Mardi Gras, Super Bowl, and the 4th of July all start
on the same day in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. In late September the city
celebrates its patron saint, the Archangel Michael, with a seven-day festival
that reaches its apex on the weekend and packs the small mountain town with a
jubilant crowd.
Normally, the population of San Miguel is near 70,000. When
we arrived, on Saturday September 28, there may have been that many people
lining a single street watching what seemed to be a never-ending parade. The
electric feeling of this shindig was highly infectious because everything was
music, dancing, fireworks, and more fireworks - and then there were the church
bells.
Several beautiful and long standing churches, one dating
back to 1564, grace the old city. Most have bells, which swung freely during
the celebration. One of particular note is the architectural marvel, La
Parroquia de San Miguel Arcángel.
Seated in the El Chorro neighborhood, La Parroquia is opposite
of the Jardin (or Main Garden) in the center of town. With its Neo-gothic
façade flanked by two tall towers, this parish church tolled its gigantic 17th
century bells, along with the other abbeys, throughout the festival day and
well into the night. Staying just a few blocks away, we also heard them clearly
throughout the festival day and well into
the night.
That evening each clang from the cloisters seemed to be
followed by a massive aerial explosion and vice versa. It was as if a sort of
competition was being waged between man and the divine. But around midnight the
weather changed and that’s when the battle really started.
Across the mountaintops came a fast moving storm monster,
which swooped into town without warning and dumped goo gobs of cold rain along
with rapid-fire lighting strikes. Who knows, maybe the Almighty had had enough of
the racket coming from this highland town; so game over, right? Not a chance. With each streaking bolt
and thunderous burst from the heavy weather, there followed an explosion of
fireworks and the eruptions of church bells. What’s not to love about this
place?
On Monday morning, this swollen festival town returned to
its normal charming size and self. It was as if a giant plug had been pulled; the
pedestrian packed streets were now drained and replaced with the quiet business
of the everyday. Once again, life and the living took up the normal and hummed
along on the near 500 year old narrow cobblestone lanes. Make no mistake
though; San Miguel de Allende is no one-trick pony. This city has a rich and
vibrant culture of art and music, which is accentuated by the cosmopolitan air
of some 8,000 to 12,000 foreign residents. Still, with its upscale restaurants,
grand hotels, and effervescent nightlife, San Miguel does not come across as
pretentious. And with the annual archangel clambake, how could it?
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