It's that time of the Roman Catholic Liturgical Year once again, fellow barefoot walkers... I know I've been negligent about posting and maintaining this blog since the year began. Busy is the understatement of the year. It seems like since the first week of January, work and other stuff just piled up one after the other [didn't I say this somewhere before? or is it here?] with Theater Down South, Jesus Christ Superstar,and the book were trying to finish. And in the middle of all that, I find it weird that I had some time to procrastinate.
But, seeing as the Barefoot Baklesa often loves to make a public display of some of his projects, allow me to brag about this year's Carroza Challenge. Ever since I decided to join the Holy Week Processional Line-up at my ancestral province of Antique a few years back, I had always felt that it was going to be a work in progress, that a lot of things need some ironing out, if the words serve, what you would call what we had to in terms of the rebulto, the carroza, and the logistics of it all.
It's almost four years now since the first Niki de los Reyes-Torres Carroza challenge, an my cousins and I have been going at it, sometimes barely making it by the skins of our teeth. But I'm thankful for their help.
I would like to acknowledge someone who has been of great help to us lately especially with the repairs made to the visage of Santa Maria de Betania: a dear friend we fondly call Djaja.By leaps and bounds, Djaja can run ten circles among the Santeros and devotees of our generation. His collection of Marian and Lenten processional images, though noted for their beauty, are for him objects that reflect his true devotion and not as oversized dolls to be displayed ~which some other image owners, mostly homosexual, are guilty of by my observation.
This year's Carroza Challenge would not have been if not for Djaja's help in assuring that the image of Santa Maria de Betania would not return to Antique if it did not bear the visage it richly deserves. In the spirit of camp, the original rostro had to undergo a major major makeover complete with new hands and repainting. Also with Santa Maria de Betania was an image of Saint Joanna the wife of Chuza, which was originally a salvaged image of Our Lady of the Snows from Leyte that we had converted to Santa Juana de Cuza. Both are pictured within this posting. Thank you, Djaja!
And so, I leave you with this for now. I'll save my fangs for another post.
thus spake the Barefoot Baklesa
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