Misteri D'Elx

See the title?  That is in Valenciano, a dialect of Spanish spoken in Elche or Elx (well, it is spoken in Valencia which is where Elche is). It means the 'Mystery of Elche'.  You now know the title of Elche's rather famous mystery play. I am sure you feel smarter already!  You see  it has been performed since the middle ages, even after the council of Trent outlawed such performances inside the cathedrals, and is performed in Valenciano.  The legend is that a casket washed up on Elche's seashore containing the script and music for this play and a statue of the virgin.  It has been performed ever since. The play recounts  that at the end of her life, Mary  asks God to see the apostles once more before she dies.  They come, singing some really beautiful songs I might add, she dies, and then is taken up to heaven (the top of the basilica) in the company of angels and music, and the statue depicting her is sent back down.   My husband had studied this play and wanted to see it, so We Did!
Ummmm..Warning! If you have a lot to do today, you might want to save this for another time. 
There are lots of photos.  Just know that, as usual, I didn't use even half of what I kept.

We had been wanting to do apartment checks and haul supplies to that neck of the woods anyway so it was a perfect opportunity.  When we do apt checks, we not only see that they are clean, we also check safety supplies, and I have been taking the opportunity to teach the missionaries how to use extinguishers, where to place smoke detectors, etc. I think we will have to go back because there are still a lot of apts we didn't get to see and there are no couples up there.

They mostly did very well in keeping  things clean.  Of course that meant that we had to go out to eat! The Chinese buffets are very good here.  The missionaries really enjoy the 'all you can eat' part.



This is the Façade of the Basilica.  We actually got to go in one of these huge doors.

God and Christ crowning Mary Queen of Heaven

I loved the ivy on this column.

St Peter(?) slaying the dragon.

Street contacting.

A rather interesting fountain.

There are phrases about women, in many languages.

This is the interior of the basilica before it filled with people.

The virgin.

They opened these windows about a 1/3 of the way through the play.

I think that door is at least 50 feet up.

Here are dignitaries entering. Note the fans.  Paper fans were passed out to us as we entered and we all used them the whole time.  It was warm and there were lots of folks.



Mary and the angels enter here.  We were very near the main aisle. Those poor angels had to wear (hot) wigs. James met 2 other apostles and they sang their trio standing right next to us.  Their songs were gorgeous and their wonderful voices blended perfectly.

That is our Mary.   

She sang a lot and it was all memorized.  She had to stay still for about an hour like this.  She did have a hanky that she wiped the sweat off with though. 

The angel is about to enter.

Here is the Archangel starting his descent.  It took about 8 minutes for him to arrive.

The organ music was wonderful. We couldn't see if from our seats so this was taken at intermission.  There are 2 sections of the play which are run on consecutive nights but we got to see the whole play in one sitting.

 In the 2nd half the Archangel comes with the 2 angels you can see, plus 2 cherubim kneeling at the base of the framework playing lutes.  The only parts of any of  them that moved during their 'flight' were their mouths and strumming hands.  I kept wondering how they didn't start spinning.

We really did enjoy the play.  One of the ladies in front of us shared her program with us during the 2nd half and that had the words in Spanish and Valenciano .  It really made understanding much easier.  All the parts are performed by natives of the city rather than professionals.  We also realized how much of the symbolism we don't get because we don't know the Catholic saints. A neat experience.
  For the whole week prior, people randomly toss firecrackers or those little poppers at other people. We heard random booms  during the play as fireworks were shot off. 

 

After the play we wandered a little down town.  This is one of the bridges over the river that runs through the city.

This was on that bridge.  Those are racks of  fireworks.  There were at least 3 other bridges, also filled with fireworks.

We returned to our hotel to rest a bit, then met up with the missionaries at a member's apartment building.  We went up on top and watched from about 10:30 pm till midnight as fireworks were shot off from all over the city.

Notice how little smoke there is in the sky at this point.

I hand held the camera and tossed most of the photos that showed movement, but I kind of liked this one.

Remember the rockets on the bridge?  They were shooting them off one after the other for about 15 minutes solid.  See the smoke in the sky?

For the finale they shut off power to the center part of town and shot a huge one like this. They call it a palm (like the tree).  Elche is famous for all it's palm trees.  Last year the final huge rocket misfired, hit the ground and burned the crew, killing one of them. This year's display was dedicated to him.  At the end you could hear people all over the city singing their anthem. 

I found it interesting that this day to honorthe Virgin is celebrated with fireworks, hundreds of thousands of euros worth, I would guess. The gospel brings a quieter, eternal light in the darkness of people's lives.  How blessed we are to have that light.  What a joy to get to share it!