Pio Pico was the last Mexican governor of California. He reputedly wrote:

"What are we to do then? Shall we remain supine, while these daring strangers are overrunning our fertile plains, and gradually outnumbering and displacing us? Shall these incursions go on unchecked, until we shall become strangers in our own land?"

Truly, the more things change, the more they remain the same. And this time change comes, for the most part, peacefully. The Las Posadas festival is simply proof that people, and their cultures, can come together.