While we spent most of the day in Teotitlan del Valle learning about the Day of the Dead traditions here, we started out in Santa Maria El Tule at the home studio of flying shuttle loom weaver Alfredo who uses naturally dyed threads to create clothing — blouses and shawls. Oaxaca Cultural Navigator tour partner Elsa Sanchez Diaz, a natural dye master, dyes many of the threads that Alfredo uses in his work. She explained the different fibers and colors to our group of fourteen travelers on a beautiful Oaxaca morning filled with clear air and sunshine!
Alfredo also makes tablecloths, napkins, table runners, dish towels, and bedspreads. For these, he uses natural white manta cloth of fine quality, however the colorful threads incorporated in the weaving are synthetic dyes, much more economical and will withstand years of machine washing. As we know, stains are inevitable and using natural dyes in home goods is impractical!
Alfredo does not practice a formal religion though he was raised Catholic. He tells us that Day of the Dead is not a religious holiday but a cultural one, hearkening back to the pre-Hispanic ancestors. Building an altar is his way of honoring his grandmothers and grandfathers who taught him to weave. He works on several looms that he inherited from his grandfather that are more than ninety years old. They have been repaired repeatedly and the wood frames are pocked with insect holes that accumulated over the years. Nothing here is discarded and age in whatever form — human or inanimate — is revered.
Above video features all the different fibers and dyes that Alfredo uses in his studio. His partner Ana is a book artist who also makes boxes covered in handmade paper and fabric. She is a talent in her own right!
We made three more stops during the day. First to Galeria Fe y Lola to smell and feel the emotional connection with the altar, learning about the importance of celebrating in the home. We were welcomed with the perfume of copal incense, candlelight, and marigold flowers — all important for guiding the spirits of deceased loved ones back home for this twenty-four hour period when they return from the underworld to visit us.
The difuntos enter our world through the sugar cane arches flanking the altar and this portal is necessary to ensure an easy passage. Almost everyone here will have their altars complete by November 1, just in time for the spirits to return at three o’clock in the afternoon. They will stay with us until November 2, consuming the ceremonial foods we have put on the altar for them. At three o’clock on November 2, the church bells will ring and announce the time for the difuntos to return to their resting places in the cemetery. We accompany them, leading the way with copal, to ease them back to the underworld, offering prayers for a smooth passage and a promise that we will see them next year.
For the children who have died before their time, families build small altars and give special prayers on November 1, too. In the city of Oaxaca, there will be comparsas (processions) of parents and children to give special tribute to the young ones who have passed.
The offerings on the altars in Teotitlan del Valle include chocolate, bread, and candles. Other foods can include those favored by the deceased: beer, mezcal, coffee, coca cola, tortillas, tamales stuffed with mole amarillo (a village tradition). There will always be peanuts and pecans, eaten here long before the Spanish arrived.
After a weaving and natural dyeing demonstration, we went to lunch where nutritionist Joanna prepared a meal of memelas topped with bean paste, Oaxaca cheese, and seasoned pork cubes. We were offered toppings of guacamole, roasted tomatoes, and pickled onions. To wash it all down, what else but hibiscus fruit water (agua de jamaica).
A piece de resistance of the afternoon was a demonstration of chocolate making, followed by a cup of steaming hot chocolate and pan de muerto (a Day of the Dead egg bread), which we dunk into the deliciousness.
Our last stop before returning to the city was a visit to Estela and Edith who weave beautiful small tapestries colored with natural dyes that they make into totes and handbags, trimmed with leather straps. It takes about two weeks to make a bag and the craftsmanship is superb. Everyone on the tour got a chance to make a pompom to adorn purse, hair, or use as a hatband, a special gift from the artisans.
On Wednesday, November 1, we will spend the day in San Pablo Villa de Mitla, starting off at the cemetery with Don Arturo where his family is buried.
Traditional Altars: Dia de los Muertos in Oaxaca, Mexico
After a night spent in the Santa Cruz Xoxocotlan cemetery on October 31 for Dia de los Muertos in Oaxaca, Mexico, I headed back to the Tlacolula Valley on Sunday morning. I was invited to San Pablo Villa de Mitla by friends Arturo Hernandez and Epifanio Ruiz Perez to visit for Day of the Dead. Here in Mitla it is always celebrated on November 1.
Mitla, or originally Mictlan, is an ancient Zapotec town at the valley terminus with Mixtec influences carved into its archeological ruins. Mitla was just named a Pueblo Magico so it’s likely that in future years there will be many more tourists there for Muertos.
Arturo took me to the cemetery with him to place flowers on his mother’s grave. The practice in Mitla is different from Teotitlan del Valle, and likely different for each of the Zapotec villages throughout Oaxaca.
Here, he explained, the people come to the cemetery early in the morning, clean the sites of their loved ones, place fresh flowers, light copal incense and finish by noon. The firecrackers go off as the signal to finish.
Then, they immediately return home to wait for the disfundos (the deceased) to return and join them for the afternoon meal. By one o’clock, the cemetery is empty. There is no sitting around the tombs here, like there is in other Oaxaca cemeteries.
This is a family, home-based tradition, says Arturo. Everyone leaves their doors open so that the spirits of loved ones can find their way home, following the scent of marigold, copal incense and the lure of their favorite foods or even a cigarette and shot of mezcal.
At the Mitla cemetery I met Gildardo Hernandez Quero who has a very traditional altar and is known for his in-depth historical knowledge of Mitla and the ways of practicing Day of the Dead from pre-Hispanic times. He invited us to visit. With an offering of a loaf of Pan de Muertos and a bottle of mezcal for the altar, Arturo and I set out to pay our respects.
This is a visiting day. Family and close friends go to each other’s home with flowers, a candle, perhaps bread and chocolate. There is always a candle burning in front of the altar and a fresh one guarantees the light will never extinguish during the 24-hour visit of the dead.
Visitors sit a while. They talk. They remember. No visit is shorter than an hour. You can’t be in a hurry here. You are offered hot chocolate and a piece of sweet egg bread. Perhaps you are invited to taste the mole negro with guajolote. You will always be offered mezcal.
Gilardo’s altar is a ritual vision of serenity that combines pre- and post-Hispanic traditions. Photos of saints adorn the wall. A woven mat, the traditional sleeping mattress called a petate, is on the floor where the dead come to rest. Also on the floor is the candle, jug of mezcal, a squash gourd, beans, fruit and flowers — symbols of the harvest and bounty. Altars were always constructed on the ground before the conquest.
The concrete altar with its arch base is a colonial design imported along with bread, Gilardo says. He also points to the coarse traditional tortilla, black from the comal, that asks us to remember to honor indigenous corn that sustains the people.
We sit a while, talk about the politics of historic preservation and what it means for Mitla now that the town is a Pueblo Magico.
I go back with Arturo to his house where I share a meal with his family and then make a visit to Epifanio Ruiz in the center of town. Epifanio has an antique business on Calle 5 de Mayo. Some of my vintage glass mezcal bottles come from him. He also is recognized by the town for his traditional altar.
I have another mezcal, a hot chocolate and bread, and Epifanio brings me mole chichilo. This is a traditional savory mole that is made the same way as mole negro except without the chocolate, so it doesn’t have the thick chocolate sweetness. I only have room for a taste. It is very good.
Then, I get back to Teotitlan, make a stop to visit Michelle. She has house guests visiting from the United States for the week, so she asked each of them to bring a family photo to add to the altar, which each of them participated in building.
Next, I visit to say hello to the Chavez Santiago family. They sit around the dining room table in their altar room, eating fruit and nuts, playing card games, sipping mezcal and keeping their dead loved ones company.
It’s after dark when I get to the casita.
With each stop to visit, I make an offering of bread and fruit for the altar out of respect to the family and their tradition
At home, I light the 24-hour candle on my own altar in honor of our dad, set the mezcal bottles and copal incense burner on the floor, get cozy in the easy chair and continue to remember.
Practices and traditions for Day of the Dead in Oaxaca vary from village to village, and are held on different days. Epifanio says that the remote village of San Lorenzo Albarradas holds the celebration for a week.
The Teotitlan del Valle church bells are ringing. Someone is in the bell tower for 24-hours and the bells toll from 3 p.m. November 1 to 3 p.m. November 2. Today we will have a 3:00 p.m. meal with the disfundos and then guide them back to the tombs to rest for another year. We will sit with them at their tombs to ensure they rest easy and then return home.
Someone I knew once said, The dead don’t care. I think he’s wrong. I think they do.
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Posted in Cultural Commentary, Oaxaca Mexico art and culture, Photography, Teotitlan del Valle, Travel & Tourism
Tagged altars, culture, day of the dead, dia de los muertos, Mexico, Oaxaca, pan de muertos, pre-Hispanic, religion, San Pablo Villa de Mitla, Teotitlan del Valle, traditions, Zapotec