November 1 & 2 are Dia de los Muertos 2021.

This weekend, Hollywood Forever Cemetery hosted its (mostly) annual Dia de los Muertos celebration (I say mostly, because it was covid-cancelled last year).

This year’s festival came back, scaled down to 80 alters, rather than 100+ alters, honoring the deceased.

So what is Dia de los Muertos?

Let’s go back 3,000 years, to Mesoamerica (Mexico & Central America), when Aztecs, Mayans, and other Nahua tribes were strong & thriving.

They believed that when you died, it’s only your body that dies, and your spirit continues on to Mictlan, the Aztec underworld.

But there is one time of year when the veil between the living and dead is so thin that the dead can come back to visit their relatives. That is the celebration of Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead.

This tradition continued uninterrupted for 2,500 years, until 1519.

In 1519, the Spaniards conquered the Aztecs. The Spaniards tried to stamp out all of the “pagan” culture & religion and replace it with Catholicism.

But Dia de los Muertos was so ingrained in the culture, that it is still celebrated today. However, you can definitely see the Spanish & Catholic influences in current celebrations.

Still, they managed to keep some of their dieties in the celebration. Most common is Mictecacihuatl (pronounced Meek’-taykah-seewatt), the Aztec Goddess of the Underworld.

When the dead come to visit their family members, the family can’t see them, but they can feel their spirits. They prepare for their visitors by creating the alters with the deceaseds’ photos, favorite foods and other offerings.

Dia de los Muertos is a time to be happy. It is considered discourteous to grieve or cry for your lost ones, as they are gladly visiting. It’s a time to laugh and remember your loved ones with fondness.

If you’d like to see more of this year’s Dia de los Muertos, view this video from my YouTube channel:

REFERENCES

Hollywood Forever Cemetery:  https://hollywoodforever.com/
Lady of the Dead:  https://www.ladayofthedead.com/

https://www.kccu.org/post/why-marigolds-or-cempas-chil-are-iconic-flower-d-de-los-muertos
https://www.history.com/topics/halloween/day-of-the-dead