Ok so I know I said no more blogs about Mexico, but I just couldn’t spend the day of the dead in Mexico and not inform my readership about the wonderful traditions that surround this important day. Mexicans have a very special attitude towards death that is very different from many other cultures.

However, for this blog I’d like to start with a disclaimer – if you have been fortunate enough to see the wonderful Disney movie Coco then please feel free to not read on. What I am about to describe cannot compete with the amazing colour and cuteness of that movie. In fact I would even urge readers to spend this time downloading the film instead of reading my blog. Seriously it’s brill and very informative for those non Mexicans (or non Mexican obsesionados).

“Día de muertos” (Day of the dead) is often confused by the rest of the world with Halloween, especially as it kinda falls during the same period. This is because during Spanish rule the celebration was moved from its original date in summer, to the October/November dates to coincide with the Christian All Saints Day. But while modern day Día de muertos has taken on a lot of different traditions (including the usual dressing up and asking for sweeties), the original traditions go way back.

The most important part of Día de muertos is a really lovely idea; it’s essentially remembering fondly your family members who have passed away. Each Mexican household and many official buildings and offices put together “ofrendas”, basically an altar remembering their dead. These are always very bright and include the usual decorations: candles, calabazas de azúcar (skulls made out of sugar- skulls were a big thing for both the Aztecs and the Mayas so you will see them everywhere), cempazuchitl (an orange marigold which blooms around the time and has a very strong scent and therefore has since Aztec times been known as the day of the dead flower as its strong scent guides visiting spirits back to earth), photos of the people being remembered and a selection of their favourite food and drink. The idea is that the dead come and enjoy their favourite things again 🙂 isn’t that nice! There would be quite a lot of rakija on our alter 🙂

Walking though Mexico you can see these altars everywhere- restaurants, bars, we even had one in the hotel, and I saw one in the central Bank when we went for a meeting.

The most traditional of Mexicans will go to the cemetery on the day of the day and all have dinner together with their dead (traditionally tamales), although nowadays this is generally popular mainly in villages.

What does happen nowadays is that the country goes wild with Día de muertos decorations. Now, I should probably tell you for those of you who have seen the James Bond film Spectre, the Day of the Dead parade is not a thing. It was actually invented by the writers of that film, but it caused so much interest from tourism that as a result they started holding a parade every year in Mexico City. In a few years time I’m sure they’ll start talking about it like an ancient Aztec tradition 🙂

Apart from putting up ofrendas everywhere, the city also has decorations of all kinds. In the centre of Mexico City this year they had a massive exhibition of skulls and alebrijes which had been designed by different designers. Alebrijes are little creatures that are actually not related to the original Día de muertos and were only invented by a hallucinating Mexican artist in the early 1930, but they are believed to be magical and so can cross to the other world. If you look at them you’ll see why- they are usually a cross between lots of different animals and lots of different colours.

All bars, restaurants, offices, public places, etc. are decorated with skulls, multi coloured paper, Catrinas, etc. I mean it’s really impressive and as you can imagine it gets me mega overexcited. I would be climbing over people in canteens and coffee shops just to get a good shot of everything to show back home.

Around the actual day of the day is when the dressing up starts. Everyone, and I mean everyone gets dressed up. From newborn babies, to grandmothers in wheelchairs, even pets get dressed up and walk around the city. Some of my friends even have dress up competitions at work. I mean I thought the gringos took fancy dress seriously but this is next level. A lot of the costumes are around the Catrina (the pretty skull designs you see so often), but then more modern fancy dressers will go for anything scary.

And the thing about Mexican dress up is it’s seriously fucking scary. I mean they go all out with their costumes. I’m not talking your extremely PG witch/ghost/vampire combo. They have taken scary dress up to a whole new level. And my serious respect to the kids. I mean at points I was scared walking around, and yet there were kids of all ages- even as young as like 2-4 years walking around dressed like the nun or that creepy clown from Saw. Think of the scariest scary movie character you’ve seen and I can guarantee there was at least a couple of under 10 year olds dressed like that. And I remember having nightmares after reading Roh Dhals the witches when I was like 12. I mean these kids have put our European kids to shame.

And to end on a good note- I will talk about the most delicious tradition ; pan de muerto (bread of the dead). It’s a round, sweet bread which is supposed to look like bones (although you really have to use your imagination on this one) and sprinkled with sugar and it is the most delicious bread ever. It unites Mexicans as it’s eaten by everyone and sold everywhere- bakeries, Street corners and even fancy restaurants. It’s also offered to the dead and eaten by them, but I think in 2018 the largest quantity was eaten by me.