Speaking of Halloween, I think everyone is not unfamiliar, in Spain, every year at this time of year you can see all kinds of Halloween around. Where did you first learn about this festival? Is it the grand Day of the Dead parade in the opening credits of the last 007 movie, or the mysterious world of "Dream Quest"? Is it halloween costumes on the streets, or is it a horror movie that comes out at this juncture?
Classic Halloween elements: pumpkin lights, dress up, and horror
Halloween, Halloween and Halloween Eve
Halloween is also known as All Saints' Day; Spanish: Día de Todos Los Santos is a traditional religious festival celebrated every year on 1 November to commemorate all saints canonized by the Church and believers who were supposed to be canonized but were not canonized. In Spain, this day is a national holiday.
Scene where the Celts celebrate October 31
So are the Halloween and Halloween we know best? Not really. Halloween literally means Halloween Eve, the night of October 31; Halloween, on the other hand, is firmly on November 1. One of the more widely circulated theories is that it originated in Celtic culture, and in Celtic belief, October 31 is the day when summer ends and winter begins, and the god of death will return to the world with ghosts on this night to find a substitute. So they lit torches and burned animals as a gift to the god of death. He would also dress himself up with animal heads or fur costumes and make strange noises so that the god of death would not recognize him and avoid disaster. That's where today's Halloween Masquerade Comes In. After that night, the ghost returned to Hades and everything returned to calm. In the 19th century, the Scots and Irish believed that halloween ghosts would come to earth, so they would dress up like ghosts and let ghosts think of themselves as their own kind.
Later, the descendants of these Saxons with the tradition of "Ghost Festival" traveled to Western countries such as the United States, the British Isles, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, and also brought their spiritual and religious traditions to Western countries. That night, children put on makeup suits and masks and go door to door collecting candy.
From the perspective of "Ghost Festival", Halloween is very similar to the Chinese Zhongyuan Festival. If you want to dress up, go out to a themed party, or knock on the door with your child to ask for candy, don't make me remember, it's the night of the 31st.
Let's talk about another headache-inducing holiday name, All Souls Day. As the name suggests, it is a "festival of all the dead" and a religious tradition, on November 2, people remember the passing of relatives and friends. It can be simply understood as the Qingming Festival in the Western world.
All Souls Day, the remembrance of the dead
Friends who have watched "Dream Quest" will surely be deeply attracted by the colorful pictures, colorful celebrations, and those skeletons that are not scary, but some cute and cute. After watching the movie, a friend came to sigh: "It turns out that Mexicans celebrate Halloween like this!" In fact, in many of Mexico's indigenous cultures, the Day of the Dead existed long before the arrival of Spanish missionaries. Before Halloween was introduced to the American continent, indigenous tribes in Mexico often preserved the skulls of the deceased and held grand ceremonies to celebrate death and rebirth. Later, as Catholic influence expanded, this festival of the dead, combined with Halloween, All Souls, evolved into the Mexican Day of the Dead, known as November 1 and 2. On November 1, Mexicans pay tribute to the children who have passed away, and November 2 is used to commemorate the passing adults.
The word-of-mouth "Dream Quest"
Xiaobian also studied in Mexico, and vaguely remembers that when the Day of the Dead arrived as scheduled that year, the celebration ceremony I witnessed and experienced and the shock I brought was no less than the shock that Mig was shaken in his heart when he saw the gorgeous land of the dead in "Dream Quest". The following small editor will share with you a few iconic events of the Day of the Dead, through which to understand the unique but warm death philosophy of Mexicans.
Altar
On the eve of the Day of the Dead, altars are erected with photographs, personal belongings, food and bouquets of flowers intended to commemorate the dead. The form of the altar is unrestricted, it can be one layer directly on the ground, or it can be two layers symbolizing heaven and earth. More commonly, there are three altars symbolizing heaven, earth, and hell, or seven altars symbolizing the seven deadly sins. The Department of Philosophy and Literature, where I had read, also set up a seven-story altar in the courtyard that resembled a pyramid of the sun and moon, with photographs and writings of the famous Mexican writer and poet Octavio Paz, as well as various objects and delicacies. It was this eminent writer who commented on the Mexican culture's attitude towards death: "Our worship of death is the worship of life; Just as love is a longing for life, it is also a vision of death."
Altars commonly found in Mexican homes
The Day of the Dead Parade
In "007: Ghost Party", Bond appeared at the Day of the Dead parade in Mexico City, with various skeleton floats and bands, and the festive atmosphere was very strong. But in fact, this cultural custom is arranged by the film for the needs of the plot, and there is no such large-scale parade in Mexico. Interestingly, however, in 2016, after the film's release, the Mexican city government reproduced the plot of the film to reality, holding a grand and magnificent parade in the city center, which has since become a new tradition of the Day of the Dead. In 2018, the municipality also gave the march the theme: The History of Migration in Mexico. Our Confucius Institute in China is also in the procession, and the performance tells the history of our ancestors 450 years ago, carrying silk and porcelain, crossing the ocean and arriving at the port of Alpko.
Mexico City Day of the Dead Parade
Stills from 007: Ghost Party: Daniel Craig at the opening parade
Go to the cemetery to pay homage to relatives and friends
Like our grave sweepers, Mexicans come to the graves of their loved ones during the Day of the Dead to pay their respects. But unlike our usually solemn traditions, Mexicans' way of commemorating them abandons sadness and warmth: they decorate the cemetery with flowers and other objects, even bring the traditional Mexican Mariachi band to the tombstones of relatives and friends to play music, and some people choose to spend the night in the cemetery and spend a night with their deceased loved ones. In this festival where the world of the living and the land of the dead are connected, Mexicans use their own unique ways to convey warmth, enthusiasm and companionship to the dead, and firmly believe that although the loved ones are not in the world, on the Day of the Dead, they will eventually return and come to us.
Mexicans go to cemeteries to decorate the cemeteries of deceased loved ones
A delicacy shared between the deceased and the living
Like other festivals, the Day of the Dead has its own culinary delights. The first thing to mention here is the Mexican sweet bread, the Pan de Muerto (Bread of the Dead). Don't look at the name so frightening, in fact, the taste is very good. A little tequila is mixed with flour, powdered sugar is sprinkled on the bread surface, and several bone-like strips are decorated. The bread of the dead is a bit like the Roscón, a Spanish Three Kings cake, and is usually very large because it needs to be shared by the whole family. In addition, there is the Skull Candy (Calavera de azúcar), which, as the name suggests, is a skull made of icing and decorated with painted syrup brushes. Naturally, the festival is also full of Tamales, banana trees, corn and other large leaves wrapped in corn flour and meat filling, this snack is not exclusive to the Day of the Dead, but often appears on the altar.
Undead bread and skull candy
Make up into a skull
Another important element of the Day of the Dead is our Catrina, which is commonly known as the Mexican colored skeleton and so on. Katrina originated from another Mexican cultural figure, the famous painter José Guadalupe Posada, who in 1912 created the image of a smiling skull woman in a victorian-style long skirt and a flower-brimmed hat, which became known as Katrina.
Katrina's original source
The author's intention to create Katrina is full of social criticism and irony, but as the times have changed, this image has gradually become a symbol of the Day of the Dead and even the whole of Mexico: she is like the Mexican attitude towards death, elegant, smiling, colorful. During the Mexican Day of the Dead, it's common to see people decorating katrina and even adding other Mexican classics, such as Frida Carlo's version of Katrina. In the small shop stalls in the streets and alleys, these colorful skull dolls are also very eye-catching.
People dressed as Katrina
Whether it is Halloween or The Day of the Dead, in today's increasingly globalized world, it is no longer foreign to us. The Day of the Dead itself is a "hodgepodge" that blends Indian traditions, Catholic festivals, Mexican modern and contemporary art, and Hollywood culture. But no matter how times change and how celebrations change, what remains unchanged is the cheerful but deep understanding of death among Mexicans: death is the opposite of life, and it is also the continuation of life. In the face of death, there is no need to weep, why not bloom and rejoice, and welcome the souls of the dead back to the living.