February 3, 2009 Tuesday martes
Ann came for our walk this morning. This will be our last walk as they are leaving in the morning for places south of here.
Ron showed up here to tell us no class today as the building is being used and is very full of people.
Today is San Blas day. This is the day they take the statue of St. San Blas out of the church. They take him to a shrimp boat, the shrimp boat then take him out to sea where the priest blesses the shrimp boat fleet.
The rest of the fishermen take their boats out to be blessed too. The smaller boats that follow the shrimp boat out are full of people. This is a big event. When the boats get back into the harbor they have water fights.
San Blass is then taken back to the church. You know when he has been taken back in as the bottle rockets and the bells go off.
This year Jean-Paul asked us to go out in his boat. We also had about 6 younger boys that were drinking beer. They were having a great time. Two of them jumped into the water while we were watching the blessing of the fleet.
There are so many boats moving in different directions all the time I am shocked that there were no accidents.
Then this evening there were the fireworks. The Indians build a tower that has firecrackers on wheels that twirl around. They also have a shape of some kind that lights up. One of the wheels had 4 hearts. Two had different types of birds.
When the tower is done the fireworks like what we have for the 4th of July go off.
Steve and his sister (two of Ellen’s children) made it to town today. They are going to try to get some rest tonight then will take care of the things they need to do tomorrow.