Cortegana Paso

The paso in Cortegana is special in the Sierra, apart from coming down our street and we can hang out on the balcony and watch it go past, because the church has steps that the costaleros, (the guys carrying the paso) have to negotiate to get to the street. This doesn't sound hard but when you take into account that they are carrying a thing that weighs a ton, the street is full of people and they are taking directions from a guy outside at the front because they can't see out from undereath, it is quite a sight. We strolled up to the top of the street at about 7.30pm to join a huge collection of our neighbors, all of whom greeted us most warmly, hanging around outside the church. They close most of the village down as it takes several hours for the paso to make its way through the streets so there are junta ( municipal) and policia local and guardia everywhere. Mostly they stand around and chat and occiasionally shoo a car away. A group of touristas showed up right in the middle of the crowd with 8 RVs that couldn't be backed up and definatley weren't going to be able to get through the village, much to the consternation of all the old folks. The guy driving the lead van had a huge argument with the guardia, never a good idea, and in very bad spirits had to get his HUGE rv around the corner and went off down the side road out of the village. He was shouting things at the crowd, which we think translated as it wasn't his fault that they had driven in to Cortegana and there wasn't anything he could do about it. The other 7 Rvs followed very slowly, many havin to do 5 point turns to get around the corner as the streets are all rather narrow. There was much giggling from the old ladies who live on our street because the way they went basically goes to nowhere, and they weren't going to be able to get back into the village. Our neighbour seemed to be saying it served them right for being forasteros, people from another village, which is almost worse than being an extranjero, a foreigner.

Once that entertainment was over, we got to watch the 2 pasos being brought out of the church. There was much cheering as each of them reached steet level and it was cool to watch them prop Jesus upon his cross as he was too tall to fit through the door upright, and he had 2 guys following along, who lifted up the electrical cables along the streets so that the paso could fit underneath. We then strolled up the road to the main square to watch them all go past again, it is very easy to outpace a paso and partook in the sacred tradition of cafe con leche and vino tinto in the local. The paso came back past our house at about 11 that night. It was very spooky as the Cortegana penitente wear black and as there was a howling gale, they didn't have their candles lit. They walk in silence so watching these hooded black shapes move slowly along the street was really rather weirdly beautiful.

Have to say that all in all we had a wonderful introduction to the traditions of what is probably this areas grandest religious festival. Can't wait for the Romerias which are much more pagan!