‘Semana Santa‘, the ten-day Holy Week leading up to Easter Sunday, starts on the ‘Viernes de Dolores‘ (Friday of Sorrow and Pain). We were in Guatemala many years ago to witness this religious festival.
We were in Guatemala City for Palm Sunday (the Sunday before Easter Sunday), and fronds of palm flowers with their heavy sweet fragrance were laid out in all the churches. The scent of the flowers grew more pungent as the week wore on.
Other types of palm flowers were also used for decoration, these on an entrance to a small church in Panachel.
But it was in Antigua where the week reached the height of the celebrations. Processions of robed pilgrims carried heavy platforms, from villages miles away, into the city where the streets were spread with carpets of coloured sawdust and flowers. People had worked on these carpets throughout the night, only for the honour of being destroyed by the procession.
the carpets of coloured sawdust are respectfully destroyed as the pilgrims carry the heavy platforms through pre-defined routes
The platforms often had scenes of the life of Christ on them, and ran on through the night lit up by lights.
the purple robes were worn every day of the Santa Semana except for Good Friday when they wore black, and Easter Sunday when they wore white and gold. Each procession began with pilgrims swinging incense burners, walking alongside the carpets…
a child pilgrim during Santa Semana
the lead-in for the platform, smoky incense everywhere…
this church collapsed in earthquake a few hundred years ago and has been left in its collapsed state. It was lit up for Good Friday…
purple is the colour of Easter in Guatemala, and these flowers have obliged…
the pilgrims take turns carrying the heavy platforms. These men rush for liquids after their hot long march from their villages into the city of Antigua, Guatemala.
creating a carpet of roses and sawdust for the ‘Procesiones’ in Antigua during the Santa Semana
Romans with horses play their part in the processions, a passion play representing the last week of the life of Jesus Christ.
a door decorated for Santa Semana in Guatemala at Easter