Fireworks and Pan de Guagua

Who knew the month of October would be so full of surprises?? Surprise number one was the wake-up call I got on the 1st of October. I was startled awake somewhere around 6:00am by a series of the loudest fireworks ever (they were set off outside...not actually in my room, as I first suspected). At first, I thought maybe it was just some kids messing around or something. Then when the second set went off a few minutes later, and the third a little while after that, I thought..."That's interesting...must be some sort of celebration today in one of the cathedrals." (I have seen the cathedrals shoot off fireworks in the day here when they are celebrating something).

Well, today when we went to go visit Zoraida, a friend who comes every once in a while to study with us, she started telling us that this month is the month the people celebrate El Señor de los Temblores (the god of earthquakes). The entire month is dedicated to this guy...which explains why I have had the same disturbing wake-up call at the same time EVERY MORNING!!! And I guess I can expect to have the same startling awakening every day until November. So...that's cool.

But that's not the most interesting thing. I have no idea if it's related to the celebration this month or not (Zoraida didn't have any idea either), but during this time of year, all the bakeries start selling bread in the shape of a baby wrapped up in a blanket!! It's called "pan de guagua" (baby bread) and the women carry these bread babies around like babies...and THEN...there's a day when they baptize the bread babies in honey, and then they bless the bread, and cut it up and eat it!!! Can you imagine? They also have bread in the shape of horses; "pan de caballo" (you guessed it: horse bread), and the men carry those because the babies are for the women to carry. (hmm...) I don't know if they baptize the horses or not. haha.