Every day is Sunday, yet no day is Sunday, and Sunday is less Sunday
than any other day in the week. Still, the Mexican way of spending
Sunday is of interest to people of other climes and habits.
With the dawn of day people are to be seen wending their willing
footsteps toward their church. The bells chime with their musical clang
historic to Mexico, and men and women cross the threshold of churches
older than the United States. Pews are unknown, and on the bare floor
the millionaire is seen beside the poverty-stricken Indian; the
superbly clad lady side by side with an uncombed, half naked Mexican
woman. No distinction, no difference. There they kneel and offer their
prayers of penitence and thanks, unmindful of rank or condition.
No turning of heads to look at strange or gaze on new garments; no
dividing the poor from the rich, but all with uniform thought and
purpose go down on their knees to their God.
How a missionary, after one sight like this, can wish to convert them
into a faith where dress and money bring attention and front pews, and
where the dirty beggar is ousted by the janitor and indignantly scorned
down by those in affluence, is incomprehensible.
No Mexican lady thinks it proper to wear a hat into church. She thinks
it shows disgust; hence the fashion of wearing lace mantillas. In this
city of rights there is nothing handsomer than a lady neatly clad in
black with a mantilla gracefully wrapped around her head, under which
are visible coal-black hair, sparkling eyes, and beautiful teeth.
A ragged skirt, and _rebozo_ encircling a babe with its head on its
mother's shoulder, fast asleep; black, silky hair which trails on the
floor as she kneels, her wan, brown, pathetic face raised suppliantly
in devotion, is one of the prettiest, though most common, sights in
Mexico on Sunday morning.
This is the busiest day in the markets. Everything is booming, and the
people, even on their way to and from church, walk in and out around
the thousands of stalls, buying their marketing for dinner. Hucksters
cry out their wares, and all goes as merry as a birthday party.
Indians, from the mountains, are there in swarms with their marketing.
The majority of stores are open, and the "second-hand" stalls on the
cheap corner do the biggest business of the week.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account