The Day of the Dead celebrations down here in Mexico are very different from anything I have ever experienced and very exciting. The holiday coincides with the Catholic holidays "All Saints Day" on Nov 1 and "All Souls Day" on Nov 2. The holiday focuses on the gathering of family and friends to pray for and remember family members who have died. The beautiful ofrendas that they build in honor of their deceased ancestors contain some of that ancestors favorite food as well as photos and beautiful pictures. Toys are set out for deceased children and other trinkets and things that that person loved. The belief is that the soul of the dead comes and eats the nutrients of the food while they visit. One common treat eaten during this holiday is "Pan de Muerto" or Dead Bread as we call it in English. They have man different kinds that they make for about a two week period before the holiday. It is delicious!
An ofrenda
Pan de Muerto
To celebrate this holiday Adri, Dusty, Moroni and I went to a small town called Chilac about a forty-minute drive out of Tehuacan. This small town has a huge cemetery and the celebrations there are huge. People decorate the graves of their family members with beautiful flowers and candles and in some places of Mexico the family will stay by the grave all day on the 1st and 2nd as well as party all night in the cemetery. They burn a special kind of rock that has a very strong smell which is said to lead the spirits to where they are supposed to go. Many of the graves we saw are covered in yellow marigolds which have now adopted the name "Flor de Muerto" or Flower of the Dead. We were not sure of the significance of the amarillo color so Moroni would ask people who were still at the graves while we were walking around. Everyone he talked to told him that they wanted an English school where they were from whether they were from Chilac or elsewhere. It was a fun day.
Our Day of the Dead weekend was super fun and busy. Our Halloween parties tired us on Friday and Saturday but Sunday and Monday were super fun. I think that this weekend has been one of my very favorite weekends down here in Mexico. We just did so much and it was so much fun. Sunday after we went to church we were invited to Nathan's (super cute RM in our ward who everyone seems to love) house by his sweet mother for his father's birthday. I can't remember their last name so I can't even call her 'Sister _____' Instead we are going to have to stick with Nathan's mom for this post. She made us a delicious dinner and made sure we were all stuffed to the brim. She is a very good cook. When we arrived Nathan's now official girlfriend was there as well as the missionaries and still his mom came out to greet us and said "Which one of you is my future daughter-in-law" She seems very set in having him marry a white girl. He gets super embarrassed and just shakes his head "Oh Mama" he says. I just felt bad for his girlfriend, she sat their the whole time and had to listen to Nathan's mom keep dropping jokes about Nathan being Adri's future novio. It made us laugh at least. He is a pretty amazing young man.
Here in Mexico YM go on their missions at the age of 18 because that is when they finish high school. Teo says that if they didn't let them go when they were 18 that they would lose more than 50% of their missionaries probably. So Nathan returned from his mission 9 weeks ago and he is 20 years old and was just called into the Stake YM Presidency. He bore his testimony on Sunday and it was very powerful. After we finished dinner at their house we caught a ride with them to Relief Society Choir which went pretty well. We started learning a new song for Christmas "Oh Come All Ye Faithful" and they are very good at it. We will continue to practice until all of the sisters are totally confident in the hymns, even the verse we sing in English. When Adri and I arrived back to the apartment after choir I received this note:
Sarah - the trinket of metal
has been strategically placed inside
the architecture for learning - in the device
that will heat nutrients with electrons - Ash
Ashley had gone to Chilac with the Puebla girls that night and so she had to leave the gate unlocked for me as well as a note telling me where the keys were. I thought she was pretty clever, someone with only a limited knowledge of English probably wouldn't have understood her note. I laughed pretty hard. I just chilled at home, had a nap talked to my family and my boyfriend Max on skype as well as Tyson which was awesome! It was a great night. Once in a while it is nice to have time alone.
Monday we had a lot of things we wanted to do. First Adri and I wanted to go back to that market we had visited on Friday morning. When we got there, everyone had packed up and was gone. We had asked on Friday when the market would to go and the guy said Monday but apparently he was wrong. It was a bit of a sketchy area too so Adri and I were kind of hesitant to just walk around and explore. After we got over our disappointment and of course took some pictures we caught a taxi to the Centro and did some more shopping. It was super hot outside which was nice since this week has been so cold. We had some ice cream which was yummy and then walked back to the house. We stopped at Adri's place to pick up a few things and then went back to my apartment to meet up with Dusty before we left for Chilac. When we got back Moroni offered to help us find the place where to catch the combi to Chilac which was like at least a half an hour walk away. When we got there he decided he would come along and show us around Chilac. He had taken the girls from Puebla on Sunday night too so I'm sure he was probably a little bored but we were super grateful that he came.
Adri's puppy dos... yes her name is TWO because they could only think of a name for the other puppy. I think she is the cuter of the two and I like her the best!
Where did everyone go?
Why do I never watch where I'm going? You think I would have learned my lesson by now
Moroni asked these people what the significance of the yellow marigolds was. They told us that the specific scent of the flowers showed the spirits where to go. There were a lot of people that didn't know what the significance was but Moroni kept asking for us.
After walking through the cemetery for several hours we were all hungry and wanted to head back to Tehuacan. We stopped and looked at a few shops while we were walking back to where we catch a taxi or a combi. We stopped at this on beautiful hand-made dress shop and Moroni was teaching us about how to know if it is handmade and whether or not it is good quality. When I stepped out of the shop I saw this young girl with a super cute puppy. I think it was a Chow-Chow. I got Adri and Dusty's attention so that they could see it because it was super cute. Moroni was standing there and he was speaking to them in Spanish. As we were walking away Adri was like "Did you just tell them we don't have dogs where we are from?" Haha it was no wonder the girl was so nice and let us see the puppy. Moroni just burst out laughing because he had. We went and waited on the sidewalk for a taxi for a while. On the opposite corner of the intersection from us there was a small little corner store and there was a huge group of men cat calling more than anyone else I've heard so far down here. This one guy spoke pretty good English but the funny part was that he sounded exactly like the Chihuahua from the Taco Bell commercials. "Come on kiss me" he kept saying to us. For some reason there are a lot of Mexican men who know that line. Moroni just told us that "For them, its enough! They don't need to know anymore than that." Adri and I were having a hard time not laughing at everything he said. "Come on the Mexican people are nice. Why you being like that?" After we had waited for probably at least half an hour for a taxi that would take us back to Tehuacan he yelled "You don't need a taxi, I have a truck come on lets go!" I just about wet myself at that point. It was so hilarious. We eventually walked a block away to another intersection where we hoped to have more luck in finding a ride back. At this point I was so grateful that Moroni had come with us. I don't know how we would have gotten back to Tehuacan with our limited knowledge of Spanish unless Moroni had been there to talk to them. We kept waiting and then to our delight all of those men that had been cat calling walked the block to stand on the opposite street corner and continue to call after us. The one guy who spoke English rode up on his bicycle. Adri turns to me and is like "That's not a truck, thats a bicicleta. You lied to me?" The way she said it was so funny. It was fun just to hang out there and laugh about things that had happened that day.
Moroni and Me on our way back to Tehuacan finally!!
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