on the edge

The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe

The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
  Originally uploaded by waywuwei

Every December in the weeks before Christmas, is celebrated the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe who is the patron Saint of Mexico. It's a big deal, especially in places like Puerto Vallarta where she is the patron of the town church. It goes on for over a week and each day groups of pilgrims come from different places to the local church. They arrive with candles and elaborate floats that they've brought from the place where they live. Many walk all of the way. Each time a group of pilgrims arrive the church bells ring. This goes on night and day for a week. At the peak of pilgrim arrivals two days before the feast day, the bells ring every 15 minutes night and day.

Rooftop Singers

  Rooftop Singers 
  Originally uploaded by waywuwei

One of the things I love about Mexico is this phenomenon that occurs on occasions. When we lived in Bucerias about an hour north of here, we had two neighbors, Juan and Maria. Juan was in his 90's and had lived through the revolution and would often talk about it. Every year on Juan's birthday, we would be woken up in the early morning by a Mariachi band. Maria would hire them to wake Juan on the morning of his birthday. It was an incredibly beautiful way to wake up in the morning and a beautiful gift.

This group began playing around 5:15 am this morning. They are still playing now as I write this at 9:45 am. They are not quite as wonderful as a full Mariachi group, just a drummer and an accordion player, but the accordion player is really good and knows enough songs to fill 4+ hours. I'm not sure what the occasion is but I suspect it is someone's birthday who loves music.