Spain’s Festival of the Near Death Experience

Rather than trying to put it out of their minds and move on, the ‘survivors’ instead clamber into coffins to be carried into the church to give thanks to Santa Marta de Ribarteme – the sister of Mary Magdalene – the patron saint of resurrection, as part of an annual Catholic celebration with more than a liberal sprinkling of pagan ritual thrown in for good measure.

The brave souls who take part are those who have survived a brush with death in the past year, climbing into the coffins, which reassuringly are left open, before being carried through the streets by family members along with a procession of thousands of worshippers. If that sounds like an easy ride, then spare a thought for those without a family as if you don’t have any relatives on hand then you have to lug your own coffin through the streets.

Under the watchful gaze of the statue of Santa Marta takes place in the small church and is played over loudspeakers to the gathering hordes who cannot fit inside, before the chanting procession winds its way up to the cemetery and then back to the church where financial offerings are made to the saint to give thanks for those that survived.

And if all that sounds a little bit, well, religious, then you can still revel in the celebratory atmosphere by enjoying the fireworks, brass bands and endless tales of near death experiences by excitable Spaniards – if you speak Spanish of course. If not, then you can just soak up the atmosphere, music and the strange sight of thousands of people flowing through the streets and carrying fully alive people in coffins.