criplomats

I woke up at 4:30 this morning to the sound of drum beats – and not the usual ones coming from the bar next door. It was the pilgrimage of the Virgin of Zapopan, an annual pilgrimage from the Guadalajara cathedral to the basilica of Zapopan that attracts two million people, by some estimates. Due to construction, the route this year was right outside our building, so I threw on some clothes and went down to the street. It was still dark, but the pre-Columbian dancers and other pilgrims were already en route and the vendors were setting up shop. I watched with my neighbor Mike for a while, then came back around 7:30 AM. It was still going on in full force with more dancers, horses, bands, monks, nuns, people in scary costumes, and thousands of pilgrims – sort of a religious sight with some Mardi Gras and Halloween thrown in. The noise was deafening at times – besides the drums (usually a 50-gallon drum on wheels converted into a drum to be played), many of the dancers wore shells on their ankles and attached pieces of tin to the bottom of their shoes. It was truly a sight to see and the masses of people were still walking when I came home an hour and a half later! I’m so glad I got to see it. Click here to see all of my photos.

Yesterday we had fun with our neighbors Mike and Esther. They’re both Canadian diplomats who live in our building. We saw them at a welcome reception Thursday night for our new Consul General and discovered we all like to play board games. They had us down for a lovely lunch on their balcony, then John beat us all at a game of Settlers of Catan (did I mention that he came in second place at a Settlers tournament here in Guadalajara a couple of weeks ago?!). We had a great time – they’re a really nice couple.

The reception Thursday night was quite nice – it was a lovely evening and the party was on a penthouse terrace with a gorgeous view of the city. Our new CG is very nice and we look forward to working with her over the next two years.

Flavia is quite happy that I’m home – here she is relaxing in her cat tree looking pretty content.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are a few parting shots from the pilgrimage.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 12th, 2015 at 11:20 am and is filed under Foreign Service. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.