Every December 11 a long line of parents, grandparents and little children wait with incredible patience at the door of the Templo de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, the church beside the best-loved park in Oaxaca.
The children wait hours for their turn to be blessed by the priest in honour of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Mexican version of the Virgin Mary and the most important symbol of Mexican identity and faith. It's a big deal and apparently worth a long wait in the sun. Judging by the expressions it's serious business.
The Virgin Mary's image mysteriously appeared on the cloak of a guy named Juan Diego (who presumably had a moustache) 500 years ago, on December 12, 1531.
So all these little boys are dressed as Juan Diego and the girls are in traditional peasant costumes.
We loved seeing the kids and chatting with the parents and I'm careful to enforce my policy of asking permission before I photograph the children.
As I was talking to this grandmother the baby in her arms surprised us by reaching out to Dave. The little guy knows a good Canadian grandpa when he sees one.
The nearby park was packed with rides, food stalls, souvenir knickknack vendors and a fun carnival atmosphere for the following days, all in celebration of the national holiday for this patron saint of Mexico, Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The photos here are all from 2013 when Pat, Bev and I were so much younger, eating fair food and practising Spanish with our friend Magdalena.
Huge crowds watched the evening parade and twirling-castle fireworks many stories high, a Mexican specialty.
Juan Diego's story, a powerful belief for millions of people...
You may have heard about this Indigenous man who proved he saw the Virgin Mary one winter day in 1531 by picking an armload of flowers on the mountain top where only cactus normally grew. When he delivered the flowers to the bishop they fell on the floor, leaving an image of the Virgin Mary imprinted on his shirt. The bishop was convinced the man had truly been visited by the mother of God, who somehow became associated with the name Guadalupe, which may have come from a place in Spain. Legends have many twists.
So that's the origin of the famous image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, always surrounded by an aura of luminous light, that you see on everything from trinkets to tattoos all over Mexico.
The original cloak worn by Juan Diego, still with the visible image, is one of the top attractions in Mexico. It's behind bullet-proof glass in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City, the most popular Catholic shrine in the world after St. Peter's in Rome. But not on my bucket list.
It's the kids with the pencilled moustaches that led me to this bit of research showing another page of the rich culture of Oaxaca. Sadly, it seems the church doors were closed this year due to the pandemic, and all the little Juan Diegos stayed home with their families.
