Enero

I had a great January! It literally passed by in an eye blink. I was pretty much all of the time with friends and particularly, with friends in a little town next to Tuxtla, called Chiapa de Corzo.
The little town of Chiapa de Corzo, more or less 50 000 inhabitants, is another “magical town” in Mexico and is incredibly famous for its long-standing traditions. In January starts what is called a “feria” which is a town feast, and it lasts more or less 3 weeks. It is an amazing event and goes along with a lot of traditions and beliefs.

First of all, the little town is very pretty: traditional houses, typical food, a lot of colours and architecture. The town is then decorated in January with lovely flags and everything shines beautifully.
I have a friend who lives in Chiapa and she invited me to come to their Feria (not one Chiapa de Corseño leaves the village in January haha they are in love with their annual tradition).
And so it happened that I went to visit her and her family to get to know this whole happening. It was so amazing I ended up going almost every day of the week haha! I really loved it and I will explain you what it is all about.

It is believed that around 400 years ago, a Guatemalan rich women had a child that got very sick. She went to all the doctors in Guatemala but nobody was able to cure her poor baby. She was told that there was a little town in Chiapas, which then still belonged to Guatemala, where the doctors are famous for these kinds of diseases. And so it happened that she travelled to the little town of Chiapa de Corzo. She went to the first people she saw, but because of all the stress she suffered from her travel, she was very scared. The men of the town decided that, to put her more in her comfort zone, they would try to dress up as women and talk to her (these are called Los Chuntaes). They succeeded and the women felt a little more at home. The Chuntae led her to the doctors and explained the problem of her dying baby. The doctors agreed to try to do everything they could to cure the baby but every time they got close to the little one, the baby started to cry horribly. They believed that their dark skins scared him of and decided to dress themselves up as white people (these are the Parachicos). It worked and the baby calmed down. The doctors started to pray to Saint Sebastian and dance in a rhythmic and traditional way, which is called El Zapateo, and eventually, they succeeded in healing the boy.
The woman was so happy that she decided to organise a huge feast for the whole village, and Saint Sebastian, and the little town of Chiapa de Corzo partied for 3 weeks.
And there it is, that is the reason that 400 years later, the people commemorate the feast of the Guatemalan woman and dress themselves up as Parachicos, Chuntaes and where the women dress themselves in typical Chiapanecan clothes. Typical music is played all day long and people make a big trip through the entire village
I will put some pictures in the document so you can see what it looks like.
The people party every day of these three weeks from the early morning to late in the night.
I too dressed myself up as a Parachico and it was really an unforgettable experience haha I loved it. Surrounded by friends and family, dancing, laughing and eating until deep in the night is pretty much the best thing there is.
I had the best time of my year.

Recently I also went to one of the Mexican wonders, el Cañon del Sumidero, here in Chiapas. It is a huge canyon, which I can see from my house hahaha but until recently I never went to see it. I went with my friends and we made a trip through the canyon by boat. I’ll get you some pictures too.

Two days ago, I returned from the mid-year trip with YFU to the state of Veracruz and I will write about it soon.

Tomorrow I will finally go to school after more than two months of vacations and my life will start to get more normal again. I am incredibly happy and knowing that these last months will pass by very fast, I will try to enjoy as much as I can. I will absolutely come home this summer but I can tell you that the thought of leaving makes me very sad hahaha, I think I fell in love with my new country.

See ya!!