Easter in Andalucia: Two celebrations, one day

Spaniards rarely let anything disrupt tradition or get in the way of a celebration, and Easter, 2011, in my local Andalucian village has demonstrated this point charmingly. Canillas de Aceituno annually hosts one of the first food festivals of the season in the picturesque mountainous region of La Axarquia. The celebration of their contribution to local cuisine, morcilla, or black pudding, occurs without deviation on the final Sunday of April each year, even when that day happens to fall on Easter Sunday, as it does this year. I wondered how the solemnity of the Semana Santa processions and the passion with which Spaniards famously express their faith and penitence would match with the all-out frivolity and drink-fuelled enthusiasm for their less pious celebration.

A crowd had gathered just outside the church with the mass in progress, a mix of knowledgeable locals and curious foreigners, and even a brass band. It had the expectant feel of a celebration already, and just around the corner from the church, on the main square, beer was already flowing from the kegs brought in for the occasion. I could tell the church was crowded and the mass sounded serious enough; I could hear a solo song of praise that sounded to me more like sorrowful Flamenco. Just as I was getting carried away by this voice from within the church a quick hiss and ferocious boom startled me. I had noticed the man charged with lighting the fireworks that day looking boyishly excited in the square, but I didn’t expect to hear them during the Easter mass. 

Soon enough the expectant faces lit up as a dozen men from the community emerged from the church, lumbering under the weight of the ornate float carrying their gilded matron saint, la Virgen de la Cabeza with the baby Jesus. I must admit, I haven’t quite worked out the history of why she’s known as ‘the virgin of the head,’ but the villagers have been toting her revered likeness around on special occasions for decades and I could see the sense of pride and import on the faces of those selected to bear the weight of the paso with the sacred sculpture. 

As if on cue, the rain began to fall as soon as the procession turned the corner from the church and headed into the main square. Undaunted, the church-going community fell in line behind the paso, protecting their candles from the rain while the rest of us huddled under awnings to watch the procession pass. The covered area outside of Bar Andalucia was particularly crowded, and a beer queue had already formed. Canillas de Aceituno is not a large village and the procession passed quickly, leaving the damp square suddenly somewhat empty as half of the community followed the procession and the other half slipped indoors or gathered under canopies in side streets outside of the bars. Most of the later half seemed intent on carrying on with the morcilla festivities, but as it was almost lunch time by now I decided to leave the scene for a while to wait out the rain and enjoy a home-cooked meal.

An hour later the cloudy sky was at least dry and the streets were filling up again with revelers. There was no longer any feeling of contradiction between piousness and partying; it was all down to partying now. The beer taps were flowing non-stop, children ran to and fro shrieking with laughter and party hats and balloons replaced the Easter bonnets and church candles. The Spanish couple on the stage put out very danceable if somewhat humorous renditions of Lady Gaga, Black Eyed Peas and Mambo Number 5, for example, along with more traditional Spanish ditties. The adults were really as riled as the children (I can’t shake the image of an adult couple dancing with Flamenco flair and huge grins to “I Kissed a Girl” by Katy Perry), while the teenagers tried to maintain their cool at the perimeter.

The next few hours passed unbelievably quickly and with increasing blurriness, as every good party should. I saw pretty much every one of the limited number of people I know from the village and shared a drink and a laugh with each until it was clearly time to find my way home again. I had slowed my pace, but this is not the way of the Canilleros; the adults carried on without missing a dance step even after the band had retired, and the teenagers and young adults came into prominence. A small, unmarked nightclub that I never even knew existed had opened its doors and a decidedly hip young crowd was already lingering casually in the vicinity.

These celebrations tend to last well into the night - even the religious processions in the cities go on until 3a.m. – and the morcilla festival was looking well on pace for keeping up tradition. The black pudding, some 200 kilos of the stuff, had been completely finished off hours ago, but the beer was still flowing rapidly. As for me, maybe I’m getting old or maybe I’m just not yet Spanish enough, but with two celebrations in a single day I thought it best to say “hasta luego,” and leave the rest to those with this stuff in their blood.