A modern witch celebrates the cycle of life and death at the confluence of cultures

This time of year, a bruja, or witch, practices central Mexican Indigenous rituals and modern pagan ones, both honoring the Earth and “us as individuals as part of nature.” But the holidays of the Day of the Dead and Samhain are not the same.

The Rev. Laura Gonzalez poses after teaching about Day of the Dead at a bookstore in Chicago in 2019. Courtesy photo

October 28, 2022

By 

Heather Greene

(RNS) — As Americans of all faiths prepare for Halloween with costumes and candy or the Day of the Dead with food and flowers, the pagan community is also preparing for its holiday celebrating death and rebirth.

Samhain is the third and final harvest festival of the pagan Wheel of the Year, as the holiday calendar is known in many Earth-based religions.

“(Modern) Pagans have incorporated the seasonal concern with the dead in a holy day that celebrates the cyclicity of life, death, and rebirth,” writes folklorist and pagan scholar Sabina Magliocco in her book “Witching Culture.” 

Not unlike the Day of the Dead and Halloween, Samhain (a Gaelic word pronounced “Sow-en”) includes feasting and honoring one’s ancestors, though those celebrating Samhain are likely to add some divination. Based largely on Irish folk religion, it is a time when the divide between the physical and spiritual worlds are believed to be thin.

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The Rev. Laura González, who is a practicing witch and a pagan educator and podcaster in Chicago, celebrates all three. “(My practice) is a hodgepodge,” she laughs.

The Rev. Laura Gonzalez celebrating Tlaxochimaco 2022 in Little Village, Chicago. Courtesy photo

González merges modern paganism with Mexican traditions, including practices indigenous to central Mexico, where she is from. “At their core, modern paganism and these indigenous practices both honor the Earth,” she said. Nature reverence is essential, she said, to her spiritual path.

“Let me describe to you what happens in my life,” González said in a phone interview. On Oct. 1, the decorations go up for Halloween, a purely secular holiday for her. Then, around Oct. 27, she sets up a Day of the Dead altar to honor deceased relatives, as most Mexicans do about this time, she said. “My mother died on Oct. 27, 2011. I believe it was her last wink to me,” said González.

Since then, González has been honoring her mother with bread and coffee but has also made it her mission to teach others about the Day of the Dead and its origins. She teaches those traditions as well as modern paganism both locally and over the internet at the pagan distance-learning Fraternidad de la Diosa in Chihuahua, Mexico.

On Samhain, González always hosts a small ritual for her Pagan students and participates in Samhain celebrations, either as an attendee or organizer. Some years she travels to Wisconsin to be with fellow members of the Wiccan church Circle Sanctuary.

Samhain is traditionally honored on Oct. 31, but some pagans celebrate it Nov. 6 or 7, an astrologically calculated date. Regardless, group celebrations must often yield to modern schedules, and González said she will celebrate an early Samhain this year.

“My (Samhain) celebration is for the ancestors and for the Earth going into slumber — the Goddess goes to sleep,” González said. She likes to focus her ritual on modern pagan trailblazers, often referred to as “the mighty dead,” rather than on her relatives, which she honors on the Day of the Dead.

González’s central Mexican indigenous practice and her modern pagan practice, rooted in  northern Mexico and the United States, “are very similar,” she added, both honoring the Earth and “us as individuals as part of nature,” something she believes has been lost in modern Day of the Dead traditions. However, she quickly added, “Indigenous practices are not pagan.”

Growing up in Mexico City, González was surrounded by mainstream Mexican culture, with Day of the Dead festivals and altars. As she was exposed to the Indigenous traditions that are still woven through Mexican culture, she explained, she began to study folk magic and traditions, as well as “Native philosophies.”

The Day of the Dead, she said, “is the ultimate syncretic holiday,” a merger of the European-based Catholic traditions with Indigenous beliefs and celebrations. “The practices brought to Mexico by the Catholic colonizers were filled with pagan DNA,” she said. All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day contain remnants of traditional Samhain and other older beliefs, she noted.

“These colonizers came to a land filled — filled — with skulls and its imagery,” she said, which must have been frightening and somewhat of a culture shock, she added.

An altar during Tlaxochimaco 2022 commemorations in Chicago. Courtesy photo

González is now actively participating in the revival of the Indigenous traditions as a teacher and celebrant. The Indigenous holiday, she said, is a 40-day celebration. The first 20 days is called Tlaxochimaco, or the birth of flowers, and the second is Xoco Huetzi, or the fall of the fruit.

“We all are flowers,” she explained. We grow, flower, bloom and then become fruit. Eventually falling and becoming seed, and the cycle continues. The Aztecs “used this mythology to describe life and life cycles,” she said.

“But there are people who do not make it to fruit. They die young,” González explained. These people are honored during Tlaxochimaco.

During Xoco Huetzi, celebrations are held to honor those who have made it to old age before passing. Both festivals traditionally involve dancing, she said, which is considered an offering to the dead. 

The 40-day celebration was eventually condensed into two days aligning with the colonizers’ Catholic traditions, she said, becoming the modern Day of the Dead celebration, a holiday that is quickly becoming as popular north of the Mexican border as Halloween is.

While González is not offended by purely secular Halloween celebrations, even with its classic depiction of witches, she struggles with the growing commercialization of the Day of the Dead. “I know what I am, and I know what I celebrate,” she said, speaking of Halloween. “I find it funny that the wise woman has been made into something scary.”

What does offend her is people dressed as sugar skulls. “It’s a double-edged sword,” González said. “It’s a source of pride knowing the world loves our culture,” she said. However, she added, “You love our culture, you love our music, you love our food, you love our traditions, you love our aesthetics, you love our parties and holidays, you love all of that, but you don’t love us.”

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An example of a Samhain altar. Photo by Heather Greene

This is the definition of cultural appropriation, she added.

“The world is filled with racism, discrimination, colorism, classism,” she continued. “There is a disconnection between the thing and the people who made the thing.” She likened this to a second wave of colonization.

Her recommendation: “If you like Day of the Dead stuff,” she said, “shake a tree and a Mexican artisan will fall from it. Buy Mexican. You will benefit the very people who have created the aesthetic,” she said. “The big box stores don’t need your money,” she said, but Mexican and Mexican American families do.

Many pagans, especially in the growing Latino pagan community, do honor multiple traditions like González, particularly around the time when the holidays align.

“I think it’s important to recognize where we come from and how we survive whatever challenges our ancestors had,” said González. Samhain, Day of the Dead and the Aztec traditions “are, after all, a celebration of life and their lives.”

Mexican villages try to preserve authentic Day of the Dead

By FERNANDA PESCE

Family members keep vigil beside graves during Day of the Dead festivities at the Tzintzuntzan cemetery in Michocan, Mexico, Sunday, Oct. 31, 2021. In a tradition that coincides with All Saints Day and All Souls Day on Nov. 1 and 2, families decorate the graves of departed relatives with marigolds and candles, and spend the night in the cemetery, eating and drinking as they keep company with their deceased loved ones. 

(AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)


AROCUTIN, Mexico (AP) — The famed Day of the Dead ceremonies around Mexico’s Lake Patzcuaro were once again thronged with visitors on Monday, economic relief for a tourist-dependent region that suffered from last year’s pandemic shutdown of the observance.

In the lakeside city of Patzcuaro itself, tourists were treated to a parade, theater and music performances.

“Come and visit us, Patzcuaro welcomes you with open arms,” said Julio Arreola, mayor of the city in the western state of Michoacan that is famed for its colonial-era plazas and architecture.

But in some smaller villages around the lakeshore, residents tried to preserve the authentic, non-tourist flavor of traditions passed down for hundreds of years.

While kids in Mexico City donned Halloween-style costumes based on the Netflix series “Squid Game,” people in the village of Arocutín were more concerned with the flower arrangements and candles meant to guide the spirits of the dead home.




Locals carry flowers outside of Arocutin municipal cemetery as people arrive to pay their respects to their dead in Arocutin, Michoacan, Sunday, Oct. 31, 2021. (AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo)

Residents of Arocutín started hanging up traditional garlands of marigold flowers early morning Sunday to adorn the entrance of the small local cemetery.

Arocutín remains a holdout: It is the only town in the region where the cemetery lies in the churchyard, and where all the tombs are dug directly into the earth, surrounded by a simple ring of stones, rather than the more elaborate cement and brick vaults used elsewhere.

“It’s all about preserving tradition as much as we can”, said Alma Ascencio, the representative for local artisans. “Tourism has distorted everything. This is a celebration, sure, but a religious one, so there is no music or much alcohol. It is very private, a completely different thing.”

While the island of Janitzio in Lake Patzcuaro is the site best known for colorful Day of the Dead celebrations, the tiny island remains remains closed to visitors to avoid crowding.

That raised concerns that tourists might flock to smaller villages nearby.

Those concerns may be overstated. The only American in Arocutín Monday was Georgia Conti. A retired healthcare manager, she decided to move to Arocutín precisely because of its beauty and traditions, and she now lives here with her dog.

When she was building her house with her late husband, they found bones that were believed to be those of a soldier killed in 1915 during the Mexican Revolution.

“Some tourists do come around here, but here is a different world. I really respect their traditions”, said Conti. “Villagers are really welcoming and told me I could lay my mother’s ashes here, next to the unknown soldier. I will probably be buried here when I die”.

The Day of the Dead originated in Indigenous cultures and has been celebrated for thousands of years, but tourists started arriving in Arocutín only in 2002. Residents are open to sharing their costumes, but resistant to changing them in any way.

“We don’t celebrate Halloween here. We are not American, we celebrate our dead. Our culture is rich enough here in Michoacán and Mexico,” Ascencio said while preparing marigold garlands.

Preparations for the Day of the Dead start on the 31st with residents adorning the tombs with marigold arches and candles.

That is the night Mexicans celebrate their deceased children, while the night from the 1st to the 2nd is dedicated to the adult dead.

Arocutín is one of the few communities where a church bell rings to call the souls and guide them back to the land of the living, to prevent them from getting lost. Each community has a different sound. This is also one of the few communities where people stay up all night, offering food and presents to the deceased.

“We coexist with our dead. We bring them all the things they liked when they were alive. Sometimes it is a beer, or a tequila with a cigarette,” said Alma Ascencio.

Elizabeth Ascencio lost her newborn 20 years ago and every year comes to adorn the small stone tomb with marigold petals to guarantee his return for the night.

“This is a special day, a beautiful day”, said Elizabeth Ascencio. “We try very hard to welcome our dead”.

Every year,the town erects a big decorated arch at the entrance to the cemetery. To many, this is the door through which the dead enter.

According to tradition, the only force that allows residents to lift the tree trunks that form the arch are the souls of the children who respond to the sound of the bells and come to help.

Bunches of Mexican marigolds adorn another monumental wooden arch that lies on the floor of another small cemetery not far from Arocutín. A group of residents patiently tie the flowers to the tree trunks, while others rest or enjoy a taco under the sun. The villagers decorate the arches, then lift them into place.

Cecilio Sánchez, a construction worker and a resident of the neighboring town of San Francisco Uricho, learned how to make the flower arch from his elders.

“But for all of us, our arch is much more beautiful than the one in Arocutín,” Sánchez said.

Maria Ermenegildo, 69, is a traditional embroidery artisan who has lived in Arocutín her entire life.

“We’ve always done it this way,” said Ermenegildo, while finishing the last marigold garlands ahead of the big night. “No other village can decorate and celebrate the way we do. We feel very proud every time tourists tell us how beautiful everything is.”

Pandemic-hit Mexican town awaits reunion with dead

Pandemic-hit Mexican town awaits reunion with dead

Mexico's Day of the Dead festival centers around the belief that souls of the deceased return for a brief reunion (AFP/Claudio CRUZ)

Alexander Martinez
Mon, November 1, 2021

Sandra Jimenez lost two sisters to the coronavirus, which devastated her small Mexican town. On Monday she awaited the return of their souls for the Day of the Dead.

Many events linked to what is considered Mexico's most important festival were canceled last year as the Latin American country battled to contain the virus.

But with a third wave of infections now subsiding, this year has seen the return of cemetery visits and other public celebrations, including a parade through the capital.


In Santa Cruz Atizapan, in the central State of Mexico, church bells rang out for months at the height of the pandemic in a show of respect for the many victims.

The residents found it so traumatizing that they asked for the tolling to stop, Jimenez said as she tidied the graves of relatives in the town's cemetery.

"It was horrible, distressing!" the 64-year-old said.

The Day of the Dead, which is rooted in indigenous culture, centers around the belief that the souls of the dead return on the night of November 1-2.

Families put out altars with pictures of relatives and their favorite foods, along with candles and decorative skulls.

- 'Calmer now' -

Atizapan is the Mexican municipality with the highest mortality rate due to Covid-19 relative to its population size, according to data from the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

The town of 12,894 people has registered 303 deaths from coronavirus, with a peak seen at the beginning of this year.

"Two or three people died every day. We were burying them up until the night," said Freddy Gonzalez, who manages the town's cemetery.

Before the crisis, annual deaths were around 60, so the graveyard had to expand its capacity and schedule to keep up, he said.

"But it's calmer now. There are two or three deaths every month," the 29-year-old said.

With the pandemic easing, relatives were allowed to enter the cemetery to tidy and decorate the graves before the Day of the Dead.

The country of 126 million has an official Covid-19 death toll of more than 288,000 -- one of the highest in the world.

Jimenez's sister Estela died in June 2020. In December, the coronavirus claimed the life of another sister.

Maria Luisa, who was 74, had continued to travel by public transport to her job as a domestic worker in Mexico City, putting her at risk of infection.

Estela, 76, died when the oxygen in her tank ran out on the way to a clinic.

"I gave her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation," but it was not enough, Jimenez said.

A woman takes part in a Day of the Dead parade in Mexico City, where an easing of the pandemic led to the return of public celebrations (AFP/CLAUDIO CRUZ)

- 'Crying not enough' -

Atizapan only has one hospital providing basic care and many patients faced a one-hour journey for treatment, according to a paramedic working in the area.

At critical moments in the pandemic the hospitals were overwhelmed, said the man, who attended hundreds of emergencies in the town.

"Crying was not enough to release the emotion. We wanted to throw in the towel, but we had to continue," said the 27-year-old, who did not want to be named.

To honor those who died and try to ease the pain, the residents of Atizapan prepared colorful altars for the visiting souls.

"Not even the pandemic dampened our enthusiasm," said Antonio Briseno, 35, who lost his mother-in-law during the pandemic.

"We wait for our loved ones with much affection and respect," said Briseno, who put out photos of his mother, grandmother and mother-in-law along with fruit, beans, rice, chicken, chocolate, brandy and cigars.

Like his neighbors, he scattered marigold petals on the floor to guide the spirits to the altar.

Gonzalez, the cemetery manager, placed an offering in the chapel for the people whose bodies lie unidentified.

The paramedic dedicated his altar to those he saw pass away during the pandemic.

"Many died with empty stomachs," he said.

axm-dr/st

Mexicans return to Day of the Dead celebration with a vengeance


Sun, October 31, 2021

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Thousands of Mexicans crowded into the main avenue of Mexico City for a lively Day of the Dead parade on Sunday, relishing the chance to mark the festive tradition after the coronavirus pandemic cast a thick pall over it last year.

Most of the mass of spectators lining Paseo de la Reforma boulevard wore protective face masks as they watched colorful floats, bands and performers trundle down the street.

Others proudly sported bright depictions of calavera skulls on their faces to celebrate.

"I love coming to see this tradition we Mexicans can't lose sight of," said Leticia Galvan, a 67-year-old civil servant decked out in a skeleton suit and trilby, and with half of her face painted in the colors of a La Catrina skull.

"It's us making light of death, celebrating death."

Children sat atop their parents' shoulders to catch sight of the procession of floats bearing dancers in indigenous attire and feathered headdresses, scaled-down reproductions of Mexico City landmarks and spectral figures.

Mexico has endured one of the highest death tolls worldwide from the COVID-19 pandemic, and last year the city authorities urged the public to stay at home, ordering cemeteries to close during festivities traditionally held on Nov. 1-2.

But with nearly half the population now fully vaccinated against the virus, Mexico has in recent weeks significantly reduced daily infections, enabling the capital and most other regions of the country to lift restrictions on the public.

Many Mexicans still mask up when they go outdoors and some spectators kept their distance from the parade.

"I didn't expect to see so many people," said Rebeca Brito, a 22-year-old nurse, hanging back to avoid the crowds. "After all the time spent cooped up, they want to get out now."

Mexico Day of the Dead

A woman made up as a "Catrina" and wearing a face shield posed for a photo during Day of the Dead festivities in Mexico City, Sunday, Oct. 31, 2021. Altars and artwork from around the country were on display in a parade, as Mexicans honor the Day of the Dead. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)

Mexico celebrates Day of the Dead after pandemic closures

MARCO UGARTE and LISSETTE ROMERO
Sun, October 31, 2021,

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico returned Sunday to mass commemorations of the Day of the Dead, after traditional visits to graveyards were prohibited last year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

But the one-year hiatus showed how the tradition itself refuses to die: Most families still celebrated with home altars to deceased loved ones, and some snuck into cemeteries anyway.

Gerardo Tapia Guadarrama on Sunday joined many others at the cemetery as he visited the grave of his father Juan Ignacio Tapia, who died in May 2020 of a thrombosis.

Even though cemeteries in Mexico were closed to visitors last year to avoid spreading the virus, so strong is the tradition that his son still slipped into the cemetery in the eastern Mexico City suburb of Valle de Chalco to visit him.

’Lat year it was prohibited, but we found a way," Tapia Guadarrama said slyly. Much of graveyard has low walls that can be jumped.

“To live is to remember,” he said. “What they (the dead) most want want is a visit from those they were close to in life."

A musician walks in the Valle de Chalco municipal cemetery as people begin to arrive to pay their respects to their dead, on the outskirts of Mexico

The holiday begins Oct. 31, remembering those who died in accidents; it continues Nov. 1 to mark those died in childhood, and then those who died as adults on Nov. 2.

Observances include entire families cleaning and decorating graves, which are covered with orange marigolds. At both cemeteries and at home altars, relatives light candles, put out offerings of the favorite foods and beverages of their deceased relatives.

There was a special altar in downtown Mexico City dedicated to those who died of COVID-19. Relatives were allowed into a fenced-off plaza and offered equipment to print out photos of their loved ones, which they could then pin, along with handwritten, messages on a black wall.

It was a quiet, solemn remembrance in a country where coronavirus deaths touched almost all extended families.

Mexico has over 288,000 test-confirmed deaths, but probable coronavirus mortalities as listed on death certificates suggest a toll closer to 440,000, by some counts the fourth-highest in the world.

For a country where people usually die surrounded by relatives, COVID-19 was particularly cruel, as loved ones were taken off alone in plastic tents, to die alone in isolation.

“The only thing I could say to him was, ‘Do everything the doctors tell you,’” Gina Olvera said of her father, who died of coronavirus. “That was the last thing I was able to say to him.” Olvera said she told her father, as she taped his photo to the memorial, “Well, you didn't make it, but you are here with us.”

One woman wept as she pinned up a photo of a female relative. Another, Dulce Moreno, was calm but sad as she pinned up a photo of her uncle and her grandfather, Pedro Acosta Nuñez, both of whom died of complications of COVID-19.

“The house feels empty now without him (the grandfather), we feel lost,” Moreno said.

For most, it was a joyful return, above all, to public activities like public altars and the Hollywood-style Day of the Dead parade that Mexico City adopted to mimic a fictitious march in the 2015 James Bond movie “Spectre.”

“These days are not sad here; they are a way to remember our dead with great happiness,” said Otilia Ochoa, a homemaker who came along with dozens of others to take pictures of the flower-decked offerings near the coronavirus memorial. “What is good is to recover this liberty, this contact we had lost” during the pandemic, Ochoa said.

Tens of thousands of Mexico City — almost all wearing masks, despite the city's relatively high vaccination rate — gathered along the city's main boulevard Sunday to watch the parade of dancing skeletons, dancers and floats.

There were few references to coronavirus in the parade, but there was a whole section of skeleton-dressed actors representing Mexico City's street traders and vendors.

“We are here to celebrate life!” Mexico City Tourism Secretary Paola Felix Diaz said in kicking off the parade.

More risky group activities like Halloween-style costume parties and trick-or-treating have still not recovered from the pandemic. But children took the opportunity to dress up in Mexico-style Day of the Dead costumes as skull-like Catrinas, or as red-clad guards from the Netflix series “Squid Game.”

But Mexico has long had a different attitude toward death, more social, more accepting than in many parts of the world. Wakes and funerals here are often elaborate, days-long events gathering entire neighborhoods and extended families for eating, praying and remembering.

On Día de los Muertos, Mexicans remember the 1,700 doctors, health workers dead from Covid
The Associated Press

MEXICO CITY —The altar shows a diminutive figure of a skeleton in a face mask and medical cap, with a hand on a bedridden patient. At its side is the sort of skull made of sugar common on Day of the Dead altars. And behind is the photo of a white-haired 64-year-old man in glasses smiling at the camera: the late Dr. Jose Luis Linares.

© Provided by NBC News

Linares is one of more than 1,700 Mexican health workers officially known to have died of COVID-19 who are being honored with three days of national mourning on these Days of the Dead.

Linares attended to patients at a private clinic in a poor neighborhood in the southern part of the city, usually charging about 30 pesos (roughly $1.50) a consultation. Because he didn’t work at an official COVID-19 center, his family doesn’t qualify for the assistance the government gives to medical personnel stricken by the disease, his widow said

“I told him, ‘Luis, don’t go to work.’ But he told me, ‘Then who is going to see those poor people,’” said his widow, Dr. María del Rosario Martínez. She said he had taken precautions against the disease because of lungs damaged by an earlier illness.

In addition to the usual marigolds and paper cutouts for Day of the Dead altars, hers this year includes little skeleton figures shown doing consultations or surgeries in honor of colleagues who have died.

It’s echoed in many parts of a country that as of September, according to Amnesty International, had lost more medical professionals to the coronavirus than any other nation.

They include people like nurse Jose Valencia, and Dr. Samuel Silva Montenegro of Mexico City, whose images rest atop altars in the homes of loved ones in Mexico City,

Martínez's altar is in a living room beside a room in their apartment where she and her husband gave consultations. Martínez, who also fell ill but recovered, now sees patients only online or by phone.

Linares died May 25 after being hospitalized at a peak of infections in Mexico City. Martínez lost consciousness at the news, but when she came to, she found her only son and her sister were hugging her. “Don’t touch me, don’t touch me!” she yelled, fearing they too would be infected.

At the peak of her own illness, she trekked from saturated hospital to overflowing clinic, looking for help.

Martínez, 59, said she now feels better, and at peace, though not resigned to the loss of her husband of 36 years, who she first met as a girl selling gum outside a movie theater to help support her eight brothers and sisters.

“I feel strange,” she said. “But I owe it to the patients and they are going to help me get through this.” She said, though, that she expects to work fewer hours.

“I’m afraid because we don’t know how much immunity you’re doing to have, how long it will work,” she said. “The illness is very hard, very cruel. ... All over the world, we are going to have a very sad story to tell.”

Mexico has reported more than 924,000 confirmed coronavirus infections and nearly 140.000 deaths listed as confirmed or probable, though experts say the actual numbers are likely significantly higher.

Still Martinez has found comfort in Mexico’s Day of the Dead practices.

“According to the traditions and beliefs, he is going to come here, accompany us, and he is going to be happy that I am thinking of him in this moment.”

Corpses lie unclaimed on Day of the Dead in violent Mexican state

By Josue Gonzalez, Daina Beth Solomon


VIDEO https://www.reuters.com/video/?videoId=OVD2QR48X&jwsource=em

CHILPANCINGO, Mexico (Reuters) - For Ben Yehuda Martinez, head of forensic services in the violence-torn Mexican state of Guerrero, there is more to celebrating Day of the Dead than arranging a colorful altar with flowers and photos.

It means trying to identify 428 bodies currently unclaimed at the state’s forensic cemetery, most of them victims of crime.

“Trying to find out their identities ... that’s the greatest recognition we can get on the Day of the Dead,” Martinez said at one of Mexico’s newest facilities for unidentified bodies.

The latest official count of people listed as disappeared reached 73,000 this year. Most are believed to be victims of drug cartel turf wars, casting a shadow over the typically festive Nov. 1-2 Day of the Dead holiday.

For families who spend months or years searching for vanished relatives, the possibility of death is often hard to accept, said Arturo Gerardo Cervantes, a forensic adviser for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

“They never lose hope of finding their loved ones alive,” he said.

Still, once there is proof, it can bring closure.

For one family looking for a missing young woman, that proof came from her feet. Relatives fondly recalled how she would put up her feet on the coffee table while watching television.

About 60%-70% of the dead examined by Guerrero’s forensic team are shooting victims. Others died in incidents ranging from natural disasters to car crashes. Workers are at pains to treat them with dignity.

On Friday, a priest led a ceremony to commemorate their lives alongside a wreath of golden marigolds, the traditional Day of the Dead flower, before sprinkling holy water upon numbered compartments stacked four rows high.

The scene was a contrast to those playing out at ordinary cemeteries around Mexico, where families pay tribute to deceased relatives with festive picnics and elaborate decorations.

The cemetery opened in 2017 to relieve overcrowding at forensic facilities caused by record levels of violence.

With ICRC assistance, officials designed the site to accommodate bodies individually, rather than putting several into one grave. The facility holds up to 1,120 in individual tombs.

Each has a plaque with a person’s case number, so families can easily retrieve bodies once they are identified.

That requires specialists in matching distinguishing features such as teeth, fingerprints, birthmarks and DNA. Such people are in short supply.

“Here the violence truly, like everywhere else, hasn’t slowed down ... bodies arrive every day,” Martinez said. “This is a never-ending story.”

Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon in Mexico City and Josue Gonzalez in Chilpancingo; Editing by Lisa Shumaker

In Frida Kahlo's old home, Day of the Dead 'offering' honors artists felled by pandemics

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A traditional Day of the Dead “offering” in Frida Kahlo’s iconic home in Mexico City has taken on a wider artistic homage, with an exhibition helped by French designer Jean Paul Gaultier also remembering artists who have died in past pandemics.

Mexico’s Day of the Dead festival blends Catholic rituals with the pre-Hispanic belief that the dead return once a year from the underworld, and seeks to celebrate the continuity of life.

Traditionally, Mexicans build Day of the Dead altars in their homes and outside, where they place pictures of the dead and items they enjoyed in life.



In Kahlo’s “Blue House,” which is now a museum, organizers put together an offering titled “The Restored Table: Memory and Reencounter,” in collaboration with Gaultier, who was a huge fan of the iconic Mexican artist. The offering included pictures of famed artists who died in previous pandemics, including Italian painter Tiziano, who passed away in 1576 when the plague ravaged Venice, and Austria’s Gustav Klimt, who died from the Spanish flu in 1918.

“It’s an interesting experience,” said Mariyah Efimova, a Russian tourist in the Mexican capital.

The offering included an homage to Mexican artist Manuel Felguérez, who died from COVID-19, and marigolds, known in Mexico as “the flower of the dead” for a scent believed to be strong and sweet enough to attract souls and draw them back.

Edna Romero, a mask-wearing visitor, said it was important for her family to learn about Kahlo and Mexican traditions such as Day of the Dead despite the tough times during the coronavirus pandemic.

“It’s very interesting and very cool,” said Romero. “I hope it will be a respite.”

Spanish families mark Day of the Dead separately amid COVID-19 fears

By Guillermo Martinez

MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish families who normally honour their dead relatives by visiting cemeteries on the Day of the Dead are spacing out their visits this year as a second wave of coronavirus sweeps the country.

Authorities have advised families to spend only 30 minutes at graveyards and not to go in large groups to mark the event, which is linked to the Catholic holidays of All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day at the start of November.

“Our family is coming separately, two or three days apart. We are the last to visit,” said Francisco Gonzalez, 81, who visited the Almudena cemetery in Madrid with his wife.

Flower sellers said many people are staying away, meaning fewer sales of bouquets to place at graves.

Yolanda Gomez, a florist who has her stall at the entrance to Almudena, said sales of flowers had fallen by 50% this year.

Spain imposed a six-month state of emergency last week enabling it to impose measures aimed at trying to reduce the soaring rate of coronavirus infections, including night curfews.

What to Know About the Vibrant Traditions of Día de los Muertos

McKenzie Jean-Philippe

Fri, October 8, 2021, 

Day of the Dead—or Día de los Muertos—celebrates life.

With spirited traditions that largely take place across Mexico, Latin America, and the United States, family and friends come together to honor their lost loved ones on November 1 and 2. Traditions include gathering at cemeteries to enjoy traditional foods like pan de muerto (bread of the dead) and calaveras (sugar skulls), dressing up in eye-catching costumes, and assembling colorful floral decorations, which often include symbolic marigolds.

"This tradition is rooted in the native Mexican belief that life on earth is a preparation for the next world and of the importance of maintaining a strong relationship with the dead," Juan Aguirre, Executive Director of the Mexican culture non-profit Mano a Mano tells Oprah Daily.

But what is at the heart of these beloved festivities? Here's a look at the Day of the Dead's rich history, and some facts you might not have known about the Mexican holiday.

"It’s not a funeral. It’s not morbid, and it’s not about being spooky. It’s about joy and color and flavor and celebration, all the mixed emotions," James Beard Award-winning chef Pati Jinich adds."It’s a very Mexican thing to have extreme sadness with extreme joy at the same time."

Here's a look at the Day of the Dead's rich history, and some facts you might not have known about the Mexican holiday.

Día de los Muertos is not a somber occasion.

During the ancient Mexican holiday, it's believed that spirits of the dead momentarily return to the land of the living, for a brief reunion. The community looks at death as an opportunity for renewed life.

Day of the Dead is celebrated with parades, festivals, and more across Mexico.

Photo credit: Jan Sochor - Getty Images

Though these traditions are universal, various regions across the country also have their own unique takes on how to honor the dead. Mexico City has held a boisterous parade since 2016, complete with entertainers in bold costume, music and dance, and floats. National Geographic identifies Michoacán as the place to go for foodies. The people of La Huasteca Potosina indulge in day-long parties, while Aguascalientes' festival of skulls have near week-long celebrations that include their annual skeleton parade, Legends of Mexico. And at Guanajuato's University of Guanajuato, students create an altar (much-loved by photo-snapping tourists) that honors deceased scholars.

Día de los Muertos is not connected to Halloween.

While Halloween and Day of the Dead occur nearly in tandem and share similar customs (candy, face painting, and community gathering), the two are not related. Halloween has ancient Celtic roots, while Day of the Dead has its own origins that date back to the Indigenous people of Mexico and Central America.

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The holiday first began with the Aztecs.

Roughly 3000 years ago, amongst the Aztec, Toltec, and Mayans, death and the dead were seen as a natural part of life that should be honored and celebrated, rather than mourned. In particular, the Nahua people of central Mexico believed the deceased traveled on a years-long journey to Chicunamictlán, the Land of the Dead. The living would provide supplies, such food and water, to aid them on the trek. This practice inspired the modern tradition of creating altars—known as ofrendas—at their homes, in addition to leaving offerings at the gravesites of loved ones.

Día de los Muertos wasn't always celebrated in November.

Once the Spanish colonized Mexico in the 16th century, their own Catholic views on the dead influenced Mexican customs. Día de los Muertos was originally celebrated in the summer months. The holiday came to fall on November 1 and November 2 to align with All Saints Day and All Souls Day on the Catholic calendar. The first day honors children who have passed, while the second celebrates adults.

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Altars, or ofrendas, are the centerpiece of celebrations.

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To beckon spirits back into the Land of the Living for the festivities, revelers create makeshift altars, or ofrendas, at their homes and at the gravesites of their deceased loved ones. Families gather at the site to eat, tell stories, and even clean the graves.

Offerings to the dead are inspired by the four elements.

Ofrendas are decorated with offerings for the spirits that are meant to represent the four elements: fire, water, earth, and wind.

Ofrendas are decorated with offerings for the spirits that are meant to represent the four elements: fire, water, earth, and wind.

• Fire: Candles are lit to help guide the spirits' journey.

• Water: Pitchers of water are left to quench their thirst while traveling to the Land of the Living.

• Earth: A variety of traditional foods are prepared to help nourish the dead.

• Wind: Papel picado are vibrant delicate paper banners are strung. They're decorated with elaborate cut-out patterns, that are said to allow souls to pass through.

Altars are also adorned with sentimental photographs, toys, marigolds, and skulls.

Traditional Mexican foods play a huge part in celebrations.

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As mentioned, when gathering offerings for the ofrendas, the earth element is an integral part of preparations. And since that symbolizes the food eaten throughout the holiday, it's basically its own category.

Pan de Muerto translates to "bread of the dead."

The most prominent food consumed is pan de muerto, or bread of the dead, which is a yeast-based sweet egg bread. Other delicacies include calabaza en tacha (candied pumpkin), calaveras (the famous sugar skulls), tamales, atole, and spicy Mexican hot chocolate.

One of the most prominent symbols of the holiday—the signature skull face—originated from a Mexican illustrator.

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It's likely that even those who don't celebrate Day of the Dead are familiar with the holiday's famous symbol: calaveras, aka, the skull. Perhaps you've seen them as decorative face paint, costumes, delicious sugary treats, or even in Pixar's Oscar-winning animated film, Coco. But as with everything for Dia de los Muertos, its significance has a rich history.

Around 1910, Mexican illustrator Jose Guadalupe Posada created a satirical lithograph that offered commentary on the political and societal unrest at the time; particularly the elite's tendency to adopt Eurocentric customs. According to The Grace Museum, the image—a skeleton donning a decorative European-style hat—depicted Chicunamictlan, the queen of the Aztec underworld. Posada dubbed her La Catrina, which is a slang word for "the rich." La Calavera Catrina means elegant skull.

Photo credit: Jan Sochor - Getty Images

Years later, in 1947, famed artist Diego Rivera depicted an elaborately dressed La Catrina in his celebrated mural Dream of a Sunday Afternoon. As it is displayed in Mexico City's Alameda Park, La Catrina gained even more visibility amongst the country's people. As a leader of the dead, and an integral part of Aztec history, she was a natural fit amongst Day of the Dead celebrations.

Cempasúchiles, or marigolds, bring color to the festivities.

Photo credit: Jan Sochor - Getty Images

While cempasúchiles are often used as an offering to decorate ofrendas, over time they've earned a spot next to skulls as one of the most prominent Day of the Dead symbols. Also known as flor de muerto, or flowers of the dead, the importance of the lively orange and yellow marigolds date back to the time of the Aztecs, according to Remezcla. The color and scent of the flowers are believed to lure spirits from their places of rest to their families.

If you want to wear a Day of the Dead costume, consider this.

"Sugar skull makeup," as it's called in many a Youtube beauty tutorial, is undeniably gorgeous on a purely aesthetic level; it's a large part of why it's been a popular Halloween costume idea for years. Know that if you're not of Latino or Hispanic—and of Mexican descent, particularly—some people may consider this cultural appropriation.

If you do decide to wear sugar skull makeup and other costume accoutrements such as flower crown headbands and traditional Mexican dresses, there are ways to make sure you're doing so respectfully. Keep in mind that, again, Day of the Dead is actually unrelated to Halloween. Before you apply that face paint, take a moment to educate yourself on the historical and lasting cultural significance of La Catrina. And, as Refinery29 notes, avoid any bloody or scary elements to your costume, because uplifting celebration is an integral part of Día de los Muertos.