Chichi

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We have had a full day in Chichi and it was fantastic. Lucy and I wandered around the streets and in the plaza for a while this morning. There is a lot of activity - music playing continuously, lots of locals wandering around in traditional clothing, there were traditional dances in the most amazing and elaborate costumes, processions through town carrying these huge statues - really incredible. We seemed to have been in the right spot every time.

The markets have everything you could imagine in them, shoes, clothes, fruit,ceremonial masks children´s toys and even dried fish! Lucy and I were starting to head back to the hotel, when amongst the crowd we spotted Jack, who was asking for directions. He arrived in Guat. City late last night and caught the chicken bus to Chichi today. I don´t think he was expecting to find us quite that easily though! It´s fair to say that tourists stick out. Apart from the cameras and the clothes, we are the tallest people here. Lucy said she feels like a giantess, and even I am tall. Many of the local women are not even as tall as my shoulder and most of the men are about my height. So it´s easy to spot one another in the crowd - don´t need to worry about getting lost!

After lunch we hired a guide to wander up to the cemetry. The cemetry is gorgeous as the tombs and crosses are all brightly coloured. Jose told us it depends on what day of the week you die, eg if you die on a Monday your tomb is blue, on a Wednesday it´s pink. Some of them had two colours, which shows the day of the week that you die firstly and then the day of the week that you were brought to the cemetry. He also pointed out the different crosses, as there is a Mayan cross as well as a Catholic cross (which crosses higher). It´s interesting, as the Catholic and Mayan religions seem to have merged together for the locals here. Some of the graves had black paint on them as well, which Jose told us was because of the bad spirits from the witch doctor!

Hiring a guide turned out to be a great idea. Originally we only asked him to come up to the cemetry with us as the guide book tells us that the cemetry isn´t a good place to go as tourists are frequently robbed at gunpoint. Not surprisingly we took quite a while to decide whether or not to go, but eventually decided that leaving our passports and most of the cash hidden in the room and hiring a guide quite a good compromise! Jose was great though, and ended up taking us to a ceremonial mask workshop and to the costume place, where I even tried on one of the local dancing costumes. It was a bit smelly, which is hardly surprising given how hot it is here and they are dancing in the full sun. It gave the others something to laugh at though!

Jose also took us up Pascual Abaj, which is a local shrine to the Mayan earth god revered by locals. It was a fifteen or so minute walk up a hill, so we also got a great view of the town. Some locals had just finished a ceremony to the god and a chicken had been recently sacrificed. There was a fire smouldering, chicken feathers all about and a charred chicken carcass still burning. Half way up the hill we passed another Mayan shrine with a women chief doing a ceremony with a local woman. They were both smoking the hugest fattest cigar type things you´ve ever seen. We asked Jose about it and he said that it was a ceremony to help her or someone in her family stop smoking! He said he had been to the witch doctor to stop smoking a year ago and it had cured him.

Because of the fiesta, there are quite a few drunken locals about. Jose told us that it´s anistetisa naturale (natural anaesthetic) and that when poor people go to the hospital that´s what they take!

The fiesta is non-stop. Las bombas and the fireworks go off non-stop. We asked Jose how long and he said five days. That´s a lot of gunpowder, because these things are huge. They go way up into the sky and make a noise like, well a bomb. One day of the festival is enough though, as with the music, dancing and las bombas I should imagine that after five days you would be pleased to have some peace and quiet.

The weather is great - hot and sunny, but very cool in the evening. We had a fire in the room, which was lovely. The hotel is really lovely, but I must say I like the 'room attendant' best! Jorge is our lovely man, who waits on us in the restaurant, cleans our room, and lit the fire. A girl could get accustomed to this life!

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Photos

A local bar
Me and Jack enjoying a drink in the local bar. Gallo is the local beer. Not bad.

The cemetery
Lots of gorgeous colours here.

More in the cemetery
It really was very pretty!

Women selling local cloth
A typical scene in Chichi

Market scene
Chichi is famous for its markets twice a week. We weren't there for those, but we got a small taster.

Pascual Abaj
If you look carefully, you might be able to see the chicken carcass and the feathers.....

Parrot at our hotel
This very noisy bird was thankfully put to bed about 10. But he was an early riser.

Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

I decided to read some of your early blogs
This festival sounds great. We will add that to our list.