Semana Santa in Sevilla

I think that Semana Santa (Holy Week) in Sevilla is hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t experienced it, especially when I can’t show you pictures as well, but if you are really interested in it, I will be more than happy to share pictures and some video with you when I come home (May 25th). I will however, do my best to try and share a bit of the magic of the week.

No matter what religion or what beliefs someone has, I think it is impossible to not get swept up in the excitement and emotion that is Semana Santa in Sevilla. From the moment I stepped off the bus from Barcelona Sevilla felt different to me, it had a different energy. In truth, the craziness in Sevilla had even started a few days before I left to go to Barcelona; I think I was one of the few leaving Sevilla and not entering. The Wednesday I got home it was a rainy day and the pasos (floats) that were scheduled for that evening’s processions were cancelled. As my Señora and I watched this announcement on T.V. (4 channels have constant coverage of the processions), the screen was filled with band members, costaleros (the guys that carry the floats), and nazarenos (people in outfits that look like KKK outfits that carry candles and are the beginning and end of each float), crying because the event they had prepared for all year had been cancelled.

Thursday for me was spent sleeping, as I was extremely ill and preparing for the night’s festivities. Early Friday morning there is a midnight procession through the streets, and I had been invited to go to my Senora’s cousin’s house to watch the action from her roof (the church where two of the pasos left from is right near by). My roommate, Señora’s nieces, niece’s friend, and niece’s boyfriend, Señora, and myself left at 12:45 in the morning to go to her cousin’s house. Upon arriving, the kids were sent to the roof to enjoy each other’s company and traditional Semana Santa food while we waited for the pasos to leave. This requires a lot more patience than one may think. The procession did not even start until 2:00 am, and this was when the nazarenos left (it was about another 45 minutes until the first paso left). In this time, my Señora’s nieces and friends kept us busy, asking us for swearwords in English and teaching us swearwords in Spanish (something I found highly ironic considering the event) and sharing each other’s company. We also enjoyed watching the crowds grow larger and larger below us (this is a much bigger deal than those of you reading at home think it is).

Finally, around 2:00 am the band began playing and the nazarenos began slowly filing out of the church, their candles lit, in a solemn procession, swaying to the tune of the music. The end to the nazarenos finally came and the crowd fell completely silent as the paso with Jesus on it began to slowly (painstakingly) leave the church. When the paso finally made it out of the church, the crowd erupted in cheers and applause. It was then that the magic really began. The paso actually swayed and moved to the beat of the music with choreographed moves. At times the paso would move slowly, at other points quickly, at times forward and other times backwards. One of my favorite parts was when after the men carrying the paso would rest by ducking down low enough so that the paso could rest on its stand. At this point, the silence would be pierced by a man banging on a wooden knocker, followed by yells from inside the paso and then, out of nowhere, the paso was being thrown into the air so the men could begin their march again. At this point the crowd would go wild again. After the Jesus paso finally made its way out of view, and after another 45 minute of nazarenos, the Virgin Mary paso repeated the process of leaving the church, this time to applause and people yelling “Guapa, Guapa” (“Beautiful, Beautiful). The beauty of the moment was impossible to ignore, with the Virgin’s face lit up by giant candles, the beautiful music being played, the nazarenos filing past, and the cheers from the crowd. It was an incredibly emotion filled moment. The Virgin eventually passed as well, and when the last of the nazarenos filed past at 4:00 am, we all headed back to our houses to get a bit of sleep.

Six and a half hours later we were on our way once again to my Señora’s cousin’s house to see the pasos enter the church they had left hours before. It was a distinctly different atmosphere than during the evening, and it appeared to be more like a carnival, with people selling cotton candy, balloons, and other trinkets and junk food as we walked to the house. We had to weave through massive crowds in order to make it to the house, but we finally made it and headed up to the roof. The crowds were even bigger than the night before, and I was glad to have my perch with a view from above. It took hours for the first nazarenos to come and they appeared to be dead men walking after having walked for ten hours (some of them barefoot as a way of repenting). The first paso finally made its way, barreling through the crowd (people were allowed to mill in the streets in front of it). When it appeared that the paso was finally going to disappear into the church, it burst right back out to the beat of the music, and the crowd went wild. It was quite the spectacle. As it finally made its way in, a man on a balcony began singing a saeta, a traditional song sung to the paso and its carriers, and the crowd went silent. When he was finished, the crowd erupted again and anxiously awaited the paso with the Virgin. When she finally made her way down the street, the candles from the night before still blazing, people threw rose petals down from their balconies and cheered “Guapa, Guapa”. There was chaos as people tried to break through police barricades and touch the paso, overcome with emotion. I really thought for a moment that I was going to witness a stampede. The Virgin paso repeated the trick of bursting back out of the church and then it finally entered to the sound of the saeta. We watched as nazarenos, costaleros, and band members milled about the church, crying as they had just fulfilled their penitence and would have to wait another year to do it again. It was an experience that I will never forget and that I will forever be grateful to my Señora for sharing it with me.

Saturday my Señora had her sons and their girlfriends over for a big lunch, after which we all went out for coffee and traditional Semana Santa pastries, torrijas. It was, to say the least, a very overwhelming experience, but at the same time a perfect way to celebrate Semana Santa. After that my roommate and I went to the town center to watch more pasos as well as the crowd. After walking around for awhile and just seeing what we could run into, we decided to do it the Spanish way and got some drinks at an outdoor bar and watched the pasos pass while enjoying glasses of wine. The pasos were cut short due to a sudden downpour, and it was madness as people ran through the streets seeking shelter. When my roommate and I finally made it home, we watched on T.V. as the pasos were being carried at the fastest pace I had seen, seeking shelter at the nearest church.

Being part of Semana Santa in Sevilla was an absolutely amazing experience. As I sat on the roof at night, watching the nazarenos pass by, talking to my Señora’s nieces, I really felt as though I would rather be nowhere else in the world.

An Easter Miracle: I ate pork for the first time in 6 years and realized once again why I don’t like it.