mascarados, Mardi Gras, and Tintamarre

The Costa Ricans working in the coffee fields created a form of mockery for the rich plantation owners. During the mascaradas, the workers don costumes that made fun of the rich. This holiday of mockery is similar to Mardi Gras back in Louisiana or Tintamarre in Acadia.

This holiday is meant to turn around the established social structure. With the roles reversed, the farmers are the rulers while the rulers are ridiculed. This holiday allows the farmers to release their stress and anger towards their landowners without violence. The costumes resemble the massive “bobble heads” found at Tintamarre. The people parade through the streets with their large disguises and act like fools.

There are common characters found in this holiday such as the corrupt policeman along with the plantation owner and his wife. The couple are portrayed with blond hair and blue eyes since many of the owners were of European descent. Wife or “giantess” is a massive woman with a hole cut in her stomach for the partier to show their face. Her husband also has a hole in his stomach and ports the blond hair blue eyes.

In Catholic cultures, it is common for there to be a holiday that reverses society. In Notre Dame de Paris, the Feast of Fools puts Quasimodo into the spotlight due to his ugliness. His deformity crowns him as the king to represent the inner grotesqueness of the French king. In Louisiana, there is Mardi Gras where the people party up until Ash Wednesday. In the countryside of Louisiana, the courir de Mardi Gras has revelers dressed in satirical costumes. The men tend to wear dresses and do black face.