Valentine’s Day in Guatemala is known as El Día del Cariño. Cariño and caress share the same etymology and it means affection. The Day of Affection would be a close translation for El Día del Cariño, thus it is much more than Valentine’s Day because it is the day to show your affection, love and appreciation to your co-workers, neighbors, friends, family, and of course, your girlfriend or girlfriend; whatever the case may be.
Processions are majestic, huge and long in La Antigua Guatemala. You can browse the Processions category to get an idea of the size of the processions in La Antigua Guatemala. There are smaller and more humble processions in the villages and small communities surrounding La Antigua Guatemala. This year, I will try to focus more in the Holy Week celebrations and processions in the villages where you can still observe the fervor, regardless of the size, for all these Catholic rituals. The photo above was taken in the village of San Pedro Las Huertas, while the procession made a pit stop or parada as they are known in Spanish. Well, I think that is the name, maybe somebody more knowledgeable in Catholic rituals can provide the actual name for the stops the processions make every so often at specific spots.
The cobblestone streets of La Antigua Guatemala were originally designed for horses and horse-carriages. So, it is no wonder that even light vehicles, like cars, create a lot of damage to the streets which, therefore, need constant repairing. Now you can imagine that huge and heavy trucks like the ones pictured above not only damage the streets, but the foundation of the houses and the city itself.
This is the façade of Café No Sé in La Antigua Guatemala, headquarters of the John Rexer’s 1a avenida sur empire. His efforts to take control over the whole 1a avenida sur (1st Avenue South) are a little more humble than Pinky and The Brain Gutiérrez who want the whole world to convert to their tender, juicy and crunchy recipe of fried chicken. 😉
The bar man is waiting for the hippies customers to show up… even though it looks empty in the early afternoon, you can barely fit inside at night. If you like live music and a bohemian atmosphere, Café No Sé is your place in town.
One by one all the houses in La Antigua Guatemala are becoming business like cafes, spanish schools, offices, travel agencies, folk-art stores, et-cetera. Above you see the corridor at Café No Sé, which was converted into a dining area by placing a few tables and chairs.
Signs: They come with all kinds messages; some with weird information too.
If you’ve been visiting La Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo for a month or longer, you will know that the sign category gets a lot of attention from my viewfinder. You can browse the sign category to see 48 samples of the different signs capture thus far.
eck, sometimes we even do some local recycling too. For instance, all those empty hard liquor bottles can have a fulfilling second life as salt and pepper shakers.
What I like about the people of Café No Sé is that they know when they are onto something; at once they apply the Café No Sé branding, and just in case, they make sure it is registered. These are my kind of hippies! 😉
John Rexer, New Yorker by birth, Mexican by heart and Antigüeño by choice, came to La Antigua Guatemala a few years ago and after surfing the local scene, he realized a joint was needed for backpackers, hippies, ex-pats and others looking for the other side, the flip side, of LAG. A sort of bohemian atmosphere where people were free to express their artistic vein, or simply to relax while eating the local variant of Tex-Mex food or drinking cheap beers or his own Ilegal Mezcal brand (the generic name for Tequila-like agave distills).
I found out about the sign above via Buried Mirror and I knew a mini series was long over due about this hippie joint in La Antigua Guatemala.
Do you know what place am I talking about?
Who ever came out with this great idea for a sign, for sure, was a hippie who now is very wealthy. Check out this amazing slide show that reveals all the different places where the sign has been posted.
COLOMBIA SANS FARC, the sign reads.
As the new mayor took office on January 15th, he launched a new campaign to rescue the streets for the lent celebrations begin in February. Right now there are crews of cobblestone street workers almost everywhere and many streets are closed for repairs. Let’s hope they can meet their goal since Lent or Cuaresma in Spanish is approaching soon.
I find the singing of the indigenous people extremely haunting and touching, even though, they are singing evangelical hymns. To me this singing has another layer of pain and denouncing which is above the meaning of the words they sing; something much older and more mystical than the religious hymn brought by the European Christianity.
Cascarones are empty eggshells that are filled with pica-pica paper confetti and then covered up with another piece of papel china (tissue paper) and finally painted in colorful ways; like everything else in Guatemala. The final painted eggshells are reserved for the Carnaval as it is known carnival in Spanish which is the ‘Sad Tuesday’ before Ash Wednesday; why ‘Sad Tuesday’?, well carnival means “farewell to meat”, you can only be sad if you are going to keep a vegetarian lent. 😉
