Wednesday, July 28, 2010

They Dressed Me Up in Traje

I am SOOOOOOO mad I didn't bring my camera to the section last night. I could have had some great photos.

Last night when I got to the section, their living room was full of colorful cortes (woven skirts), huipiles (embroidered-ish tops), and fajas (woven belts) -- the traditional traje (dress) of Guatemalan women. I'd barely gotten through the door when the girls started yelling, "Wear this one! Try the yellow! No the pink! Put it on right now!"

Fifteen minutes later, after a lot of tugging and pulling and wrapping and making sure we could still breathe, the girls and I were all walking around in the gorgeous traje. This traditional dress is unique to Guatemala, and every Guatemalan village tends to have its own style of weaving the clothing. You can look at a Guatemalan woman and know exactly where she's from, just by noticing the style or color of her corte. A statement of cultural, local, and personal identity, it's pretty cool.

The girls kept commenting how funny it was to see a white person in the corte, but they were also pretty cute, repeating over and over again, "¡Te miras bonita!" You look pretty. 

Sorry, no photos to show you, but just take my word for it: they all looked so cute dressed up. If you'd like a visual though, here are the results from a handy Google image search.

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