Embroidery and Gunpowder

My husband and I took a trip this past Christmas into the state of Chiapas, down along the Guatemala border. Visiting Chiapas is like looking into Frida Kahlo’s closet. When you see her in self-portraits wearing those colorful costumes, you might think, Ah, those were the days…But those days are, amazingly, not gone. In village after village you can still see the women in the local huipil, a blouse with huge flowers, or banded in red and yellow, or covered in fanciful purple vegetation, all embroidered.

There’s more exotica, too. Handmade marimbas are played in churches where floors, empty of pews, are strewn with pine needles and the air is perfumed with copal incense. Photographs are not allowed of people or images of saints, their essences being at risk. In some churches, those saints are called cuaranderos/healers and the priest is replaced by the shaman.

We stayed in San Cristobal de las Casas for several days and then meandered up toward Palenque. Cresting a hill, we looked down on a village clustered around a particularly grand orange church. We pulled off the highway.

In the town we found the women wearing ponchos of white cotton with wide bands of color, either red, magenta, or purple, the colors looking as though they had just come out of the dye pot. The ponchos were embroidered around the neck and down the front with whatever contrasting color would pop the most. I’d seen them before. I think hippies used to come home with them. Frida wore one, too.

We found the street leading to the church and tried to park. But no. An official told us there was no parking on that street because of El Relámpago—The Lightning Bolt. We’d have to park on a side street. We did as told and strolled toward the church.

We passed people sweeping the middle of the street, ignoring the plastic trash on the sides. Following behind them, a man was pouring out a trail of gunpowder as another laid down, every 18 inches or so, an agave fiber-wrapped bundle like a small tamale which likely was packed with gunpowder, too. The Lightning Bolt. A sweeper said it would go off in about 20 minutes so we went on toward the village center.

A full carnival was set up in front of the church and most of the town was there. Children rode the carousel, going up and down with great glee, but in slow motion since the only power came from other children pushing it around. On the steps of the church, a crowd of dazzling poncho-clad ladies looked at us with some suspicion. Oh, for that picture. Inside three men on a marimba played bouncy religious music as worshipers sat on the floor with a thousand candles between them and the altar. It was the feast day of Santo Tomás.

When we went back out to see the Lightning Bolt, it stretched nearly a kilometer. It would be lit at the far end and head toward the church. We took a position on the street about half way, back against a house, and waited with a few other people.

Whoa! There it came! A fireball, big explosions about once a second, smoke and dust completely filling the street and billowing up over the tops of the houses. We all looked, we all ran. No analysis or assessment. Down the first side street, and then down still further as the explosions began to concuss our chests and eardrums. Everyone pressed fingers hard to ears. Still, those bombs were the loudest sounds I’ve ever heard. Too slowly and painfully, El Relámpago passed and went on to assault the center of town. When we finally could unstop our ears, we heard the echoes of the explosions bouncing crazily around the valley.

The trauma to hearing and brain was with us for the next couple of hours. The delight seems to be permanent.