In this Mexican city some girls dream of a crown made of vanilla.
Papantla decorates its Corpus Christi festival queensor queens, with the thick brown stems of the vanilla orchid woven, twisted and jeweled into fragrant crowns, a nod to the spice's place in the city's history.
Centuries ago, the Totonacs here used the orchid. planifolia vanilla as perfume; Then, the Aztec conquistadors began mixing it into a chocolate drink during the time of Emperor Montezuma. After the Spanish invasion, vanilla from Mexico spread abroad and Papantla gained international fame.
Mexico may no longer be the leader in the world's vanilla trade (that's Madagascar), but in Papantla the spice still reigns supreme.
Many of the city's ancient queens They still cherish their vanilla braided wreaths decades later. The crown is a sweet memory steeped in her youth, her city and his heritage.
“You can have a crown with many things: diamonds, emeralds, pearls,” said Marichu Mondragón, who won hers in 1981, “but a vanilla crown only here.”
Marichu Mondragón, 59 years old.
Queen: 1981
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1. Marichu Mondragón vanilla crown from 1981. 2. “The smell of vanilla when they put the crown on you, I don't know, it's something that stays with you,” says Mondragón, 59 years old.
Marichu Mondragón occasionally removes the jewels from her crown, bathes it in vanilla extract and leaves it in the sun for several days. The vanilla braids on the crown absorb the extract, he explains, keeping it looking new.
Mondragón wears the crown every year at a celebration held by Pemex, Mexico's state oil company and her husband's employer. She also brings it out for any Papantla event she is invited to as a former queen.
“The smell of vanilla when they put the crown on you, I don't know, it's something that stays with you,” said Mondragón, who remembers being crowned by the first lady of the state of Veracruz.
Delia Núñez, 94
Queen: 1949
Delia Núñez's 1949 vanilla crown, which she kept in a cookie tin and took out from time to time to show her children.
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1. Delia Núñez, 94, poses for a portrait with her vanilla crown and scepter. 2. Núñez shows a photograph from 1949.
Delia Núñez was 19 years old and a school teacher when she competed for the vanilla crown. Her supporters from the Papantla Carnival held a bullfight to help her win votes and raise money for a new kindergarten where she would teach.
Years later, when she was raising her seven children, she would take her wreath out of its storage place (a cookie tin in her closet) and hold it up for them to smell.
Delia Núñez, energetic and optimistic while struggling with memory problems, still has the crown, now dry and damaged. At her daughter's house in Papantla, she put it on and smiled as she posed for a photo. She then sat and looked at a photo album of her when she was a teacher, before she earned the money for the kindergarten that the crown helped build.
Tania Zayas, 27 years old.
Queen: 2014
Tania Zayas' vanilla crown is braided to symbolize a pyramid in El Tajín, an important Mesoamerican city that is now an archaeological site.
Zayas, 27, poses for a portrait wearing the crown and vanilla scepter he won when he was 17.
Tania Zayas did not want to be queen.
But her high school pushed so hard for her to be its candidate in the Corpus Christi festival that the 17-year-old relented.
“I was embarrassed,” said Zayas, who now teaches physical education at an elementary school in Papantla.
Now she doesn't shy away when people look for her as a former queen. Her crown is woven in the shape of a pyramid that represents the nearby archaeological site of El Tajín. It also contains two orchids and three hearts, a symbol of the region.
“Once I did it and I was on the other side, I said it really is an experience that all women should have,” she said. “It's more beautiful because you stay in the history of Papantla.”
Alma Rosa González Herrera, 85 years old.
Queen: 1958
Alma Rosa González Herrera, 84, poses for a portrait with her vanilla crown from 1958, when she was 18 years old.
González, 84, was declared queen of a Corpus Christi party in Papantla.
Alma Rosa González Herrera was 18 years old, working as an accountant and living with her parents in 1958 when several ranchers came to her house one afternoon to ask her if she would run as their candidate for queen of the Corpus Christi festivities.
González, who had already been “student queen” at her high school the year before, was happy but not overwhelmed.
“Those things hardly move me,” he said. “I was contributing to my city.”
But González, who married a rancher and today writes poems for a local newspaper, has saved the crown for more than half a century. A photograph of her at her home in Papantla shows the then-teenager smiling, her hair covered in crowd confetti thrown into the air as she arrived at a theater for her coronation.
Josefa Vargas Riaño, 71 years old.
Queen: 1972
Vanilla crown by Josefa Vargas Riaño adorned with hearts and jewels.
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1. Josefa Vargas Riaño, 71, poses with the crown and wand she won at age 19. 2. Vargas Riaño holds a framed photograph of herself as queen in 1972.
The race for Josefa Vargas Riaño to become queen of the Corpus Christi festivities was simple. Vargas, then 19, and two other candidates from what she called “the biggest party in the city” took envelopes from a glass bowl. Vargas was stunned to see that hers said “queen.”
Photographs of her coronation hang on the wall of Freijoó Casa Vintage, the hotel she owns in Papantla, which will soon have an exhibition on the history of the queens.
“This was a really nice part of my youth,” said Vargas, who also works for Pemex.
On the 50th anniversary of Vargas' coronation, about two dozen former queens gathered to celebrate.
“Congratulations for all the honor you have given us during these last 50 years,” said the mayor. “A queen or princess of Corpus Christi officially serves only one year. Even after she renounces the crown, in reality, she never, ever ceases to be a member of the royal court.”
