Photo Essay: A Mexican Christmas

It always seems a little odd to me when I see Christmas cards and decorations featuring snow in a tropical country like Mexico.

Wouldn’t it be more interesting if they had their own Christmas traditions?

Well, it turns out that they do.

I was working on a cruise ship last December when we anchored at Zihuatanejo, a small fishing village on Mexico’s southern Pacific coast.

Zihuatanejo is built in a pretty little bay surrounded by tree covered hills. Fisherman bring their catch ashore in small wooden boats and spread their fish out on the beach to sell, while gringos lay in the sun or hang out in restaurants and bars.

Being mid-December, there were Christmas decorations in the streets. A particular sort caught my eye; large, colorful stars decorated with tissue paper and ribbons and hung from wires above the street. They spun lazily in the sea breeze.

I found a little market where people were making the decorations. They sat under awnings, surrounded by clay pots, cardboard and colored paper.

I saw that the stars are constructed using clay pots. The conical points are made with cardboard and attached to the pots, then decorated in bright colors with shiny paper, tissue and ribbons. Finished stars hung from the ceilings in brightly coloured clusters along with giant Santas and Christmas trees.

On the tender back to the ship I realized that there was an interesting story here somewhere and I decided to do some research.

The stars are called piñatas and are a Mexican Christmas tradition. The clay pots are filled with candies and at Christmas, blindfolded children hit them with a long stick to break them and release the goodies.

In Europe, this custom originated in Italy in the 14th century (the Italian word pignatta means ‘fragile pot’). The custom spread to Spain and developed into a fiesta at Lent called the Dance of the Piñata. The Spanish started decorating the pot with ribbons, tinsel and fringed paper.

The Aztecs of 16th century Mexico had a similar ceremony. At the end of the year they celebrated the birthday of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec god of war, by placing a clay pot on a pole. It was decorated with colorful feathers and filled with treasure. The pot was broken with a club or a stick and the treasures fell to earth as an offering to the god.

Spanish Franciscan missionaries, looking for ways to convert the indigenous people, endowed the piñatas with religious symbolism and used them to attract converts to their Catholic ceremonies.

Today the piñatas no longer have religious significance and are a game played at Christmas and birthday parties. Traditional songs like this are sung while breaking the piñatas:

“Dale, dale, dale, no perdas el tino,

porque si lo perdes, pierdes el camino.

Esta piñata es de muchas mañas, sólo contiene naranjas y cañas.”

“Hit, hit, hit.

Don’t lose your aim,

Because if you lose, you lose the road.

This piñata is much manna, only contains oranges and sugar cane.”

Not quite as odd, and much more interesting than snow, don’t you think?