Halloween Creeps in Where Mexican Tradition Ruled the Living and Dead Elisabeth Malkin - The New York Times
go to original October 31, 2014

Mexico prepares for Day of the Dead festival (MailOnline/a16+)

MEXICO CITY — It was just a few days before the annual celebration of Day of the Dead, when Mexicans decorate altars to their departed ancestors, and the Sonora Market was buzzing.

But in this always riotous scene, something was askew. Not all the stalls were hawking the traditional Day of the Dead regalia, things like giant papier-mâché skeletons, pink-and-purple tissue paper cutouts and little ceramic skulls.

Some stalls offered up grinning plastic jack-o’-lanterns jammed into enormous plastic bags. Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” throbbed from more than one, and everywhere, it seemed, there were buckets filled with child-size witches’ brooms and rubber masks oozing blood.

As Day of the Dead approaches on Sunday, it is hard to tell what Mexicans are celebrating. Is it reverence for the relatives who have passed on, their sepia photos to be placed on home altars sprinkled with yellow marigold petals and framed by their favorite food? Or is it Halloween, imported with a recorded witch’s cackle and puffy pumpkin costumes?

...Many Mexicans straddle the line, indiscriminately blending elements of Halloween into their Day of the Dead celebrations, creating a fluid mix of tradition that is as old as the holiday itself.

Read the rest at The New York Times

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