San Cristobal

Main square with santa
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On our first day in San Cristobal we did a tour to two Mayan villages. The first one is more traditional than the other one, they have kept Spanish churches for example but have adapted them to their own beliefs. We visited one of the churches, in the graveyard the crosses have different colours that mean different things. Blue crosses are for young children and people who have died from accidents are buried separately from those who died from natural causes. The cross is not the christian cross but the mayan cross that symbolises their sacred tree. Inside the church pine needles are sprinkled on the floor, people only pray to the saints that have mirrors around their necks as these give out wisdom.  They light candles but the candles are red, black, white or yellow symbolising corn or green to symbolise the earth. The mayans believe that god made people three times, first out of mud but they disintegrated, then from trees but the tree people couldnt feel so finally they made them out of corn and these were perfect. So corn is the basis of the Mayan religion. They also wave chickens around head first over the ground to wave away evil spirits and then break their necks as a form of sacrifice. You could see this in the church too. It is forbidden to take photos in the church.

View of the first mayan village
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We also visited a leaders house. The leaders nominate themselves to represent one of the saints. They have to buy all the pine needles for the floor, candles for the church, gifts and offerings and have celebrations in their house every 20 days. Its an expensive business! They serve as such for one year.

Salsa in San Cristobal

We then looked around their markets.

The second village was less traditional their church had pews and they sacrificed chickens in privacy not in the church. The village is much more tranquil. Here we visited a house and watched the people weave traditional garments and tasted handmade flour tortillas with salsa and pumpkin seeds. They were yummy!

Outside of the church at the first village
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In the early evening we had salsa lessons. We all went and had a few dutch courage shots to loosen up our snake hips especially the boys. IT was hilarious. really good fun. We then had dinner (curry! and it was good) and then went out for more drinks and back to the salsa club. However by that time our dancing had deteriorated somewhat and they didnt play kylie!?!

The next day after a greasy spoon, we did some serious shopping around town and ate lots. We had a 9 hour bus journey the next day so we chilled out that night.