La Madrugada

Semana Santa celebrations, like basically everything else in Spain, are intense. The entire point of celebrating Semana Santa in this way with pasos and penitents (at least when the tradition was created in the 16th century) was to educate the people about the Passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and for people to remember and participate in his Passion, death, and resurrection.

Yesterday was Jueves Santo (Holy Thursday or Maundy Thursday) where we commemorate the Last Supper and the sacrament of Communion. It is the day where Jesus celebrated the Passover meal with his disciples, washed their feet, and after praying for hours into the night was arrested and brought before the Jewish authorities. The midnight hours of Thursday night of Semana Santa, or La Madrugada (madrugada simply means the early hours of the morning after midnight), are meant to commemorate the events of that night and are perhaps the most important of the whole of Semana Santa with some of the most important and best-loved pasos including El Silencio, Jesus del Gran Poder, La Macarena, y La Esperanza de Triana.

Each paso is made up of penitents, a marching band (sometimes dressed as Roman centurians or in another Biblical costme), a sculpture of a scene from Jesus’ final days, and a second sculpture of the Virgin Mary. They march down a predetermined route, enter one side of the Cathedral, pass through it, and exit out the other side before heading back to the church they came from. It is funny because all of the Virgins are very beautiful (“Todas son muy guapas,” as Carmen says), but many people have their own particular favorite and insist that she is more beautiful than all the others are. For example, there is a huge rivalry (if you can even call it that) between two images of the virgin: La Esperanza de Triana and La Macarena. Carmen, my señora, was telling Christy and me that she has a friend who is very dedicated to La Esperanza de Triana. We heard him telling Carmen that La Esperanza de Triana is “la mas guapa que todas.” Carmen, on the other hand, prefers La Macarena, but is careful not to say that in front of him. It is like a friendly but heated sports rivalry, only Spanish-Catholic style. Personally, I like La Macarena, but I don’t want to take sides.

The first paso, El Silencio, would be passing the Cathedral a little after 2 AM, so Christy, Kerry, and I left our neighborhood at 1 AM to go to el Centro with the hopes of finding a good spot to stand where we would be able to see everything else until the last paso came by around 6 AM. That is so late for me (Or is it early? I am so confused…), but for Jesus, for Culture, and for Art, right? Right. We were lucky to find a spot near the side of the Cathedral where we could just stand and see everything pass by.

I have not seen so many people in the streets of Sevilla in all my time here, and the Spaniards have no concept of personal space, so walking was an adventure. Because the streets were blocked off for the pasos and there were many areas set up with chairs we could not take normal routes to get out of el Centro. We had linked hands so as not to get separated and there was a moment when the crowd was moving through a very small alley with two or three downward stairs before the alley rounded a corner. I was pressed against Christy with who knows who pressed against my back and on every side of me, and the whole crowd was moving as one. All of a sudden, I realized my feet were not touching the ground; I was basically carried over all the stairs by the forward motion of the crowd. Terrifying, but absolutely hilarious. A few seconds later ground rose up to meet my feet, and after a few more minutes in the middle of the mob, we were able to walk more freely and returned home a little after 6:30 AM. And that’s La Madrugada.