Christmas Eve in Tepoztlan

Tepoztlan is one of a group of towns on the ranges of mountains behind Popocateptel, the signature volcano of the Valley of Mexico, that Hernan Cortes and then the missionary Catholics had a heck of a time overcoming. The locals were independent, liked their way of life, and didnt feel much like changing to suit others!  they did their best to drive Cortes out.  and they are still famous for working to keep their valleys the way they should be! And in the smaller villages on the outskirts of these tows, people still are fluent in Nahuatl and apparently still keep a lot of traditions alive.

Because the towns are in rugged terrain with beautiful mountains around, apparently they had many small shrines in them, i guess you could say in beautiful power spots, before the Catholics arrived.  Tepoztlan in particular was famous for being the birthplace of the Toltec ruler who was closely linked with and mistaken for the god Quetzalcoatl, he was the Abraham Lincoln of his time (about ad 1000) and talked everyone out of human sacrifice for a while.  And parts of the valley were also sacred to the goddess Tonantzin, who is like the Chinese goddess of compassion,  Quan yin.  many people think that Tonantzin became melded with legendary virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's patron. Anyway, by the time the Europeans arrived, in the 1520s, shrines abounded.  And also, apparently all the worship took place outside, which also makes sense given how lovely and special the towering stone outcroppings above are

Why am I telling you this?Well it's because once the Catholic orders of monks came to these valleys to convert the folks and built their parochial churches, (with amazingly huge outdoor spaces and outdoor chapels because the locals expected that worship services should be held OUTSIDE, not inside) they also had to work hard to try to wipe out local shrines, and so, they quickly went to work rapidly building chapels over each of the shrines that had already existed.  And since Tepoztlan had a lot of these, there are currently about eight of these "barrio" chapels or Capillas still standing, they are each the focal point of their neighborhoods, and if  you are headed to Tepoztlan for Christmas Eve, it's probably these you should be aware of and hang out near to see the best of the Christmas preparations.

The Pre-Christmas season is celebrated traditionally, with nine nights of posada processions each followed by parties.   We missed all these, but what we can now tell you about Christmas Eve processions  in Tepoztlan is that they ars also solemn, and dignified.  

But before we get to this, I wanted to describe a little about our journey here to this town, how we heard about it, and where we are staying. 

Getting to Tepoztlan 

Craig and I took an overnight plane to Mexico City and then right from inside the airport, took the express first class bus to Cuernavaca.  the company that serves Cuernavaca is Pullman de Morelos.  it costs about $15 each for an hour to hour and a half  journey.  .  We'd done our research:  Cuernavaca though historically very nice, is not at all nice now.  But what a lovely setting. Wide plains surrounded by volcanic mountains, with pine forests at the top and semitropical woodlands lower down on their slopes.  There are still a lot of undeveloped lands and wildlife preserves. 

we quickly got out of Cuernavaca, by taxi for about $15 for the 45 minutes up to Tepoztlan (you can also go by local bus, but to do this we'd have had to go downtown, and several locals had explained to us that some Cuernavaca taxi drivers are not so honest, so with our luggage we played it safer and got a taxi from the bus station and paid him to take us the fast, direct way on the toll road for a little bit more. 

So, To get to Tepoztlan you go halfway back up the mountain and laterally and up and around giant basalt outcroppings, into a valley between two ranges.  It's a really nice town with flagstone  streets, very traditional look and feel, shrines to the virgen of Guadalupe here and there, and some of the best ice cream around. 

Yes, ice cream. There is a local brand TepozNieves that makes seemingly hundreds of flavors, from rose petal to guayabana, and they have several shops and lots of small stands around. Just so you never run out of a chance to eat ice cream. There is also TepozCrema which makes a sort of Bailey's liquor, again with a flavor variety.

Then the other specialty of Tepoztlan is spiritualism!  Lots of places to get your tarot cards read, your spirit cleansed with a traditional medicinal steam bath or temazcal followed by a massage. Also lots of stores selling Hindu objects and clothing, and imports from all over Asia.  So powerful that every crèche scene in town has plenty of elephants in it, as well as the oz and ass.

The third and fourth specialties of the town would be food, and hiking up the cliff to the pyramid on top of it. And not sure in what order.  

As a result of all of these. Tepoztlan is a very popular tourist destination for Mexican tourists, especially coming in from the capital just for the day, to hike and eat and get spiritual,   But its not much of a destination for other foreigners currently!    In three days we saw the town center bustle each day and then quiet down, but we only heard or saw foreigners a very few times!  Very nice for us. 

When we reached town we couldn't easily get to our hotel by taxi due to comstruction and we were traveling lot so we hopped out, and walked up several streets which are pedestrian by day due to all the stalls set up for Mexican tourist-oriented street fairs, filled with scarves from India, CD stands, honey samples, herbal products, and every imaginable memento of Tepoztlan.  soon we saw the big church which has the huge fenced yard, which you can usually only enter by a huge white front archivo.   The high walls on each side of this arch are amazingly mosaiced, with aztec warrior type scenes, but all done with seeds!   It's right next to the local food, shoe, sweater and flower market, and it's clearly the heart of town.

In addition to the usual market areas and the fun touristy street fair, there is a small town square or zocalo, which has the usual bandstand in the middle.  it is taken over at Christmas with ornament sellers, fireworks sellers, pottery sellers, and lots of local rural folk who bring yards and yards of mosses, lichens, grey Spanish moss and many other little plants that everyone local needs to buy to set up their outdoor nativity scenes with yards and yards of instant Holy Land vegetation, in which to set their crèche figures, 3 kings, sheep, camels, elephants, shepherds, etc.  every house and business and churchyard seems to have one.   All the main figurines are from Italy and the animals are from everywhere and it makes a very deliicious hodge-lodge. I have no idea where they store all this stuff the rest of the year, since none of the houses seem that large.  Also there is sugar cane for sale.  Oh, and lots and lots of twinkling lights and mechanical Christmas music boxes playing North American and world Christmas music -- not much Mexican except Silent Night which translates into every language. And paper lanterns and stars.  Many roofs get giant lighted paper stars on high, high poles and you buy those in the market too. Unlike many of the other decorations these are not Asian made, they are locally made, of paper or of translucent cellophane in many colors. Beautiful.  

Tepoztlan has quite a few places to stay, scattered through all the neighborhoods.  There are a few spas and larger rambling hotels out of town, but right in town there are no obvious multistory hotels with lobbies, just mostly guesthomes.  We stayed in a lovely house, La petite maison, not French and not a mansion. Has 4 rooms. We got the beautiful large front room with views to the mountains on two sides. And there is a rooftop area as well.  A very good thing because the town is full of phone lines and electric lines. Only getting on the roofs can you get a clear view up the 1300 feet up to the beautiful pyramid in a saddle near the top of the cliffs.  And to the beautiful knobs and turrets of the local outcroppings with vultures and maybe eagles soaring around.

Christmas Eve

We didn't know what to expect on Christmas Eve!   A few years ago we were in Oaxaca, a big happy tourist oriented city, and it was a major festive day, preceded by the very fun December 23rd festival of Carving The radishes., but, in Tepoztlan, we couldn't find out much about what to expect.   The hotel owner promised us there would be a lot of fireworks explosions.

These were definitely going on all day and all night, and we saw lots of people buying plants and flowers.  Restaurants and stores seemed to be open for business as usual and we had great food. Ate at la juquilita, had great mole and sopa de zeta and iticate, a local sort of cornmeal biscuit split and filled with huitlacoche, which is a great tasting mushroom that grows on corn.  But otherwise as of mid afternoon not a lot seemed to be happening.  

Walking, exploring town we found a few nice processions, young ladies,dressed as angels with big white wings, and old and middle aged ladies carrying what?!!  Small ceramic babies in their rebozos and in their arms!  This was a major theme.  Everyone who had a nativity scene had to have a Christ child, none of these could be out in the scenes til midnight, and until then, carrying them seemed to be a very special act of devotion.  Even men sometimes carried these Italian fair haired baby Jesus figures, of all sizes, all around town.

Turns out later this was dress rehearsal of sorts,  rehearsing the hymns and the moves for the serious processions at night.  The funny thing to us was how serious everyone was!  You might think that for a young girl or child, to dress up with huge white wings and a long dress and a halo and to carry a big star on a long stick and wave it side to side would be really fun, and elicit smiles and laughing!  And yet--- especially the angels, especially when being photographed and filmed by their families, always looked as dignified as possible. 

And the songs.  The songs were repetitive and about cows and donkeys and angels.  And, love!  But, serious!  Sung drily and seriously. 

We'd been told restaurants would stay open and that there would be a midnight mass. So,we put off eating til late. Mistake!  Places closed early and the streets got very quiet.  For two reasons.   First families went home to eat with each other, not in restaurants. Second, the Mexican tourists, in the know, had reserved for the few restaurants that, having closed, would re-open later for very special Christmas Eve buffets, with Bacalao and other special dishes. 

So, we ate some bar food at one of these places (La terrazza, where they wanted us to enjoy the very famous local Cecina de Capixtla, Some town nearby that makes, sort of, prosciutto, and we also had some  sopa Azteca to die for with ice cold red wine, before  they closed to prepare for the feast.  and, discouraged that everything had moved to private celebrations in peoples houses , we went home to our beautiful room.  But luckily we took one more swing around to the main church and heard an older woman explain about a bunch of rows of chairs set up in front of the ancient public outdoor altar in ruins.  She said, at about 10:30 there would be a mass, but, at about nine, the Pastores would begin to come.  

At this my spirits lifted.  I knew a little about Pastorelas. In many places It's a re-enactment of the shepherds who, being alerted by the angels of the need to go to Bethlehem, set out, only to be tempted by devils on the way.  So we didn't know what we'd see. 

Here's how it works in Tepoztlan.  Each of the local parishes, selects three very important men, not boys, to dress up,as the 3 kings.  Some other people dress as pastors, or pilgrims.  A very few kids become angels.  The angels hold the lighted white stars, others hold colorful cellphone very three dimensional lighted stars, and every star has to be continually swayed slowly side to side.  It must be exhausting as this goes on for a long way!  Then, each group has a band. And the band can be oompah brass, or guitar, or even have percussion, or violins. Usually brass.  And, everyone has to sing,usually the songs are led by the 3 kings. And certain people hold their Christ child. And everyone not otherwise occupied holds a candle.  And, on occasion, they light huge sparklers, easily a meter long. Fun, huh? Especially for the little kids holding them.   And, yet, even still, NO ONE smiles. They are not necessaily at all sad, but gaiety? smiles? laughter? not on your life!  They sing songs of God's grace and the piety of the animals and they repeat the verses a lot and though the words are quite happy the repetition is very very solemn.  Sooo different than our sweet rejoicing hymns,  this seems very much to be a night of penitence or reflection or just respect. They gather in a pre-appointed street, then process to their home chapel, then are blessed, then process around town to the huge white gate, pause, sing a song requesting entrance, about opening the doors of heaven.  then at some point each group comes in and down the many white steps into the huge yard, in, process more, come to the gathering spot, and then only the church elders sit, all candles and Stars are put out, and finally mass begins.  But, because there are eight to twelve chapels around town, and maybe individual  groups are formed also, it takes several hours for all the groups to arrive!  It's really quite amazing. At least it was to us.

Since we had been up about twenty hours, we didn't stay up for the whole service. Next time perhaps!  We went home and slept with hundreds of firecrackers going off. 

Now we know what we'd recommend next Christmas Eve. after midafternoon, go home to sleep. then don't expect much action til 9, find a capilla or several of them and we'd probably recommend Santa Fe.  I think that the chapel service and procession from it, to the main church, would be very nice to linger around. But id also say don't expect to get too close as this is not at all a tourist event... Solemn, personal, and community based.   It is however beautiful, moving through the streets past all the overhead strings of lights and decorations, and the connection with the pilgrimage from the satellite sites to the central one, feels like a vestige also of old traditions from ancient, pre-European times. 

Christmas Day 

Great hike with hundred s up shady canyon

Elephants in. Every manger

Pyramid

Coati

Cane

Market lunch Mayre Antojito sopa de pancita and huarache

Dinner 

Margarita with tequila tradicional

Mushrooms in beef broth 

Huazontle en chile Pasilla 

Chiles en nogada