More Procesiones & Preparations

Today was the Procesion Infantil, from the church on the corner by our apartment - La Merced. There were thousands of people in the streets to watch. The floats are enormous - and the carriers are all children. We learned that the carriers for each procession are organized into groups according to height in order to balance the load properly. So the first group to carry a float out of a church will consist of the tallest carriers. At the first change-off, the next group will be a bit shorter, etc until the last group, who will all be short people! The organization involved in these processions is incredible, but the changes of the carriers and other things that happen along the way are done so smoothly that an observer will probably never be aware unless watching for it very closely.
Some of the floats weigh several thousand pounds and require as many as 80 people to carry them. The processions last for as long as 12 hours or more, continuing into the darkness of night or even into the early hours of the next day. The images that they carry may be as much as 400 years old in some cases, and their history is a history of La Antigua itself. There are stories of where statues were moved to be protected and restored after they survived the destructive force of various earthquakes. There are stories of where they were hidden to protect them from being moved when the government was moved from Antigua to Guatemala City after the earthquake of 1776. And stories of images which miraculously moved themselves to different locations in the middle of the night. These images (imágenes in Spanish) are more than just sculptures. Many believe them to have miraculous powers. We hear them referred to as "the Jesus," or "el Seniór," clearly indicating that they are considered to be of significance much greater than merely a representation. The Virgin Mary is usually called "la Virgen" (the Virgin). The activities of lent and holy week are an integral part of the history and culture of La Antigua. Indeed, without the processions, vigils, alfombras and sacred images, it would simply not be Antigua.