For centuries on end, the church of St Alex has played host to the major religious purposes of the village, with its square doubling up as a meeting place for its inhabitants
Erected in 1597, the Curtorim church is amongst the oldestin Salcete. Till today, the remnants of the ancient temple remain visible. Inthe year 1647, the church underwent a massive amount of re-construction and thevillage declared St Alex as their titular saint in 1815.
Even though the patron saint of the village may have beendeclared as St Alex, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe went on to becelebrated with more fervour by the villagers. Celebrated on December 18, thisfeast is also known as ‘Feast of O’. This dates back to when services were inLatin, as in those days, every prayer from the feast to Christmas, would beginwith the Latin alphabet ‘O’. Till today, several women have the name Guadalupeas a part of their whole name.
The feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, in ancient times,involved a lot of banana trading. As such, it began to be known as the ‘kelleamfest’ or the feast of bananas.
