“Do we really want to travel in hermetically sealed popemobiles through the rural provinces of France, Mexico and the Far East, eating only in Hard Rock Cafes and McDonalds? Or do we want to eat without fear, tearing into the local stew, the humble taqueria's mystery meat, the sincerely offered gift of a lightly grilled fish head? I know what I want. I want it all. I want to try everything once.” ― Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
I've been amazed that, although this is a very popular festival in Mexico and was even shown on a popular TV show on PBS, that there are few foreign tourists here. Supposedly, there are 20,000 people here for this event, but I have seen fewer than 20 American and European tourists. Lots of people come here from Mexico City and Puebla and there are a lot of locals, but hardly any foreigners. We were the only foreigners on the bus to and from Cuetzalan. Why is this? Who knows, but they are missing a great experience.
Day 3 started with some street food. There are lots of vendors selling tacos, elote (corn on the cob slathered in mayonnaise and chile pepper) and deep fried things I don't know the name of. We tried some tacos with mystery meat, slathered in hot sauce, cilantro and onions. This was followed by six different deep fried things, one resembling a fajita, the others who knows what? Total for everything, less than $2 and a wonderful, tasty experience.
From here it was down to the plaza for one of the main events; the coronation of La Reina de la Huipil. The candidates were 11 young women, ranging in age from 14 to 17. They were all dressed to the nines in their beautiful white skirts, white huipiles embroidered on neck and shoulders, a white lacy poncho style shawl, a kind of bonnet on their heads, and many necklaces. They looked very regal. All were barefoot. Led up by their town's mayordomo onto the platform which was carpeted with soft pine needles, They had to go before several judges, reciting a speech in both Nahuatl, one of the local indigenous language and the language of the Aztecs, and Spanish. The speeches were long and a bit canned, all about the special features of life and responsibilities and crafts in their towns, but apparently one was better than the rest and she was the new Reina, or queen.
It was during this that we noticed a Voladores troup going into the church. We followed them and they were soon doing their dance, going around in a circle, stomping their feet, bowing and twirling, the leader playing his flute and drum, always going counterclockwise, which is the direction they fly. Soon, other dance troups came in and started their dances. Within a few minutes there were seven dance troups dancing at the same time, some with guitars, violins, drums, flutes and lots of ankle bells. The entire church echoed with the cacophonous sound! They were all doing this for a blessing from San Francisco, the patron saint of the festival. After their dance they would all go up to the statue of the Saint for an individual blessing.
The funny thing was, throughout this whole thing in the church, and we were in there about two hours, there wasn't a priest in sight. Maybe this was just a little too pagan for them. But as a practicing agnostic myself, it was wonderful!
We came and went intermittently, but the ritual dances inside the church went on for hours! It didn't stop from late morning, til about ten at night. It was amazing how wonderful the cacophony of drums and flutes and violins and more drums was, echoing in there. It was transporting. Plus you could really really get a feel for the descriptions Cortez's men had written about how powerful and terrifying that same drumming had been for them, when they'd encountered it all the way up from the Veracruz coast to Mexico City through these same mountain ranges,
The rest of the day was spent mostly hanging out in the plaza, watching Voladores about every half hour or so, seeing the different dance troups, all dancing around the plaza at the same time.
We also went up to the upper plaza, where some great traditional music, called huapango, was being played. This consists of a violinist, a guitarist and person playing the jarana, which is a ukulele type instrument from Veracruz. There was great traditional music and dance.
The evening, and for us the Feria, ended with a spectacular fireworks show. There was a huge "Castillo", a giant wall of different fireworks. These included a fiery rotating duck, squirrel, acorn and other objects. At the end, San Franciso himself went off in a blaze of glory. At the top, two fantastic rotating Voladores went off in a spectacular fashion, with fire shooting off everywhere and loud noises galore. What a way to end this amazing three days!
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