el dia de los muertos shrine at hollywood forever cemetery

alpha tom spent the night. in the morning we went to our new place to meet the landlord, sign the lease, give the rest of the move-in money, and pick the keys. now it's official! later in the day we picked up nopalita and went to the el dia de los muertos at hollywood forever cemetery. we were excited to go but tired from the night before. i had never been to a dia de los muertos thing and the festival is at the cemetery which gives it that extra special touch. i used to think of it as a mexican halloween, just because of the proximity of the dates. however, upon further reflection, it finally hit me this year that el dia de los muertos is like the mexican obon festival. obon in japan usually takes place in august and it is when you celebrate the dead. it is a time when the dead sort of return to your house so you put out food for them. you also go to the family tomb and have a picnic there. at least you do in okinawa. for el dia de los muertos, you decorate a shrine of the deceased and also lay out food. in japan though, i don't think there is the chance of interpreting it as morbid or with humor as the dead celebration seems to have in mexico. (i'm talking about all the calaveras and skull sugar candies, etc.) except though in okinawa, perhaps it is a bit odd to have a graveside picnic. i mean, if other cultures see a bunch of skeletons, they probably think it's morbid. i being a little off center can see the humorous side. it's really just having fun with it. festivals for the dead are often are not morbid, it's really a celebration of life. i think particularly in american society, death is seen as morbid because we do not celebrate life. we don't have any festivals that are deeply rooted to our heritage because we are a young country that wiped out the existing culture and tend to erase any old world culture that immigrants bring with them.

el dia de los muertos shrine at hollywood forever cemetery

at the festival held at the hollywood forever cemetery, there is a shrine decorate contest. all sorts of people, particularly students, work together to create shrines of various themes. some look like they are for particular people (salvador dali and his wife, the dead members of the ramones, etc.), while others were more people in general (mexican wrestlers, american soldiers, etc.). there was even a shrine for dogs. in addition to the shrines, there was a stage for music, crafts vendors, food vendors, a small play performance, and aztec dancing. i always enjoy watching aztec dancing but this particular performance kept going on and on that even i was getting tired just watching them. i can't imagine how tired the dancers and drummers were. the dancers took a break and we left at that point. who knows long long they continued on for. overall, the festival wasn't that great. nopalita said she went last year and it was much better. the festival is free (donations accepted), which is great. you just have to find parking, which can be difficult in that area. the cool thing was that it was my first time visiting this famous cemetery. it is very large and nice. it has a pond and many different types of graves, some quite elaborate. one of the mausoleums was open and decorated inside. it was cool to be go inside but it was cold and depressing in a way. just confirms with me that i prefer cremation instead of the wasted space of burials and narcissitic shrines.