Semana Santa

Happy Easter!

Today is the final day of the huge celebration Semana Santa (Holy Week) that's been going on here in Sevilla. Semana Santa is one of the most important and traditional events in the city. It occurs all over Spain, but no city does as grand a celebration as Sevilla.

Semana Santa begins on Palm Sunday and continues all week until Easter Sunday. Certain churches out of the hundreds of different ones in Sevilla participate, which means they have have beautiful floats called pasos that have lifelike wooden sculptures of individual scenes of the events that lead up to Jesus dying on the cross, or images of the Virgin Mary showing her grief for the torture and killing of her Son. Some of these pasos are hundreds of years old and are considered artistic masterpieces.

The paso is richly carved out of wood and decorated with fabric, flowers (real and white delicate and very detailed ones that are made out of candle wax), and candles. Many of the structures carrying the scenes of Christ are gilded with gold, and those carrying the Mary are usually silver-plated. As a result, the pasos all weigh at least one ton or more, and some weigh three tons! This is important because unlike our parades where floats are driven by cars, these floats are carried by men. They are called costaleros and there are anywhere between 20-50 men underneath the pasos carrying them. They practice all year round to be in shape for this one week, because some of these pasos are carried for 10-14 hrs one day throughout the whole city. 

There is also a band that plays and marches behind the pasos, and depending on what song and rhythm they are playing, the costaleros underneath will march differently, sway, make the paso "dance", or move it up and down. Since they are all inside the structure and hidden from the external view by a curtain, the paso seems to move by itself. However, some processions are silent, with no musical accompaniment. When these pasos walk by, the audience must remain silent as well. Everyone is very respectful of these pasos.

The sculptures themselves are carved and painted, and often lifesize or larger. The oldest surviving ones were carved in the 16th century!

There are a number of people who walk before the pasos and are dressed in robes and wear the distinctive pointed hood, hold long wax candles (only lit at night), marching in silence, and are sometimes barefoot as a sign of penitence. These are the Nazarenos. Colors of the robe are distinctive for each brotherhood (church). Usually the Nazarenos march in pairs. And no, even though they might resemble people of the KKK they are in no way affiliated with them. The Nazarenos and Semana Santa originated long before the KKK ever came to be. Also, there are a number of penitentes, carrying wooden crosses, making public penance. They wear the robe and the hood of the brotherhood, but the hood is not pointed like the Nazarenos.

A procession can be made up from a few hundred to near 3,000 Nazarenos and last anywhere from 4 to 14 hours, depending on how far the home church is from the Cathedral (each paso leaves from their church and walks through whatever streets they want, but they all must go down the main route that leads to the Cathedral. Then, after passing the Cathedral, they will walk back to their home church). The largest processions can take over an hour and a half to cross one particular spot.

This week of different processions is very culturally and spiritually important to Catholics and tourists all over the world. The city is PACKED full of people! It's difficult getting anywhere in less than an hour (for the shortest distances). Bus routes have been changed, parking lots are full, some of the streets are closed off to bikers and cars. Whew! It has been a tough week to figure out how to get around. Most stores, markets, and all schools are closed for the week (I'm almost out of food in my house because no stores are open!), and many of my Spanish friends left to other cities and countries for a spring break, and to stay away from the crowds that were here in Sevilla.

I loved watching all the different processions. It was so fascinating to me! In some churches, people are able to go in and kiss the feet or hands of Jesus on his paso before the brotherhood leaves, and there are some Virigin Mary pasos where the people in the audience will yell things to her, like how pretty she looks.

However, this week as a whole has been a huge disappointment due to the rain. It has rained almost every day except for two or three, and as a result hardly any of the processions have been able to go out (since they are all made out of wood and are very old). People are seen crying in the streets out of sadness and disappointment that their favorite paso couldn't go out, or if they were a Nazareno or penitente then they are also hugely disappointed. I'm glad I got to see the 9 or 10 pasos that I saw earlier in the week.

It has been such a unique and amazing experience for me. I hope to come back another year and see more of it (now the pasos are in the churches so you can see them there, since most of them couldn't actually go outside), but for now I am thrilled by what I got to see. And the rest of this week was also so much fun! I spent a lot of time with my different Spanish friends here, dancing, eating, talking (in Spanish of course), and just having a blast. It has been a very relaxing week (no work and lots of sleep!), but now it's back to teaching bright and early tomorrow morning.

If you want to learn more about Semana Santa, check out the Wikipedia webpage (lots of good information). I've also included a video so you can see some of the pasos and processions, as well as part of Sevilla! I wish I could post some of the videos that I took, but my internet is too slow to upload them.