Skeletons rise from sugar coffins in marzipan graves. Wooden toy skeletons execute frantic dances and clay ones move their jaws to laugh at death. In churches, alters are covered with papal picado. Worshipers bring sweets and pan de muertos, for the hungry in the other world. This is the survival of an ancient Indian belief that the mortal soul of the deceased still craves for human comforts.
Cemeteries have more visitors than any other day of the year.
They look more like camp sites, because people actually camp there. They stay overnight with all the favorite dishes of the deceased laid on his tomb, waiting for him to come eat. Picnicking by the gravestone. All through the pre-Colombian era there was a strong cult of the dead. A cult that honored death, not for death's sake, but as a counterpart to life, as seen in the dual beliefs of the pre-Hispanic mind.