10th April 2015 – San Cristobal de las Casas

We get a good night sleep, and this morning Michael wants to work on the car and check the front end after the accident. There is a morning tour with a local guide so Kay goes on this with all the girls and 3 of the men as the rest of the men are working on their cars.Our tour guide Daun meets us at 9:15 with a bus and first we go to a local village San Juan Chamula which is inhabited by Tzotzil people descendants of the Myans. There are many stalls with local handcrafts, mostly textiles that the ladies make. In the main square is the church, which is like no other that we have seen and is used for locals to worship their saints and practice their ancient rituals. There is no resident priest, so it is not like a normal Catholic Church the people come here to pray if they have a sick family member, a sick animal or for their Harvest and they bring their own medicine man or woman with them.The local people believe that John the Baptist came to the village many years ago so he is the patron saint of the village. Inside the church there are no seats, there are cloths draped across the ceiling and around the walls are effigies of different saints and in front of each one are dozens of candles. The whole inside is glowing from the thousands of candles that are alight all around the walls, the altar and on the floor. On the floor there are pine needles strewn all over the tiles, which makes it a bit slippery to walk on. There are family groups sitting on the floor and in front of each one are dozens of candles just stuck on the floor tiles. One group that we watch for a while comprised a medicine man, husband, wife and 3 children, a couple of bottles of brown liquid and a chicken. The brown liquid in the bottles is either coca cola or a drink they make from fermented corn and once the medicine man passes it over the candle and does his blessing it becomes holy, the husband then drinks some. The medicine man passes the clucking chicken over the flames of the candles and says a blessing, then it goes back in the box. The children are only young and they are very well behaved while this ceremony is going on. There are several of these groups sitting on the floor some bigger than others, while we wander between them. I felt as though we are invading their privacy, but apparently they don’t mind as our visit brings money into the village. On the alter in the middle is John the Baptist with Christ to one side with Mayan crosses. It’s quite strange to see the mix of conventional Catholic Church effigies and pagan rituals being performed to them, instead of to the moon or sun as they would’ve done in ancient times – one might call it progress. One lady with her young son was praying to one of the saints and then she looked at her mobile phone briefly and continued praying. The women of the village are all in a line around the main square waiting to collect their money from the government.ÿ In order to qualify for this money they must attend medical check ups and their children must go to school.ÿ When the girls of the village are between the age of 12 – 14 they are betrothed to a partner selected by their parents.ÿ These young girls have about 5 children and there is a very high rate of cervical cancer amongst them, hence the reason they have to have medical check ups.ÿ A lot of the children in this village are very dirty looking and sad.Next we go to the village of Zinacantan which is a primary flower growing area. All of the flowers are grown in hot houses and many are exported to the US. Flowers feature in the embroidery of the ladies in the village. We visit a family textile business and watch a lady weaving. We are also able to try the fermented corn drink which is very strong and burns all the way down, an acquired taste and it’s 40% alcohol. There is a lady making tortillas on a large plate over an open fire and we get to try one. There’s a choice of fillings, avocado, black beans, tomato, cheese, hot hot peppers, they’re delicious.We visit the church in this village which is a conventional Catholic Church and we girls have a photo taken with a few of the local children.Back in San Cristobal Daun takes the girls for a walk to the main plaza where we visit a shop and we are given a talk about amber, which is mined not far from here. There are street vendors selling plastic & glass but saying its amber. The festival that is currently on is the Spring and Peace festival and the main plaza is decorated with lots of fresh flowers, on arches and the buildings, it’s very pretty.We then walk through the streets to the local food market, a bit like Vic Market you can buy anything here. We buy mangoes, avocados, tomatoes, bananas and passion fruit for our lunches over the next couple of days. This afternoon after Michael finishes working on the car we go for a walk around town and a hot chocolate before going to a restaurant for dinner and we are entertained by a couple of guys playing a large xylophone, although Dave thinks it’s too loud so blocks his ears!ÿ The girls enjoy the music while they drink their Margareta’s.