Halloween and “Dia de los Muertos”

Running:
No running - not even across the street - I can tell you it's very very frustrating!

Life
This evening I had a loud knock at my door when I opened it I realised today was Halloween! Ay!!!! Forgot to buy chocolates but I was a good fellow and gave these children at my door a huge Lindt chocolate block I had for later on.

I grew up celebrating the “Day of the dead”, but what it is…? Here is a bastardised explanation:

1. It is a celebration that goes a long, long, long way back. It was a celebration in Mesoamerica (pardon me … what is that?), i.e. the home of the Mayan and Aztecs, in what is today known as Mexico and Central America. The ritual is a celebration of the memory of those who have departed but also a celebration of the continuation of life.
2. Apparently it was celebrated in the northern Summer (around August) rather than at this time of the year heading.
3. When the Spanish "conquistadores" made it to the Americas, things got complicated and they brought the Gregorian calendar and their own traditions, so the Aztec/Mayan calendar was made redundant.
4. So a compromise was made in due course… (oh yeah!). The celebration was moved by Spanish priests (more intriguing to say the ‘Conquistadores’) to coincide with the Christian celebration of All Hallows Day. So it is now a blend of paganism and Christianism at work!

The first day of November is “All Saints Day” and the second day is the “All Souls Day”. Halloween is a different kettle of fish, really.

When I was growing up it did not make difference to us whether we were celebrating the Day of the Dead, All Saints Day or All Souls Day, because we were too busy flying our kites and having fun… It coincided with the beginning of the school holiday. In Guatemala, people gather at the cementery to honour their dead by flying big kites (barriletes). In preparation for these celebrations, we prepared our barriletes days in advance (alternatively, we bought kites-ready made). The kites made out of long and skinny pieces of wood and colourful paper.

The kites were made of different sizes. The bigger kites were obviously for bigger and older children. I remember learning to make a kite (a metre in diametre) with the old of one of my older brothers and feeling like a very grown up boy...!

After flying our kites, we used to go to the tomb of our dead and leave flowers for them. Celebrations used to follow after that. These were happy times.



http://www.batoco.org/photos/barriletes_gigantes_de_gu/gigantguatemala006.jpg