First of all, Happy Easter to everyone! Spring has come out here in Spain, bringing rain and flowers at the same time. The last few weeks have been a strange cross between beautiful days of sun and torrential rain. Even this rain, however, could not dampen my friend Jenny and I's enthusiasm for going to Sagunto to discover how Holy Week is celebrated here in Spain.
The first processional we saw was on Monday night. We went after dinner, taking along a newly-arrived pastoral assistant from Argentina with us. The longer we stay here, the more painfully obvious newcomers get--the enthusiasm, taking pictures of absolutely everything, and complaints about the distance on foot between the school and the town all mark a person as "fresh off plane." Despite this guy's picture-taking, we somehow managed to get to the processional in time. The entire village was bedecked in purple banners, and the town cathedral was lit in purple as well. It was a small processional, with lines of men robed in black carrying long white candles. The effect was very dramatic. There was also one of the better marching bands I've heard out here playing. The two images in this processional were of Christ carrying the cross and of the virgin Mary.
By Wednesday, most of the ESDES students had left on various travels, so my conversation class was sent to the market in the morning for a "practical lesson." Unlike during Fallas, there wasn't anything there related to Holy Week, but it was still fun and there were more vendors there than I'd ever seen.
That night was the craziest Easter adventure I've ever had.
It started out well. Jenny and I left on foot to see the Tamborrada, a magnificent drum display, and even managed to get a ride with one of our teachers over there. He told us that the Procession of Silence I was interested in seeing would only last a half an hour, so we shouldn't have any troubles getting back to the dorm by curfew at 11:30 even though it wasn't scheduled to start until 10:30. So, we enjoyed the Tamborrada, following the strangely-dressed musicians across town. Their playing would be enough to make any percussionist grin ear to ear.
Afterwards, to kill time before the Procession of Silence, we had kebabs for dinner and got some necessities at the Mercadona. We sat on a bridge and saw a gorgeous sunset before we headed over to the center of town again to watch the black-robed men gather for the processional. I found us what I thought was a good spot to see it, leaning against a pillar right next to the purple paper provided to prevent the wax from ruining the old streets. It was a great place to see the procession from--but not to leave from.
Basically what happened is that the processional started twenty minutes late, and we were trapped in Sagunto with no way of contacting the school. We tried to call them with a cell phone, just to discover it had no minutes. Meanwhile, the gigantic Baroque image of Jesus that's being carried passed me nearly falls on me. Yeah. That was exciting. Eventually, we broke through the lines of candle-carrying men to walk back to the school.. . but then Jenny started getting dizzy spells, and that's where life got complicated.
We were already at the outskirts of Sagunto when I thought, "Hm, she might not make it on foot back to the school. Hey, there's a friendly police car! They're supposed to be helpful!" So, I flagged them down and explained our situation to them in brief. After asking us where the school was, they said, "We can't take you there because it's not in Sagunto city limits. We can take you to a phone, though." So, we got into the back of the police car, and they took us all the way to the train station--farther away than we were from the school before and handed us a number for a taxi. They left us alone in front of a phone booth.
Not exactly alone, though. Oh, no. There was a man jabbering away in some African language we didn't recognize for half an hour before we could finally use the phone. Then, once we did, the taxi number turned out to be a dud. Some helpful policemen! So, we wound up walking all the way back in the middle of the night, arriving at about 1:30 AM. Fortunately, we had told the dorm before we left that we might be a little late, so the dean on call was waiting for us at the window to let us in. She didn't tell us off--she could tell we'd paid for breaking curfew enough by the expressions on our faces. She was just relieved we'd made it back eventually and more than a little irritated at how the police had dealt with us.
Naturally, we spent the rest of Holy Week a little closer to home, doing nice, tranquil things like taking pictures in our one day of sun. There have only been two days of sun this entire vacation--Thursday and today, Easter. For this, I am glad--nothing expresses the joy of this holiday like a beautiful, clear day. I hope all of you have a very happy Easter, full of light and joy.
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