Dia de los Muertos

People in Austin are getting ready for the Day of the Dead. Tomorrow we will have a grand procession downtown. People will be dressed as skeletons or other dead figures...some people dress as zombies and others just have a lot of fake blood all over their face and clothes. This celebration is a mixture of Aztec and Spanish Catholic traditions. Other indigenous people of Mexico have also added touches to the celebration that is thought to have been celebrated 3000 years before the Spanish conquest. The Spanish did not really want the indigenous Mexicans to continue celebrating the dead, so they tried to squelch the tradition. This did not work, so they moved the celebration to November first and second to correspond with All Saints Day.

The Aztecs viewed death as a continuation of the life of the soul. Octavio Paz says "The Mexican is familiar with death, jokes about it, caresses it, sleeps with it, and celebrates it. It is one of his favorite playthings and his most steadfast love." The viewpoint is that death is just part of the circle of life. So on the Day of the Dead, the spirits of loved ones come around and altars must be set up for them, with pictures, strongly smelling spices, food, candles, and flowers. I made this altar for my grandmother.

It is not totally traditional, but it has some traditional parts. There is a lot of symbolism in these altars. Colors have the following meanings:

• purple means pain, suffering, grief, and mourning,
• pink means celebration,
• white means purity and hope,
• orange means the sun,
• red means the blood of life, and
• yellow cempazuchitl are marigolds that symbolize death. Petals make a trail to lead the dead to their altar.

Skulls symbolize death and rebirth.
Pan de Muerto (bread) symbolizes the soul of the dead.
Incense symbolizes the physical changing to the spiritual.
Salt and water symbolize ongoing life.

Here is a closer view of some of the components of my altar. When I was a little girl my grandmother always seemed so glamorous, so I selected the lady on the left in the back to represent glamour. The skeleton in the red box has a tree behind him that might represent the tree of life. The ducks beside the skeleton also must be symbols, but I'm not sure what they mean.

The skull with the rollers in her hair represent my grandmother making herself beautiful. It is a sugar skull. Part of the preparation for the Day of the Dead is making sugar skulls for the altars because it is believed that the dead love sugar. The flower is a chrysanthemum and is the closest I could get to a marigold. The blue plate contains cinnamon sticks, a mint sprig, cilantro sprigs, and epazote (a Mexican herb with a strong aroma).

Behind the blue dish is a disk of chocolate. Mexican chocolate is quite different to what we are used to in the United States. It has a rougher texture and has hints of other tastes such as nutmeg or cinnamon. The chocolate and the items in the blue dish are thought to attract the spirit  to her altar.

This view shows the picture of my grandmother. In front of her are three small sugar skulls. The lady on the left is also made out of sugar. The creature with the gold hat is a dog skeleton with a starfish in his mouth.

On the far right you can see a mother in a coffin with a baby and the words "soy tuyo" which in Spanish means "I am yours."

Tomorrow I will attend the procession and will let you know all about it. I will also make pan de muerto and write a post about it.