retro-blogging: Quema del Diablo

it's a bit cheesy and cliche, but i'm finding lots of connections in holidays and beliefs from around the world.

for instance:
the exclusively-Guatemalan holiday of
Quema del Diablo (Burning of the Devil), 7 December--
these details i got from a spanish website, so my comprehension may be a bit sketch, but it's basically the day where people burn the yuckies in their lives to get ready for the new year (and i thought to get ready for christmas, too, but not sure.) they bring out their trash and other junk to burn, but mostly they burn Devil pinatas, which are ubiquitous on the streets of g-town in the few days leading up to this holiday. self-explanatory, but the devil represents everything bad and evil in their lives. copious amounts of fireworks and firecrackers are also purchased and set off in the streets, which obviously renders a realllly safe environment. (we had a slight mis-hap in which the fireworks started spouting HORIZONTALLY back at us, instead of vertically into the safe sky... let's see if i can get Kamster's video up. it was funny, but only cuz no one was hurt.)


a nice portrait of the pinata devil.... these are burnedddddd. we think the "7" on his chest signifies the 7 deadly sins, but not sure. they range from toddler-sized to building-sized, but the ones bought on the street are shorter than me.

conjunction junction:
does this tradition remind you of Lunar New Year? amazing, right? and, the eight year old girl standing next to me made the same connection as well, so i'm glad to report that i'm at least as smart as an eight year old :)

honestly, if i had just been sitting at my house and not known about this holiday, i would have thought that the world was ending. it's a loud, fiery holiday.

next year, come visit on december 7th!