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Published: April 14th 2013
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El Monasterio de Santa Catalina de Arequipa. The Peruvians use monastery and convent pretty much interchangeably, so it is really the Convent of Santa Catalina. The price for general admission is $35 soles per person (roughly ten bucks) and to get the full benefit, you will want to hire a guide for an additional 20 soles for the group. After an hour with the guide, you can return at your leisure to the places you saw for study in greater detail or more picture taking. Flash photography is allowed. We were very lucky to get Sandra for our guide. Not only is she a very nice young lady, she is not too hard on the eyes either. She studied English in the United States, so her abilities in English are far better than most and she has a good, understandable accent. Even though I am about half deaf, she still managed to get all the information across. If you go to the convent, you would do well to request her even if it means waiting until she finishes her tour.
This is the official web site link:
http://www.santacatalina.org.pe/ One of the first things you see when you enter is
a huge sign over the archway that implores SILENCIO! The nuns were required to remain silent for about six hours of the day. One of the next things you see are a barred window where the nuns could visit relatives. It was designed in such a way as to prevent them from seeing anything but bits and pieces of their loved ones. Their days were taken up by prayer, meditation and Bible study. They also made items that were sold to support the convent. They also prepared the Holy Host unleavened bread using a giant sifter that produced the very fine flour used for the baking. It was baked in a separate room known as the Host Room.
Although they were limited to one bath per month, there was evidently a lot of laundry done at the convent. They invented an interesting way to accomplish this using a constantly running flow that ran through several huge vases (
jarron) that had been broken in half. Each one had a pipe through the trough that ran into the
jarron. The water was diverted into the
jarron by blocking the flow of water near the pipe until it was full. See pic
below.
The nuns lived in rooms known as cells, which somehow seems appropriate as the convent was almost like a prison in many ways. Wealthier families who had a daughter in the convent could provide for them much larger, nicer cells than normal. Some even brought servants with them. Some cells were set up for multiple occupants. I believe the guide told us that there were normally 120 nuns in residence at any one time. The streets inside the convent are all named for cities in Spain (Sevilla, Malaga, etc.). The convent has been described as a city within a city.
Seeing the way the nuns lived was fairly impressive. One thing I noticed right away was the total lack of toilet facilities. Not sure how they handled that little situation. Pots, I suppose. The rooms seemed spartan with only a bed and a chair and a rudimentary kitchen. Some apparently were better decorated than others, presumably due to the wealth of the families.
One of the cool things they used was a volcanic stone water filter that was semi-porous. They filled the vessel with water at night and in the morning, it had all filtered into
another container beneath the cone shaped stone. Yay! Clean water.
Don't forget to see the pics at the bottom of the page.
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