We're Gearing Up For Day of the Dead In Mexico
Day of the Dead, El Dia de los Muertos, is another Mexican two-day extravaganza. It starts around sundown of November 1. Families, at least in the more northern and rural parts of the country, have been preparing their family altars to welcome the spirits of their ancestors, and family members who have died.
The altars have symbolic items on them, like salt, and wine, or tequila, candles. And of course, have food and drink, and items that the deceased used to like in life, such as books, or now in a more modern vein, CD's, videos, etc.
Schools and public buildings usually have altars to which everyone contributes in honor of their deceased family members.
Here in my city, and further south, there are fewer home altars. But I had a student whose family all lived in a very small town up in the mountains, and people in that village would dedicate an entire room to being a walk-in altar, and the populace of the town would take tours and go visit all these. It was a competition to see which family could outdo the others in extravagant display. My student, a young man in his twenties, always went back to his home village a few days before Nov. 1 to help set up the family display room. It took days to do it.
The belief, at least of the old people, is that the spirits of the dead come back at midnight on November 1 to mingle with their loved ones, eat the food and drink the booze.
On November 2, the families all go to the cemetaries and bring a picnic, and clean up the gravesite of their family members, put in new plants, and figurines, etc. The cemetaries are packed on that day with picnicing people.
The color for all this is orange, and the traditional flowers are orange mums.
The altars have symbolic items on them, like salt, and wine, or tequila, candles. And of course, have food and drink, and items that the deceased used to like in life, such as books, or now in a more modern vein, CD's, videos, etc.
Schools and public buildings usually have altars to which everyone contributes in honor of their deceased family members.
Here in my city, and further south, there are fewer home altars. But I had a student whose family all lived in a very small town up in the mountains, and people in that village would dedicate an entire room to being a walk-in altar, and the populace of the town would take tours and go visit all these. It was a competition to see which family could outdo the others in extravagant display. My student, a young man in his twenties, always went back to his home village a few days before Nov. 1 to help set up the family display room. It took days to do it.
The belief, at least of the old people, is that the spirits of the dead come back at midnight on November 1 to mingle with their loved ones, eat the food and drink the booze.
On November 2, the families all go to the cemetaries and bring a picnic, and clean up the gravesite of their family members, put in new plants, and figurines, etc. The cemetaries are packed on that day with picnicing people.
The color for all this is orange, and the traditional flowers are orange mums.
