Visita Iglesia

It's Holy Thursday.

Time for Visita Iglesia. This day in Holy week is when we would all go to seven different churches and reflect on the Stations of the Cross.

When we were younger, Mama would bring us to the churches and we would go through the entire fourteen stations, one by one. In later years, we would start "cheating" by going through only two stations per church completing all fourteen by the seventh church.

There were always long lines in the confession booths. Lots and lots of people everywhere. Children running around.

When we were young, Mama prayed with us. We would wait and listen as she read the specific passages that related to each station. Later she had Jo Ann read it aloud for all of us to hear. Eventually, as we got older, we got our own stations-of-the-cross books and paced ourselves as we wished.

One of the main reasons we liked it so much was the fiesta-like atmosphere of the day. There were vendors all around the churches. There were balloons, and toys, and cotton candy. Popcorn, boiled corn, peanuts, and my all time favorite, snow cones.

Being Reyes', you know what the attraction was for us.

Fish balls, squid balls, pineapple juice and dirty ice cream.

Mmmm.

As I got older, I would actually try and save up some money just for the purpose of buying goodies on Visita Iglesia Day.

We would end the day tired, full of junk, and happy.

And if we happened to get three wishes from finding a new church to go to...

Well!!!

Icing on the cake.


Mmmm