Day of the Dead
On November 1st and 2nd, Guatemalans celebrate Day of the Dead. Apart from reading a little bit about this holiday, we don't really know what Guatemalans do to celebrate. Starting last year, we decided we were going to celebrate this holiday in our own unique Guatemalan-American style.
First stop was the cemetery. It is my understanding that in Guatemala on the Day of the Day, relatives go to the cemetery and decorate their family's graves. We were headed to my father's family plot when we came across some deer. There were two mommys and three babies. Last year when we were at the cemetery on Day of the Dead, we got rather close to one of the deer, but I wasn't quite expecting what happened this year. The deer in the cemetery know they are safe from hunters and even though they are wild animals, they have become quite tame. We pulled up right alongside these five deer and stopped. I rolled down the windows so the kids (and me and Greg of course) could get a better view.
We turned to watch the little baby twins sniffing at each other.
When I turned back around, one of the mommy deer was walking right over to the car. I was chatting with her and she just kept coming closer. Then her nose was inside my window!
I could have pet her but was so surprised by what was happening I didn't have a chance to decide if that was something I wanted to do or not. After she determined that we didn't have any treats for her, she went back to grazing.
We parked the car and got out about 50 feet from where the deer were. Instead of running, they came over near us. Ultimately they decided that we weren't that interesting and headed off.
I mentioned the deer to my dad later in the day and he pulled out a picture that was just in the local paper. Apparently there are some people that go to the cemetery twice a week and feed the deer out of buckets and pet them. I guess is it pretty common for people to feed the deer from their cars too. Next time we head up there, we are taking carrots!
At last we made it to the Wylie plot.
It had been a year, but Marcus and Will seemed to enjoy visiting some of their great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents. Marcus kept asking, "Where the dead people?" We had to stop to give the dog a hug too.
Then we were off to visit my mom's side of the family. There were more pictures (and yes, I think it was odd that I took pictures my kids with headstones) and we enjoyed the view.
And really, how could I not take pictures of these two cute kids even if we were in the cemetery?
Back home we ate some lunch and headed out to fly some kites. The kites are a symbol of the connection between the living and the dead. Unfortunately, there was not even a breeze to be had. In our first attempt to get the kites up, our very low quality kites both broke. Not even a minute into the activity and we were breaking out the tape. Most of our kite flying looked like this:
Marcus got bored with the anticipation.
I did manage to get one kite up for less than a minute. I threw the camera at Greg and yelled to hurry up and get a picture.
The kids didn't care and had fun flying kites in their own style.
During Day of the Dead, Guatemalans spend time with family. We concluded our celebration at a family dinner to celebrate my dad's birthday. Maybe we didn't celebrate in the "correct" traditional way, but it sure was nice to have the day as a family making our own traditions.
First stop was the cemetery. It is my understanding that in Guatemala on the Day of the Day, relatives go to the cemetery and decorate their family's graves. We were headed to my father's family plot when we came across some deer. There were two mommys and three babies. Last year when we were at the cemetery on Day of the Dead, we got rather close to one of the deer, but I wasn't quite expecting what happened this year. The deer in the cemetery know they are safe from hunters and even though they are wild animals, they have become quite tame. We pulled up right alongside these five deer and stopped. I rolled down the windows so the kids (and me and Greg of course) could get a better view.
We turned to watch the little baby twins sniffing at each other.
When I turned back around, one of the mommy deer was walking right over to the car. I was chatting with her and she just kept coming closer. Then her nose was inside my window!
I could have pet her but was so surprised by what was happening I didn't have a chance to decide if that was something I wanted to do or not. After she determined that we didn't have any treats for her, she went back to grazing.
We parked the car and got out about 50 feet from where the deer were. Instead of running, they came over near us. Ultimately they decided that we weren't that interesting and headed off.
I mentioned the deer to my dad later in the day and he pulled out a picture that was just in the local paper. Apparently there are some people that go to the cemetery twice a week and feed the deer out of buckets and pet them. I guess is it pretty common for people to feed the deer from their cars too. Next time we head up there, we are taking carrots!
At last we made it to the Wylie plot.
It had been a year, but Marcus and Will seemed to enjoy visiting some of their great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents. Marcus kept asking, "Where the dead people?" We had to stop to give the dog a hug too.
Then we were off to visit my mom's side of the family. There were more pictures (and yes, I think it was odd that I took pictures my kids with headstones) and we enjoyed the view.
And really, how could I not take pictures of these two cute kids even if we were in the cemetery?
Back home we ate some lunch and headed out to fly some kites. The kites are a symbol of the connection between the living and the dead. Unfortunately, there was not even a breeze to be had. In our first attempt to get the kites up, our very low quality kites both broke. Not even a minute into the activity and we were breaking out the tape. Most of our kite flying looked like this:
Marcus got bored with the anticipation.
I did manage to get one kite up for less than a minute. I threw the camera at Greg and yelled to hurry up and get a picture.
The kids didn't care and had fun flying kites in their own style.
During Day of the Dead, Guatemalans spend time with family. We concluded our celebration at a family dinner to celebrate my dad's birthday. Maybe we didn't celebrate in the "correct" traditional way, but it sure was nice to have the day as a family making our own traditions.
posted by Annie and Greg @ 4:19 PM
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