The Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, one of the most famous in the country, has it all: costumes, color, fireworks, and (yes) fried chicken.
Plumed head dresses in front of the Iglesia de Santo Tomás during the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Surviving the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chicicastenango
Chichicastenango (which everyone simply calls Chichi) is a mountain town about 90 miles (145 km) northeast of Guatemala City and a popular day trip from Lake Atitlan. The town is famous for its weekly market which attracts vendors selling everything from potatoes to ponchos and a huge array of crafts from around the region. Even more famous (and loud and colorful and crowded) is the town’s annual Festival of Santo Tomás.
Happy crowds at the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Most towns in Latin America have a patron saint which they honor annually with a festival as large and grand as the town can afford to put on. The full name of Chichi is actually Chichcastenango de Santo Tomás since, you guessed it, Santo Tomás is their patron saint.
Members of the cofradia, or honorary council of community leaders (you can tell by their clothes), at the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Every December Chichi pulls out all the stops and throws one of the biggest, loudest and most colorful saint festivals in Guatemala to honor their patron saint. Though the festival honors a saint, the Festival of Santo Tomás is really a melding of K’iche’ (or Quiché) Mayan customs and Christian traditions which explains the party atmosphere and elaborate, vivid costumes and lack of grindingly long church services.
Elaborate floats carrying effigies of saints emerge from the Iglesia de Santo Tomás before being paraded around town as part of Chichicastenango’s annual Festival of Santo Tomás.
Festival events took place in front of the Iglesia de Santo Tomás which was built by the Spanish in 1545 on top of a pre-Columbian temple mound. It now anchors Chichi’s main square where most of the festival action took place. There’s a smaller church facing it on the other side of a large open area.
Costumed dancers representing Spanish conquistadors strut their stuff during the annual Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Dedicated dancers of the Santo Tomás festival
Guatemala is already a colorful country with a vibrant textile tradition and day-glow clothing that’s still part of daily dress in many areas. During the festival, hundreds of participants put on even more elaborate outfits involving intricately decorated clothes and fancy masks which transform them into representations of Spanish conquistadors.
A dancer dressed as a Spanish conquistador takes part in the annual Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Called the Dance of the Conquest, it traditionally re-enacts the subjugation of the local people by the Spanish. All we saw during the festival in Chichi were conquistadors dancing around minus any subjugation or historical story telling.
Costumed dancers representing Spanish conquistadors strut their stuff during the annual Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Stranger still was another group of dancers wearing huge sombreros and masks and toting live snakes. The Dance of the Mexicans started off as the Dance of the Snakes, a serpent-based fertility rite that was banned by the church. In order to keep their ritual alive, indigenous groups kept the snakes, dropped the more sexually explicit elements and added the Mexican costumes. Why Mexican? Because there’s a giant snake on the Mexican flag.
The Dance of the Mexicans is a tweaked version of a snake-based fertility dance that the church banned.
The Dance of the Mexicans is a tweaked version of a snake-based fertility dance that the church banned.
The Dance of the Mexicans is a tweaked version of a snake-based fertility dance that the church banned.
Though we kept asking locals (and even the tourism representatives who occasionally wandered through the crowd) we could never get a clear answer about when the valadores were scheduled to perform.Therefore, we completely missed this impressive spectacle which involves costumed dancers climbing to the top of a 100 foot (33 meter) pole then tying a rope to their ankles before rolling off a platform at the top and slowly spiraling down to the ground head first.
Valadores in costume before their amazing head-first spiral off the top of a 100′ pole–which we totally missed.
No matter which costume they were wearing, the dancers were expected to perform all day long. In heavy, stifling costumes they shuffled and jumped under a blazing sun.
Our video, below, captured a lot of the dancing action at Chichecastenango’s Festival of Santo Tomás.
https://www.youtube.com//watch?v=REP0CIHN1XI&rel=0
Parades and processions of the Festival of Santo Tomás
When folks weren’t dancing or spiraling off the top of very tall poles members of the cofradia (a kind of honorary committee of community leaders) were parading slowly through the streets carrying three enormous and elaborately decorated floats with representations of Santo Jose, Santo Sebastian and, of course, Santo Tomás inside.
Members of the cofradia, or honorary council of community leaders (you can tell by their clothes), carry floats during a parade at the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
As the heavily decorated floats were carried out of the Iglesia de Santo Tomás, the technicolor feathers, inlaid mirrors, satin and sequins reminded us of Mardi Gras costumes.
Members of the cofradia, or honorary council of community leaders (you can tell by their clothes), carry floats during a parade at the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Women taking part in a procession during the annual Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Check out one of the Festival of Santo Tomás processions in our video, below.
Frightening fireworks
As we’ve mentioned before, Latin Americans are obsessed with fireworks. It’s just not a party without an enormous cache of things that make loud noises and/or explosions and/or sparkly colors in the sky. The Festival of Santo Tomás was certainly no exception.
Fireworks go off in front of Iglesia de Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
From morning until night gangs of men worked diligently to make sure that something was exploding somewhere at all times–usually within a few feet of where we were standing.
During the day they focused their efforts on laying down miles of mats studded with firecrackers before lighting one end, creating a startling machine gun effect of noise and smoke. Another daytime favorite involved an ominous metal tube which was placed on the ground (in as densely populated an area as possible). Then a croquet-ball-sized bomba was placed inside before its long fuse was lit.
Fireworks go off in front of Iglesia de Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Even the fireworks boys ran from this one before the ball was thrust up into the air where it (hopefully) exploded before falling back down into the crowd.
At night they turned their attention to huge castillos which are elaborate wood or bamboo structures with spinning wheels and other moving parts all loaded with sparkling, hissing fireworks that ignite in successions until the entire display goes off, revealing the overall design of the castillo.
Put your earplugs in and check out some of the fireworks from the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala in our video, below.
The well-funded Festival of Santo Tomás also featured full-on fireworks displays in the sky that were as solid as many July 4 displays.
It’s not a fetival without a few drunks…
A borracho passed out amidst the shredded paper remains of a series of firecrackers that were set off right beside him.
The Spanish word for drunk is borracho and it’s not a festival without a few around. The borrachos in Chichi were world class: lurching, lunging, falling, sleeping, and not even flinching when they ended up passed out in the midst of a pile of exploding firecrackers which locals seemed to intentionally ignite almost on top of them. Not even the pounding bass lines and thumping speakers from the live band stage could rouse them. Impressive.
World’s best fried chicken?
All this festivaling worked up a pretty serious appetite which was amply satisfied by equally serious fried chicken. Guatemalans love fried chicken and the golden, crispy, juicy, fresh stuff served up out of roiling caldrons of hot oil by overworked and slightly cranky hordes of women in Chichi took the dish to new heights of deliciousness (25Q, or about US$3, with tortillas and a soda). The Colonel’s got nothing on these ladies.
Members of the cofradia, or honorary council of community leaders (you can tell by their clothes), carry floats during a parade at the Festival of Santo Tomás in Chichicastenango, Guatemala.
Our hotel haven in Chichi
We were being hosted at Hotel Santo Tomás, a regal two story whitewashed adobe and wood building with a landscaped inner courtyard featuring gurlging fountains and a mildly disturbing collection of caged birds. All of the 30 rooms are slightly different, but they all have fireplaces (it’s 10Q, or about US$1.25, for a bundle of wood) and the Wi-Fi signal only reaches the rooms closest to the front desk. Run by Doña Inés, the place is full of antique furniture, religious sculptures, and pottery. Even though the hotel was just a few blocks away from the festival madness, it managed to maintain a serene environment..
As if there wasn’t enough going on, a total lunar eclipse took place in the middle of the final days of the Festival of Santo Tomás. Eric shot it and made this cool montage of eclipse images.
Here’s more about travel in Guatemala
Enjoying the adventure through your passion and exploring, thanks.
Chichichicastenango, lovely scenery with such bold dazzling textures and colors. Love a god like Maximon, too cool.
Stunning photos, great post. Even if I need earplugs (thanks for the warning thought), I’d love to attend Santo Tomás one day.
Another reason to go to Guatemala! Maybe it’s because I lived in Central America, but it keeps piquing my interest.
I’ve been told that in central and south America, there’s always a market or a festival happening. I’m a huge fan of both, so I’ll definitely keep entertained. I cannot wait to see it for myself. Looks very exciting!
Wonderful photos!
I never visited this city, but it is one of my favorite city names :-)
Amazing photos! I’ve been to Guatemala a few times but have never made it to Chichicastenango. Damn! :)
Latin American festivals are so colorful! LOVES the photos :)
Thanks for sharing these great pictures – we went to the festival of Santo Tomas last year and it was one of our favorite festivals in all of Central America! I had totally blocked these fire works out of my memory though, which were SO scary.
[…] area and it’s located 90 miles from Guatemala City, and lot’s of folks come to see the town’s annual Festival of Santo Tomás. I looked up this video so the kids can see the festival’s celebration. We watched […]