Domingo de Ramos

or, in English, Palm Sunday. Today marks the beginning of the official procession season. Each day here in Sevilla various brotherhoods will process through the streets to the cathedral. They march in a kind of parade with pasos (floats) depicting scenes from the passion of Christ. Often there is a second float with a depiction of the Virgin Mary. In some cases, there may even be a third float. The artifacts and sculptures on the floats date back hundreds of years. The oldest brotherhood dates back to the 1300s. The floats are interesting in another sense in that they are very heavy and are carried by teams of about 30 men that are hidden under the float. The act of carrying is considered by some as a kind of penance.

I went out and watched the procession of the Estrella brotherhood which is based right around the corner from our flat here in Triana. In this procession there were over 2000 nazarenos (marchers in pointy hats):

People lined the streets to watch, listen to the band, encourage friends in the procession and otherwise spectate. People in the flats above the procession had an excellent view:

The Christ paso passed through Triana and up over the bridge (the best bridge) for its date with the cathedral at 9:30pm:

As I write this, they're just approaching the cathedral. They'll go inside for a blessing and a prayer and then return to Triana around 2am.

The pointy hats are kind of shocking to folks from the US (think KKK). After you see about 2000 of them, men, women and adolescents, you start to realize they're just regular people out for a pretty long religious ceremony. Laura spotted these two pointy hats with owners absent at a bar, likely pre-gaming the procession:

Here are some other candid shots of nazarenes dressed and heading towards the start point of the procession. Even a nazarene on a mission (sans interior pointy hat support) has to wait for the WALK signal:

Two more, one pretty young, headed to the starting line:

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Laura went over to a different procession earlier in the afternoon. I tried to meet her there after an errand, but couldn't get through the crowd. I did a timelapse of my walk home in which I encountered a couple of processions:

I have a couple other videos, but I'll share them tomorrow. Still waiting for them to upload and process.