The past week I´ve been on a cultural vacation. It was Semana Santa, the Holy Week. An annual tribute of the passion of Jesus Christ, celebrated by the Catholic religion. Unlike many Catholic countries, Spain the processions display the suffering of Jesus and the sadness of Mary in the street. In general, these processions are all about repenting. There are people walking in the parades with bare feet’s, wearing clothes with dot-shaped masks to ensure anonymity. Especially in Andalucia (Southern part of Spain) they celebrate this week very big.
What I love about festivals in Spain is that they’re all ingrained in religion somehow, and their traditions have been passed down for generations. After seeing las Falles, which was more cultural, I wanted to see something more religious. So I texted my old roommate, who now is living in Madrid, because I haven’t seen her in a while and it seemed fun to go on vacation with her.

In Spain, I try to enjoy my life more like the people here do, like I told you in the blog of the past week. Normally I have to plan all my vacations in advance, but this time, I just thought about it two days in advance, so we booked it last minute, which was hard since a lot of hostels and hotels were booked this week and we didn’t want to pay too much. But my friend found a hostel which looked really beautiful. It had this old-Spanish/Arabic look, it was in the middle of the center, near to the Alcazar of Seville (the royal palace). So we booked it for 5 nights. I preferred to go more early, but my friend could not. So I texted my old colleague. I worked with him for a while, back in the Netherlands, but he went back to Spain, where he is originally from. He lives two hours from Sevilla, below Cadiz, in San Fernando. I asked him if I could visit him for a weekend and if he could show me around. He was fine with it, he offered me to stay in his house and I would get my own room. On a Friday night I went there and I stayed until Sunday morning. He showed me around in San Fernando and in Cadiz. It was perfect to see all the ceremonies, because in the smaller cities, they celebrate it big. He told me about each and every procession and about the history of these cities. Sunday he brought me to Sevilla, where I went to the hostel and checked it. I went to my room, had a look in the neighborhood and then my friend came. We were leaving on Friday so we had almost a whole week to see the city. We didn’t really plan everything out, but we just discussed what we both wanted to see, and what day would be best. (some days are more cheaper if you want to visit a museum for example).

In these few days I saw a lot, I did a lot, I learned a lot, and I got to know some people.