In the week before Easter , the people of Antigua make 'carpets' in the streets where the Catholic processions will later travel. Several houses or businesses in the same street will club together to create the carpet. Mostly they're made of sawdust, and decorated with coloured sawdust and flowers or fruit. Most have religious images, others geometrical patterns but all are very inticate and take several hours to create, during which time the streets are closed to traffic, and there's a real party atmosphere. The practice originated with Mayans who made the carpets to welcome the spirits and then processed over the carpets to dispell the evil spirits. When the Catholic Spanish arrived, the practice continued but the images changed.
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