midnight on the 15th.  Oh, and I don't mean in the basilica, I mean in the area directly surrounding it, in the courtyard, in the park, and in the streets surrounding the park. 

And then, after being up all night for the mass, I decided I would skip Laudes and sleep in.  I was woken up about 7:00 by a helicopter that seemed like it was flying awfully close to the Basilica.  

Turns out the Vice president of Guatemala wanted to stop by to see the Cristo.  

To all of my Chile friends:  I think meeting the VP tops meeting Ariel Dorfman. 

Sadly, hundreds of thousands of pilgrims have quite a negative impact on a little town like Esquipulas.  However, no later than Sunday afternoon, they townspeople took to the streets en masse each with a broom in hand to clean up the mess.  By Monday, the only places where I could take an appropriately dirty picture were in the places where they couldn't reach!

Oh, and some people showed up from Mexico to do some dances. 

I think they represent the Conquistadores?

After all of their sword fights, they all advanced on this poor woman.

I didn't really understand it.

   
P.S.  For anyone interested, apparently they do this twice more (although on a smaller scale) while I am here in Esquipulas.  March 8th (yep, mardi gras) for the celebration of bringing the Cristo from Antigua to Esquipulas, and Holy Week.  You are more than welcome to come down and experience the madness for yourself.