San Cristobal was yet another charming highlands town full of character. We particularly loved it because it actually gets cold at night - what a relief! We arrived pretty tired after an overnight bus journey, which despite being the Deluxe coach (thanks dad!), we still arrived tired. We stayed in a very cheerful room overlooking a very colorful sweet little courtyard (Los Camellos Inn - great except for the miserable girl at the front desk!)
We did an extremely interesting half day trip from San Cristobal out to some local villages (San Juan Chamula) to see their culture, rituals and religion etc. And we found some rather unusual things: for starters, the villagers drink coca cola as part of their religious rituals - it makes them burp which usurps evil spirits, secondly they use crates of coca-cola to settle judicial matters, for example fines.
Most unusual was our visit to the local church, where you cannot take photos but you can watch the semi-pagan-catholic rituals. The floor of the church is covered in some kind of cut grass, which they believe gives them protection. The locals are gathered sat on the floor in little groups performing their rituals for the purpose of dealing with some problem - for example, an illness in the family. The rituals include variously: lighting large numbers of candles on the floor, drinking coca cola and the local firewater (even the kids drink the alcohol) and in some cases if their problems are really bad, they sacrifice a chicken. All quite unusual, and surrounded by images of the Saints (although no Jesus as far as I could see).
