Palm Sunday

Today is palm Sunday, or Domingo de Ramos and in still the very Catholic Spain is, of course, the excuse of another big fiesta. On Palm Sunday, in the Roman Catholic Church, as well as the Episcopal church and most Lutheran churches, palm fronds (or in colder climates some kind of substitutes) are blessed outside the church building and a procession enters, singing, re-enacting the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.
My visiting friends left us to babysit their adorable baby girl (who's having her siesta right now) and went to mass.

Since last week you could buy a palm to take with you to mass so you can have it bless by the priest and then take it home until the next year. (Our downstairs neighbours kept their last year palm in their balcony).
Of course, there were loads of palms to be bought in every shops, from the main supermarkets to the small seasonal shop around the corner. I call it "the seasonal shop" because is basically an empty shop that sells whatever is on season; for Christmas it was trees, logs and decoration, fancy dresses for Carnival, and now they're selling palms.
There's a variety of palms as I've never seen before, some are knitted in very elaborate ways and are quite beautiful, some are just very plain and my neighbours told me that they buy a simple one and knit it in a special way that's been in the family for generations. There's also big ones and smaller version, such as this that can be pin to a lapel.

A Spanish rhyming proverb states: Domingo de Ramos, quien no estrena algo, se le caen las manos ("On Palm Sunday, the hands drop off of those who fail to use something new"). Before the advent of consumption society, Palm Sunday was a day to wear new clothes or shoes, according to the possibilities.

The most famous Semana Santa tradition in Spain takes place in the south, specially in Seville where you have this huge processions with the cofradias' members carring the dying Jesus around town, dressed in long robes and pointy hats that remains me of the KKK. Very dramatic. You can see the whole thing on TV, actually you can see it too if you have sky because they have TVE with is Television España. Not a cheery sigh, mind you, at least not until Sunday when we're back to celebrate and eat another lovely Easter mona as the one here.

This is a good time to visit Spain. Altough the weather hasn't been that good later, it was raining almost everyday since my friends arrived and they're joking that all my writtings about Sunny Barcelona are just a ruse!!

My friend Esmeralda suggested to add more pictures to each entry of the blog, to make it more attractive so... what do you think?