St. James a No-Show at Michoacan Culture Week

When St. James the Apostle failed to arrive in Santa Ana on Sunday, the rumors began.

Word was that the statue, star of a traditional dance native to a small Mexican town, had been unable to enter the United States.

“You see,” said Roberto Laurean, a leader of the Michoacan Federation of Orange County, “even a statue can’t cross the border without the right papers.”

St. James’ dance, called tlahualiles, at the Delhi Community Center was supposed to cap Michoacan Cultural Week, a string of events in Orange County celebrating the Mexican state that is the birthplace of many of the region’s immigrants.

Some suspected that the Mexican or U.S. government had stopped the maiden voyage of the 6-foot clay figure. It’s possible that in other communities, organizers might be able to do the dance without St. James. But in Santa Ana, many people know that without St. James, the tlahualiles isn’t the tlahualiles.

More than 60,000 people from Michoacan live in Santa Ana. So many of them are from Sahuayo -- a town so small that it doesn’t show up on most maps of Mexico -- that there are carwashes, laundries and restaurants named for it.

Each July 25, St. James’ feast day, villagers in Sahuayo reenact a 9th-century battle between the Moors and Christians that led to St. James becoming the patron saint of the reconquest of Spain. Dancers portraying Christians dress in hats and swords, and those playing Moors wear masks with faces of tigers, bears or leopards.

Although the failure of the statue of St. James to appear at the Delhi Community Center might not matter to most Mexicans, onlooker Jose Anaya, a Sahuayo native who has lived in the U.S. for 28 years, saw it differently. “We lost some of the essence of the event because of the statue. We were just hoping that it might still get here.”

Angel Orea could have told him it wasn’t going to happen. Although he’s from Mexico, he’s not from Michoacan, even though his Santa Ana restaurant is named after the state’s most famous lake, Patzcuaro.

Villagers from Sahuayo had trucked 10 masks and the statue to Tijuana, where Orea was supposed to pick them up over the weekend. With the colorful animal masks each measuring about 6 by 6 feet, there wasn’t enough room in his truck. So he left behind several masks -- and St. James.

“I guess I really underestimated the importance of the statue,” Orea said. “I guess it’s just not the same without the statue.”

But people who are not from Sahuayo would have no idea.

“It’s the first time we’ve had a cultural week, and we hope it becomes a tradition ... with or without the statue,” said Santa Ana Councilman Jose Solorio, who is from La Piedad, Michoacan.