Sawdust Carpets

The Lau family, well-known from Amelia Lau Carling’s award winning picture-book Mama and Papa have a Store/La Tienda de Mamá y Papá, have been invited to spend Easter with their cousins in Antigua, Guatemala. Although they are Chinese and Buddhist, Mamá loves the pageantry of Easter.

Antigua, the former colonial capital of Guatemala, is renowned for its Easter processions. Not only are the statues outstanding examples of Spanish colonial art, they are carried by hundreds of penitents, wreathed in incense. One of the most striking and original features of these processions is the creation of spectacular, ephemeral, sawdust carpets which the processions walk over and destroy. The cobble stone street of the city are lined with these carpets which people spend days creating, only to see them disappear. The heroine of the story helps to make a one of these carpets.
Guatemalan and Chinese religious observances, the Goddess Kuan Yin and the Virgen de Guadalupe, Dragon Boat Races and Easter processions, piñatas and baptisms and Chinese tamales all weave in and out of this story that celebrates beauty, religious celebration, and tolerance.