Posadas
December 1 - 24 across mexico
(Puerto Vallarta 1 - 12)
All over Mexico, families, businesses and neighborhoods celebrate the holidays with parties. Every home has a Nativity scene, and candlelit processions called posadas, recreating Joseph and Marys search for lodging in Bethlehem, are formed. The hosts of the posada (one family in one home or a number of families in the neighborhood) act as the innkeepers and the neighborhood children and adults are the pilgrims (peregrinos), who have to request lodging for the weary couple by singing a traditional song. All the pilgrims carry small lit candles in their hands, and the head of the procession carries a candle inside a paper lamp shade that looks like an accordion but is open at the top (farolito).
The pilgrims will symbolically ask for lodging at three different houses, but only the third one will allow them in. That will be the house where the posada will be held for that evening. Once the "innkeepers" let them in, the group of guests come into the home and kneel around the Nativity scene to pray, followed by the singing of traditional Christmas songs and a party for the children, including a piñata and special foods and sweets.
Each one of the nine days a different family (or group of families) offers to be the hosts, so that the whole neighborhood or section participates.
In Puerto Vallarta, the most festive day is the 12th, where the largest posada arrives at the Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe. After prayers in Church, locals and visitors mingle in the town square and the Zocalo is alive with music until all hours of the night, offering traditional food and drink.
The main Christmas celebration, a traditional family dinner on Christmas Eve, is followed by Midnight Mass. Christmas Day is a quiet religious celebration and national holiday.
