Easter in Arequipa

Our Easter season in Arequipa began a couple weeks ago when our school had an Easter Party.  During the party everyone participated in making the traditional Good Friday soup, and then while it was simmering we took turns sharing (in Spanish) about Easter customs in our home countries.  It was a fun and informative morning with our teachers and classmates at school!

Here we are chopping onions for the soup!

It was so much fun working together with our classmates from around the world!  In this picture you can see American, German, Swiss, and Peruvian friends of ours all working together to make the soup!

One of our teachers preparing to put the ingredients in the stock pot:

The recipe posted on the wall:

Team USA sharing about Palm Sunday, the Easter Bunny, and Easter Sunday church services!

Lase week, we were off from school on Thursday and Friday, and we were invited to lunch by Finn's sweet nanny, Celia.  We had a wonderful time eating with her and her family, and doing our best to converse in Spanish!

 

Finn enjoyed playing with Celia's granddaughter (above) and seeing the cows that graze near Celia's home (below).

 

Then on Good Friday, it was interesting to see the way the whole town puts out these little shrines in front of their homes or places of business (or even on the back of their vehicles).

 One interesting tradition that many of the Catholic people in Arequipa observe is a sort of pilgrimage on Good Friday to 14 different Catholic churches where they say certain prayers.  This custom is meant to call to mind the 14 stations of the cross.  I came across one group of people walking down the road that seemed to be observing this tradition, led by a man carrying a cross.

 

Later that afternoon, we had the opportunity to babysit for our missionary friends here in Arequipa, so that they could go out on a little date.  I had been wanting to do an Easter craft with Finn, so we decided to bring supplies so that he could do it with the other children.  We all had a blast painting together!

  

 

 

That evening we had a couple of American families from our language school over for tacos, movies, and games.  It was a lot of fun!

Saturday was a fairly restful day.  Apparently not a lot happens on the day before Easter here.  I guess everyone is resting from the Good Friday activities and preparing themselves for a super early morning of "burning Judas," an early morning activity that apparently kicks off with fireworks at 4:45 a.m. (I know this because it woke me up).  Read more about that here.  

On Sunday we enjoyed a lovely Resurrection Sunday service at La Roca (our church), and then lunch with the Gutierrez family afterward.  

All in all, it was a delightful long week-end and a wonderful time of celebrating the resurrection of our Lord with brothers and sisters in Christ.  This morning we returned to our Spanish classes feeling refreshed and ready to take on our final 4 weeks of school here!

- Laura