At the back of a burial plot in Hollywood Forever Cemetery, six musicians crammed onto a tiny stage, singing the songs of their ancestors. The altar paid tribute to the legacy of dead musicians by transforming a patchy bit of grass into a bohemian cafe for the night. A photograph of the Beatles, with the faces of John and George colored in as calaveras, or skulls, decorated the bandstand.
Yet despite the emphasis on death, the atmosphere at the DÃa de los Muertos event last Saturday was one of celebration rather than solemnity.
DÃa de los Muertos, also known as the Day of the Dead, takes place on Nov. 1 and 2, sharing the time around the end of October with Halloween. While both holidays are a fusion of pagan and Christian traditions, the focus of the two differs greatly.
A celebration of life through the eyes of the dead, DÃa de los Muertos is dedicated to the joyful remembrance of loved ones who have passed on, as opposed to the horror, gore and candy of Halloween.
“Halloween is a celebration for children where skeletons become some kind of frightening image, and children get tricks or treats. It’s either you give me (candy), or something is going to happen to you,” said Mary Andrade, author of the award-winning book series, “Through the Eyes of the Soul, Day of the Dead in Mexico.”
DÃa de los Muertos is more about community and generosity, according to Andrade, who described past celebrations in Mexico where entire towns converged on the homes of families recovering from recent losses.
“They bring ofrendas, offerings, to welcome that soul: fruit, bread ““ pan de muerto, candles. They are the ones who are giving,” Andrade said.
While many Chicanos celebrate Halloween, Day of the Dead is a holiday that offers more for them in the way of meaning and ritual, explained Nivardo Valenzuela, a fifth-year Spanish and Portuguese student and president of UCLA’s Undergraduate Spanish and Portuguese Association (USPA).
“I think Halloween in the U.S. has become a party, especially in college,” Valenzuela said.
USPA has no plans to commemorate the Day of the Dead this year, but there are other opportunities on campus to observe the holiday.
The UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center (CSRC) and the César E. Chávez Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies plan to join together to create an altar Friday afternoon to honor the life and memory of Dr. Yolanda Retter Vargas, the center’s former head librarian, who died this August.
“We thought it was important to honor her as part of a community during the Day of the Dead and use it as a way of bringing people together at the library,” said Chon A. Noriega, director of CSRC and a professor in the Department of Film, Television and Digital Media.
Elsewhere in Los Angeles, other organizations regularly commemorate the Mexican holiday.
The Hollywood Forever Cemetery event last weekend began with a traditional Aztec procession, blessing and dance, and gave people the opportunity to exhibit their personal altars throughout the grounds in an altar-making competition.
“My family members are represented here on this altar. For example, my grandfather grew the tree that those persimmons are from,” said Jessica Grout, a Los Angeles native who built an altar at the cemetery for her ancestors and loved ones.
Grout, who is not of Mexican descent, explained that she became immersed in Mexican culture simply by growing up in Los Angeles.
Patty Hernandez attended the Hollywood Forever Cemetery celebration primarily to honor her infant son, Azul, who was buried there three years ago.
“In the Hispanic heritage, you are allowed to cry because those are human emotions,” Hernandez said. “This is the day you come and be with your relatives and hope they’re with you.”
The Mexican culture has a unique orientation toward death, according to Noriega.
“There’s no marking of a boundary,” Noriega said. “Death is accepted as part of our condition as humans.”
Andrade also finds Mexican culture more expressive than American culture, particularly regarding death.
“We have a tendency to not talk about it, because it’s too painful,” Andrade said. She says the Day of the Dead provides an opportunity for people to deal with their feelings.
At Hollywood Forever, skeletons and skulls decorated altars that were also covered in twinkly lights, candles, and marigolds.
“Instead of being afraid of death, you celebrate it. That’s why they have the skulls, that’s why they have the artistry with pictures of skeletons,” said Nancy Lopez, a fifth-year political science student.
Traditional sugar skulls and brightly painted papier-mache skeletons slathered in sequins sat at banquets of fruit and exotic foods like mole, a traditional Oaxacan dish made from dried chili peppers, spices and chocolate.
At one altar, an opened pack of Camel Filters and a bottle of absinthe left for the spirits of the departed remained untouched. Visitors seemed to know better than to mess with the tempting ofrendas at the burial ground.
“A lot of people think being in a cemetery at night is scary, but it’s not,” Hernandez said. “It’s more of a gathering with your relatives that have gone to the other side, and hopefully they’re here with us and around us and among us, partying and standing in line and getting some churros.”