La Maya

May 2015. Duna Puente Romera, 9 years old, is a “Maya girl’ for the traditional celebration of ‘Las Mayas’ on the streets of Colmenar Viejo, a small village near Madrid. The festival, held each May to celebrate the arrival of spring, has pagan rites and dates from at least the medieval age. Only four or five girls, all aged between 7 and 11 years of age are chosen as ‘Maya’ each year. They must sit still, be serious, and quiet for a couple of hours in an altar on the street decorated with flowers and plants and afterwards they walk to the church with their family for a ceremony.