Don't you paint the eggs? Ku Klux Klan, guapa and potatoes on the street – Semana Santa in Andalusia

I really wanted to spend Easter in Andalusia because I heard it is so spectacular. And it's true, but it is also really strange for poles.

The most well know thing connected with Easter here are street processions. When you first time go to see it and you can see it from the beggining, you are a little bit scared – why? When you see tens of hooded figures just with the holes for the eyes, with the candels in their hands, first impression is: madre mia, ku klux klan – run away! Then you calm down a little and realise that: c'mon – it's Spain XXI century, not America in XIX. In fact, this hooded persons called here penitentes or as a joke penitontos (tonto means stupid) have old tradition. In the middle ages there were people called – flagellants who talked about the end of the world, took on themselves the sufferings of the world and gave themselves up to repentance. When the pope forbade public scourging, they began to hide under the hoods, which become their symbol. Next this penitents began to form themselves into groups and as one of the objectives chosen to remind people of the Passion. From the fifteenth century, the brotherhood (hermandades) organized processions.

But penitentes are just the beggining of this huge spectacle which you can see here 4, 5 each day during one week. Other characteristic persons are women dressed on black with special lace veils who mourn the suffering and death of Christ. The most impresive are the real size figures carry of tens of men. The first figure shows other scens from the Bible (depend on the day it is from the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem by the court, the cross way, death on the cross...). The second one it is Virgin Mary. Each figures each year have new costumes and decorations – that is why, if there is raining, the procession doesn't show up on the street. Each procession is hundreds of people, who pay for participation, and practice all year round to prepare perfect each step and detail. There is also another hundreds of people on the street, who just come to see it and, on the one of the most famous procession – in Albayzin, called Aurora, people shout when they see the figure of Virgin Mary: Aurora - guapa! It is really impressive and totally different than in home...

Other thing which surprised us were... eggs. Yes, eggs. In Poland egg is a symbol of Easter – symbol of the new life. We paint eggs, eat eggs, share eggs with family wish each other all the best. Here, noone ever heared about it. What are tradicional food for Easter? Boiled potatoe eating on the street and toasted bread soaked in the milk with cinnamon and fried. It is good, but full house of polish girls had to prepare huge, more or less polish typical breakfast on Sunday of resurrection.