Category: Mexican Tourism

Piñatas! More Piñatas! December in Mexico is Piñata Season

Traditional piñatas ready for sale decorate the door to the Hernández family's tiny taller (workshop) on Av. Lázaro Cárdenas near Plaza Carrillo in Morelia, Michoacán.

Among clean ollas de barro (clay pots), plastic receptacles filled with engrudo (flour/water paste), and colorful, neatly stacked rounds of papel de china (tissue paper), Sra. María Dolores Hernández (affectionately known in life as Doña Lolita) sat on an upturned bucket. She celebrated her birthday on December 24, and she lit up–just like a Christmas tree–when she talked about her business and her life. Doña Lolita passed away approximately four years ago.

The last point of the star-shaped piñata is in Doña Lolita's hands, nearly ready to be glued into place.

"When I was a young woman, raising my family together with my husband, it was hard for us to make a good living here in Morelia. We had eight children (one has died, but six girls and a boy survive) and we struggled to make ends meet. My husband was a master mason, but I wanted to help out with the finances. I knew a woman who made piñatas, and I thought, 'I can do that.' So I started trying my hand, more than 60 years ago."

Doña Lolita adds another layer of newspaper to this piñata in progress. "You can't put too much newspaper on the pot, because it will take too long to break the piñata," she explained. "And you can't put too little on it, either, because then the first child to hit it will break it. That's no good, either. You just have to know how much to use." Click on the photo to enlarge it and get a good look at the clay pot inside the layers of newspaper.

"The woman who made piñatas wouldn't give away her secrets, so I had to figure everything out for myself. You should have seen me the first time I tried to make a bird's beak for a parrot-shaped piñata! A man I knew told me to make it out of chapopote (a kind of tar), so I did. It hardened all right, but later in the day the weather warmed up and that beak dripped down to *here*! What a mess! I finally figured out how to make the shape out of paper, but I just about broke my head thinking about it!"

Pre-cut rounds of papel de china (tissue paper) wait to be glued onto a piñata. The black plastic bag holds strips of newspaper.

Doña Lolita told me about the different grades of paper used to create different styles of decoration on the piñata, and she explained different kinds of paper-cutting techniques; she's absolutely the expert. Here, her son-in-law Fernando cuts tissue paper for fringe. His hands are so fast with the scissors it made my head spin; he can even cut without looking.

"In those days, the clay pots cost four and a half pesos for a gross–yes, for 144. In the old days, I usually sold about 7,000 piñatas every December, so you can imagine the investment I made just in clay pots. In the 1960s, I could sell a large piñata for seven pesos. Now–well, now the pots are much more expensive, so naturally the piñatas cost more, too. The large ones cost 45 pesos. This year, I'll sell about 1,000 piñatas just for the posadas."

Piñatas in various stages of completion hang from every beam in Doña Lolita's tiny workshop.

"When my daughter Mercedes was about eight years old, she wanted to learn to make piñatas. She'd been watching me do it since she was born. So I taught her, and I've taught the whole family. Piñatería (making piñatas) is what's kept us going." Doña Lolita smiled hugely. "My children have always been extremely hard workers. There was a girl for each part of making the piñatas. Every year, we started making piñatas in August and finished at the beginning of January.

This gigantic piñata, still unfinished, measures almost six feet in diameter from point to point.

"One time, we had so many piñatas to finish that I didn't think we could do it. So I thought, 'if we work all night long, we can finish them by tomorrow morning.' Only I couldn't figure out how to keep the children awake to work all night." She laughed. "I went to the drugstore and bought pills to stay awake. I knew I could keep myself awake, but I gave one pill to each of the children. And in just a little while, I was working and they were sleeping, their heads fell right down into their work! What! Those pills didn't work at all! The next day I went back to the drugstore and asked the pharmacist about it. 'Oh no! I thought you asked me for pills to make them sleep!' he said." Doña Lolita laughed again. "We finished all the piñatas in spite of those pills, but you had better believe me, I never tried anything that foolish again."

Doña Lolita builds piñatas with her son-in-law, Fernando Cedeño Herrera (left), her daughter Mercedes Ayala Hernández, her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren. A close friend, Oswaldo Gutiérrez López (background), works with the family. Her grandson Enrique, 19, says he intends to keep the family business going.

Oswaldo Gutiérrez works on this piñata in the doorway of the tiny taller. Doña Lolita has taught many people the art of creating traditional piñatas, but her family and her loyal customers say she's the best piñatera (piñata maker) in Morelia.

"People come from everywhere to buy my piñatas. I don't have to take them out to sell; I only sell them here in the taller. Because they're so beautiful and well-made, all the best people in Morelia–and lots of people from other places–come to seek me out and order piñatas for their parties. I've taught my family that our work is our pride and our heritage, and my children have all taught their children the same. That is our legacy, our family tradition."

Fill the piñata with candy like these bags of traditional colación (hard candies especially for Christmas).

But why piñatas, and why in December? During the early days of the Spanish conquest, the piñata was used as a catechetical tool, to teach the indigenous people about Christianity. The body of the piñata represented Satan; each of the seven points symbolized the seven deadly (capital) sins (pride, lust, gluttony, rage, greed, laziness, and envy). The blindfold worn by the child or adult trying to hit the piñata represents blind faith. Breaking the points of the piñata equated with the triumph of good over evil, overpowering Satan, overcoming sin, and finally enjoying the sweet delights of God's goodness when the clay pot (Satan) finally breaks and everything good pours out of the piñata. Doña Lolita's most sought-after piñatas continue to be the traditional style, with seven points, but she also creates piñatas shaped like roosters, peacocks, half-watermelons, deer, half moons, and once, an enormous octopus!

For the nine nights from December 16 through December 24, Mexico celebrates las posadas. Each evening, a re-enactment of the Christmas story brings children dressed as la Virgencita María (ready to give birth to her baby and riding a live burro) and her husband Sr. San José (and a street procession filled with angels, shepherds, and other costumed children) along the road to Bethlehem, searching for a place to stay. There is no place: Bethlehem's posadas (inns) are filled. Where will the baby be born! For the re-enactment, people wait behind closed doors at certain neighborhood houses. The santos peregrinos (holy pilgrims) knock, first at one door, then another. At each house, they sing a song, begging lodging for the night. At each house, the neighbors inside turn them away in song: 'No room here! Go away! Bother someone else!' Watch a lovely slide show: Las Posadas.

Freshly toasted cacahuates (peanuts) are in season now and are also used to stuff the piñata. The wooden box holding the peanuts is actually a measure, as is the oval metal sardine can next to it.

Fresh caña (sugar cane) is in season now in time for the posadas. Buy it in two-inch unpeeled sections for adding to the sweets in the piñata; buy it in 3" peeled thin sticks for adding to your hot ponche navideño (Christmas punch).

After several houses turn away la Virgen, San José, and their retinue, they finally receive welcome at the last designated house. After the pilgrims sing their plea for a place to stay, the guests assembled inside sing their welcome, "Entren santos peregrinos…" (Come in, holy pilgrims…). The doors are flung open, everyone piles into the house, and a huge party starts. Traditional foods like ponche (a hot fruit punch), buñuelos (a thin fried dough covered with either cinnamon sugar or syrup), and tamales (hundreds of tamales!) pour out of the kitchen as revelers sing villancicos (Mexican Christmas carols) and celebrate the coming of the Niño Dios (the Baby Jesus). Finally, all the children line up to put on a blindfold and take swings at a piñata stuffed with candy, seasonal fruits, and peanuts.

These very large bags of individually wrapped candies are ready to use to fill any piñata. These are available at the Mercado Medellín in Colonia Roma, Mexico City, as well as at all other markets in Mexico.

Mandarinas (tangerines) are in season at Christmastime, as are tiny jícamas and fresh sugar cane, which round out the goodies in lots of piñatas.

The piñata, stuffed with all it will hold, hangs from a rope during the posada party. A parent or neighbor swings it back and forth, up and down, as each child takes a turn at breaking it open with a big stick. Watch these adorable kids whack away.

The piñata, lovely though it may be, is a purely temporary joy. Nevertheless, happy memories of childhood posadas with family and friends last a lifetime.

Looking for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours

14 de December de 2019

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe :: December 12, the Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Queen of Mexico and Empress of the Americas

The new Basílica de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, built between 1974 and 1976, is the second-most visited religious site in the Western Hemisphere, second only to the Vatican.

My head was whirling with excitement at 7:00AM one New Year's Day a number of years ago. I was in a taxi going to the Guadalajara airport, ready to catch a flight to Mexico City. Although I had lived in the Distrito Federal (Mexico's capitol city) in the early 1980s, it had been too many years since I'd been back. Now I was going to spend five days with my friends Clara and Fabiola in their apartment in the southern section of the city. We had drafted a long agenda of things we wanted to do and places we wanted to visit together.

The old Basílica was finished in 1709. It's slowly sinking into the ground. You can easily see that it is not level.

First on our list, first on every list of everyone going to Mexico City, is the Basílica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the heart of the heart of Mexico. When I chatted with all of my Guadalajara neighbors about my upcoming trip, every single person's first question was, "Van a la Villa?" ("Are you going to the Basílica)"

To each inquirer I grinned and answered, "Of course! Vamos primero a echarle una visita a la virgencita." (The first thing we'll do is pay a visit to the little virgin!)

The interior of the new Basílica holds 50,000 people.

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe is Mexico's patron saint, and her image adorns churches and altars, house fronts and interiors, taxis and buses, bull rings and gambling dens, restaurants and houses of ill repute. The shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, locally known as la Villa, is a place of extraordinary vitality and celebration. On major festival days such as the anniversary of the apparition on December 12th, the atmosphere of devotion created by the literally millions of pilgrims is truly electrifying.

There are often 30 Masses offered at the Basílica during the course of a single day, each Mass for a different group of pilgrims as well as the general public.

The enormous Basílica of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe is located in the north of the city on the hill of Tepeyac, a place of great sanctity long before the arrival of Christianity in the New World. Long prior to the arrival of the Spanish to the shores of what is now Mexico, Tepeyac had been crowned with a temple dedicated to an earth and fertility goddess first called (in Náhuatl) Coatlicue, then Tonantzin, the Mother of the Gods. Tonantzin was a virgin goddess associated with the moon, like Our Lady of Guadalupe, who usurped her shrine.

The Tepeyac hill and shrine were important pilgrimage places for the nearby Mexica (pronounced meh-SHEE-kah) capital city of Tenochtitlán. Following the conquest of Tenochtitlán by Hernan Cortez in 1521, the shrine was demolished, and the native people were forbidden to continue their pilgrimages to the sacred hill. Their pagan practices had been considered to be devil worship for more than a thousand years in Christian Europe.

Some of you may not know the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe. For all of us of whatever faith who love Mexico, it's important to understand the origins of the one who is the Queen, the Mother, the beloved guardian of the República de México and of the Americas. She is the key to understanding the character of Mexico. Without knowing her story, it's simply not possible to know Mexico. Indulge me while I tell you.

On Saturday, December 9, 1531, a baptized indigenous Mexica man named Juan Diego set out for Tenochtitlán, as what is now Mexico City was known. He was on his way to find medicine for his uncle, who was desperately ill. Passing the pagan sacred hill of Tepeyac, he heard a voice calling to him. Climbing the hill, he saw on the summit a young woman who seemed to be no more than fourteen years old, standing in a golden mist.

Revealing herself as the "ever-virgin Holy Mary, Mother of God" (so the Christian telling of the story goes), she told Juan Diego not to be afraid. Her words? "Am I not here, who is your mother?" She instructed him to go to the local bishop and tell him that she wished a church for her son to be built on the hill. Juan did as he was instructed, but the bishop's office staff refused to let him in.

On his way home, Juan climbed the sacred hill and again saw the apparition, who told him to return to the bishop the next day. This time the bishop's staff said, "If she really is who you say she is, ask her to send proof to the bishop."

A day later, on December 12, 1531, Juan went again to Tepeyac and, when he again met Mary, she told him to climb the hill and pick the roses that were growing there. Juan climbed the hill with misgivings. It was the dead of winter, and flowers could not possibly be growing on the frosty, rocky mountain. At the summit, Juan found a profusion of roses in bloom, an armful of which he gathered and wrapped in his tilma (a garment similar to a poncho). Arranging the roses, Mary instructed Juan to take the tilma-encased bundle to the bishop, for this would be her sign.

When the bishop unrolled the tilma, he was astounded by the presence of the flowers that spilled out onto the floor of his office. They were roses that grew only in Seville, Spain, where he had come from. But more truly miraculous was the image that had mysteriously appeared on Juan Diego's tilma. The image showed the young woman, her head lowered demurely. Wearing a star-studded cape and flowing gown, she stood upon a half moon. The bishop was convinced that the Virgin Mary had indeed appeared to Juan Diego and soon thereafter the bishop began construction of the original church devoted to the honor of her son.

News of the miraculous apparition of the Virgin's image on a peasant's tilma spread rapidly throughout Mexico. Indigenous people by the thousands came from hundreds of miles away to see the image, now hanging above the altar in the new church. They learned that the mother of the Christian God had appeared as one of their own kind and spoken to him in his native language. The miraculous image was to have a powerful influence on the advancement of the Church's mission in Mexico. In only seven years, from 1532 to 1538, more than eight million Indians were converted to Christianity.

The shrine, rebuilt several times over the centuries, is today a great Basílica with a capacity for 50,000 pilgrims.

Juan Diego's tilma is preserved behind bulletproof glass and hangs twenty-five feet above the main altar in the basilica. For almost 500 years, the colors of the image have remained as bright as if they were painted yesterday, despite being exposed to humidity, smoke from church candles, and airborne salts for more than 100 years following the apparition.

The coarsely-woven maguey cactus cloth of the tilma, a cloth considered to have a life expectancy of about 40 years, still shows no evidence of decay. The 46 stars on her gown coincide with the position of the constellations in the heavens at the time of the winter solstice in 1531. Scientists have investigated the nature of the image and have been left with nothing more than evidence of the mystery of a miracle. The colors forming her portrait have no base in any of the elements known to science.

The origin of the name Guadalupe has always been a matter of controversy. It is believed that the name came about because of the translation from Náhuatl to Spanish of the words used by the Virgin during the apparition. It is believed that she used the Náhuatl word coatlaxopeuh which is pronounced "koh-ah-tlah-SUH-peh" and sounds remarkably like the Spanish word Guadalupe. 'Coa' means serpent, 'tla' can be interpreted as "the", while 'xopeuh' means to crush or stamp out. This version of the origin would indicate that Mary must have called herself "she who crushes the serpent," a Christian New Testament reference as well as a a reference to the Mexica's mythical god, The Plumed Serpent.

Thien Gretchen photographed this wonderful group of statues in Seguin, Texas for the Seguin Daily Photo Blog . Similar statues are for sale at the Basílica.

Clara, Fabiola, and I took the Metro and a microbus to La Villa, a journey of about an hour from their apartment in the south to the far northern part of the city. We left the bus at the two-block-long bridge that leads to the Basílica and decided to take a shopping tour before entering the shrine. The street and the bridge are filled chock-a-block with booths selling souvenirs of La Villa. Everything that you can think of (and plenty you would never think of) is available: piles of t-shirts with the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe and that of Juan Diego, CDs of songs devoted to her, bandanna-like scarves with her portrait, eerie green glow-in-the-dark figurines of her, key chains shaped like the Basílica, statues of her in every size and quality, holy water containers that look like her in pink, blue, silver, and pearly white plastic, religious-theme jewelry and rosaries that smell of rose petals, snow globes with tiny statues of La Guadalupana and the kneeling Juan Diego, who are dusted with stars when the globes are shaken.

There are booths selling freshly arranged flowers for pilgrims to carry to the shrine. There are booths selling soft drinks, tacos, and candy. Ice cream vendors hawk paletas (popsicles). Hordes of children offer chicles (chewing gum) for sale. We were jostled and pushed as the crowd grew denser near the Basílica.

The virgin's image is everywhere.

Is it tacky? Yes, without a doubt. Is it wonderful? Yes, without a doubt. It's the very juxtaposition of the tourist tchotchkes with the sublime message of the heavens that explains so much about Mexico. I wanted to buy several recuerdos (mementos) for my neighbors in Ajijic and I was hard-pressed to decide what to choose. Some pilgrims buy before going into the Basílica so that their recuerdos can be blessed by a priest, but we decided to wait until after visiting the Virgin to do my shopping.

Pope John Paul II loved Mexico, loved Our Lady of Guadalupe, and visited the country five times during his tenure as pope. Here he celebrates Mass at the new Basílica.

The present church was constructed on the site of the mid-16th-century Old Basílica, the one that was finished in 1709. In the mid-1970s, when the Old Basílica became dangerous due to the sinking of its foundations, a modern structure called the new Basílica was built cheek-by-jowl with the old one. The original image of the Virgin of Guadalupe is now housed above the altar in this new Basílica.

Built between 1974 and 1976, the new Basílica was designed by architect Pedro Ramírez Vásquez. Its seven front doors are an allusion to the seven gates of Celestial Jerusalem referred to by Christ. It has a circular floor plan so that the image of the Virgin can be seen from any point within the building. An empty crucifix symbolizes Christ's resurrection. The choir seating is located between the altar and the churchgoers to indicate that it, too, is part of the group of the faithful. To the sides are the chapels of the Santísimo Sacramento (the Blessed Sacrament) and of Saint Joseph.

One of the many processions that constantly arrive from cities and towns all over Mexico and the Americas.

We entered the tall iron gates to the Basílica atrium. It was still early enough in the day that the crowds weren't crushing, although people were streaming in. Clara turned to me, asking, "How do you feel, now that you're back here?"

I thought about it for a moment, reflecting on what I was experiencing. "The first time I came here, I didn't believe the story about the Virgin's appearance to Juan Diego. I thought, 'Yeah, right'. But the minute I saw the tilma that day, I knew—I mean I really knew—that it was all true, that she really had come here and that really is her portrait–a portrait of our spiritual mother." We were walking closer and closer to the entrance we'd picked to go in and my heart was beating faster. "I feel the same excitement coming here today that I have felt every time since that first time I came, the same sense of awe and wonder." Clara nodded and then lifted her head slightly to indicate that I look at what she was seeing.

Faith

I watched briefly while a family moved painfully toward its goal. The father, on his knees and carrying the baby, was accompanied by his wife and young son, who walked next to him with one hand on his father's shoulder. Their older son moved ahead of them on his knees toward an entrance of the Basílica. Their faith was evident in their faces. The purpose of their pilgrimage was not. Had the wife's pregnancy been difficult and was their journey one of gratitude for a safe birth? Had the baby been born ill? Was the father recently given a job to support the family, or did he desperately need one? Whatever the reason for their pilgrimage, the united family was going to see their Mother, either to ask for or to give thanks for her help.

Clara, Fabiola, and I entered the Basílica as one Mass was ending and another was beginning. Pilgrims were pouring in to place baskets of flowers on the rail around the altar. The pews were filled and people were standing 10-deep at the back of the church. There were lines of people waiting to be heard in the many confessionals.

We stood for a bit and listened to what the priest was saying. "La misa de once ya se terminó. Decidimos celebrar otra misa ahora a las doce por tanta gente que ha llegado, por tanta fe que se demuestra" ("The Mass at eleven o'clock is over. We decided to celebrate another Mass now at 12 o'clock because so many people have arrived, because of so much faith being demonstrated.")

Indeed, this day was no special feast day on the Catholic calendar. There was no celebration of a special saint's day. However, many people in Mexico have time off from their work during the Christmas and New Year holidays and make a pilgrimage to visit la Virgencita.

The framed tilma hangs above the main altar in the new Basílica. Photo courtesy of Hernán García Crespo.

Making our way through the crowd, we walked down a ramp into the area below and behind the altar. Three moving sidewalks bore crowds of pilgrims past the gold-framed tilma. Tears flowed down the cheeks of some; others made the sign of the cross as they passed, and one woman held her year-old baby up high toward the Virgin. Most, including the three of us, moved from one of the moving sidewalks to another in order to be able to have a longer visit at the feet of the Reina de México.

When I visited several years ago, there were only two moving sidewalks. Behind them was space for the faithful to stand and reflect or pray for a few minutes. Today's crush of visitors has required that the space be devoted to movement rather than reflection and rest.

We walked to the back of the Basílica to look at a large bronze crucifix exhibited in a glass case. The bronze crucifix, approximately 3 feet high, is bent backward in a deep arch and lies across a large cushion. According to the placard and the photos from the era, in 1921 a bouquet of flowers was placed directly on the altar of the Old Basílica beneath the framed tilma. It was later discovered that the floral arrangement was left at the altar by an anarchist who had placed a powerful dynamite bomb among the flowers. When the bomb detonated, the altar crucifix was bent nearly double and large portions of the marble altar were destroyed. Nevertheless, no harm came to the tilma and legend has it that the crucified Son protected his Mother.

After a while, we reluctantly left the Basílica. With a long backward glance at the tilma, Clara, Fabiola, and I stepped out into the brilliantly sunny Mexico City afternoon. The throngs in the Basílica atrium still pressed forward to visit the shrine.

Jackson and Perkins created the lovely Our Lady of Guadalupe hybrid floribunda rose.

We stopped in some of the enclosed shops at sidewalk level and then continued over the bridge through the booths of mementos. After I bought a few gifts for my neighbors in Guadalajara, we moved away to hail a taxi. My mind was still in the Basílica, with our Mother.

On December 12 the tiny and gloriously beautiful Santuario de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe in Morelia, Michoacán, will be in full fiesta.

Her feast day falls on December 12 each year. Think about her just for a moment as you go about your day on the 12th. After all, she's the Queen of Mexico and the Empress of the Americas.

Glossary of loving terms for Our Lady of Guadalupe


La Virgencita	The Little Virgin
La Morenita	The Little Dark-Skinned Woman
La Guadalupana	The Guadalupan
La Reina de México	The Queen of Mexico
La Paloma Blanca	The White Dove
La Emperatriz de las Américas	The Empress of the Americas

How to get there once you're in Mexico City:

From the Centro Histórico (Historic Downtown) take Metro Line 3 at Hidalgo and transfer to Line 6 at Deportivo 18 de marzo. Go to the next station, La Villa Basílica. Then walk north two busy blocks until reaching the square.
From any stop on Line 1 of the Metrobús (above-ground rapid transit), get on going NORTH to the Deportivo 18 de marzo Metrobús station. Walk down the stairs, then half a block left to the traffic light. Cross the street to the right and walk two blocks to the Basílica.
From the Hidalgo Metro station take a microbus to La Villa.
From Zona Rosa take a pesero (microbus) along Reforma Avenue, north to the stop nearest the Basílica.
Or take a taxi from your hotel, wherever it is in the city. Tell the driver, "A La Villa, por favor. Vamos a echarle una visita a la Virgencita." ("To the Basílica, please. We're going to make a visit to the little Virgin.")
Looking for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours.

7 de December de 2019

Color and Beauty For Your Home :: Muebles Finos Artesanales–Classy Painted Furniture and Accessories from UNEAMICH

The unprepossessing doorway to UNEAMICH mfa/eronga, the Erongarícuaro, Michoacán artists' cooperative originally founded in 1981 by Steven and Marina Rosenthal. "Go to the corner where the primary school is, turn right, and go halfway down," read Marina's directions. 'Halfway down to what,' wondered Mexico Cooks!, but the building was easy to find. All photos by Mexico Cooks! except as noted.

Pátzcuaro, the original capital of Michoacán, is a well-known destination for tourists, whether they are interested in pre-Hispanic religious sites, centuries-old architecture, modern working artisans, or regional Purhépecha cuisine. Just a few minutes' drive away, another side of Michoacán exists: small-town, little-visited, and still very much oriented toward Mexico's traditional way of life. In Erongarícuaro, the day bustles gently around the small plaza. The pace is slower even than that of Pátzcuaro.

In the Erongarícuaro, Michoacán taller (workshop) of Muebles Finos Artesanales Erongarícuaro–the UNEAMICH wholesale entity branded as mfa/eronga–Marina Rosenthal stands before a custom-painted panorama of canvas nudes. You can put your own face in one of the vacant spots.

Erongarícuaro, attractive in a well-worn, frayed-cuff style, is home to about 13,000 people, including a few souls from 'away'. Europe, Canada, and the United States are equally represented. Long a bohemian outpost (according to local legend, Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera and their international cohorts were frequent visitors), Erongarícuaro still attracts the slightly eccentric foreigner: a handful of people setting up a sustainable community, another handful interested in communal housing, and one or two long-time residents working in town.

The sales and reception room at UNEAMICH mfa/eronga, where we talked with Marina. Photo courtesy Bernie Frankl, Tucson, AZ.

Steve and Maureen Rosenthal, originally from Arizona, have lived and worked in Erongarícuaro for nearly 50 years. Their commitment to the town and its people runs deep; they've put their lifework into training artists, producing incredibly beautiful furniture and home decoration over the course of the years. Their business, UNEAMICH mfa/eronga, has evolved from its 1980s-era origins as an Escuela Taller (Workshop School) to the worker-owned cooperative that it is today. Along the way, the Rosenthals and the artist owners have created a living heritage for Erongarícuaro.

One of the artists' workrooms at UNEAMICH mfa/eronga. Most of the 40-plus artist members of the cooperative were attending a community funeral on the day that Mexico Cooks! visited the UNEAMICH/mfa/eronga taller.

Mfa/eronga (the name of the UNEAMICH store that Steve runs in Tucson) has talleres (workshops) on both sides of its quiet Erongarícuaro street. One is the carpentry workshop for building and carving the wooden furniture; the other is filled with artists' cubicles where the fine decoration work takes place. Mexico Cooks! greeted Marina (Maureen's name loosely translated into Spanish) Rosenthal with a happy, "Finally! We've wanted to visit you for years!" We hugged and laughed that our meeting had been delayed for so long.

The carved and painted backrest of a UNEAMICH mfa/eronga chair. Click on any photo for a larger view.

While giving us a running history of the business, Marina took us on a tour of the two talleres. "Steve and I came here in 1970 to finish writing a screenplay, but the option to make the movie just never panned out. By then, we were so in love with this part of Michoacán that we didn't want to leave. We started making painted furniture, and little by little, customers started seeking us out.

The exterior and interior of one of mfa/eronga's fabulous painted pieces. Photo courtesy mfa/eronga.

"When Cuahutémoc Cárdenas was governor of Michoacán (1980-86), he was a huge supporter of the state's regional arts. You know that he was the son of Lázaro Cárdenas del Río, Mexico's forward-thinking president from 1934-1940, and he had a lot of his father's sensibilities. One of his projects was to open Escuelas Talleres–workshop schools–where artisans could receive training that would enhance the quality of their work and make it more easily sold. That's where we came in: our workshop began to receive state support for training artists. Literally dozens of artists have trained with us; some continue to work with us now, and some of our current workers are the children of those men and women who initially trained here.

Work facilities at UNEAMICH mfa/eronga are primitive, but the cooperative of artists creates glorious work in spite of the harsh conditions.

"Most of the artists we've trained knew some carving or painting techniques before they came to us. Their level of general knowledge of art was practically nil, though: none knew of the great European classical or modern painters and none had heard of any artists north of the Mexican border. Few knew of Mexico's great artists: Rivera, Kahlo, Tamayo, the Coronel brothers, and Juan O'Gorman, just to name several. One of my greatest joys has been taking our extremely talented artists to Morelia, to Guadalajara, and to Mexico City to show them art's possibilities outside their limited frame of reference.

UNEAMICH mfa/eronga artists hand-paint and hand-finish bateas (hand-carved shallow wooden bowls) from their own designs–or from your special-order design.

"We've made furniture using classic Michoacán designs, in bohemian designs, in our own designs, and with every painted decoration you can imagine. You'll find anything from a still life of hybrid roses to a caricatured cat on our furniture and home decor. Our artists, wonderfully inventive talents, can take the simplest thing and bring it to a level of beauty that attracts the most discriminating client.

Another artist's workspace at UNEAMICH mfa/eronga.

"The work that comes from our talleres has spread all over the world. Right now, we're working on furnishing a hotel–not the first one, and we surely hope not the last! Disney commissioned pieces for a restaurant, we have other long-time restaurant clients who decked out their restaurant with our pieces and need frequent replacements, and we have years of background making custom pieces for private customers.

The man carving intricate hand-drawn orchids into this chair back said, "Solo soy carpintero." ('I'm just a carpenter.')

"Our stories range from the sublime to the truly ridiculous. We've gone through times of terrible famine, when we couldn't make our payroll–think of the horrors of the 1994 devaluation of the peso! But our artist workers stayed with us, even when we couldn't pay regularly. Really, it's the workers who have always made our business a success. You don't measure success just by looking at your bank balance. Loyalty to one another: that's a huge measure of success, in my mind.

For your home, mfa/eronga sells cinema seating made in the old-fashioned style, but of new materials–and in this case, painted with artists' stylized portraits. Other styles are available. Photo courtesy mfa/eronga.

"Right now, because economic times are really challenging, Steve is staying across the border in Tucson, running our retail operation. I'm here with our youngest daughter, running the talleres. Our staff here in Erongarícuaro currently numbers about 43, down from a high of 160 working artists. But we keep on going; our loyalty is to our cooperative artists, and their loyalty is to the cooperative and to us.

Nothing is wasted, everything is recycled. Out of this chaos of wood trimmings come works of art.

Flowers in a vase, hand-painted on an artist's workspace wall. Making art is more than a job; art is a way of life.

If you're planning to be in the Morelia/Pátzcuaro region, please contact Mexico Cooks! for a guided tour of Erongarícuaro, the mfa/eronga workshop, and more entrancingly beautiful villages in Michoacán.

Cactus in bloom on mfa/eronga chair backrests.

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30 de November de 2019
Wandering with Mexico Cooks! :: 2019 Meanderings Part 2

Remember that old saying, "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first,"? Mexico Cooks! is a firm proponent of that–at least for beginning today's report. This sweet, delicious offering is on the menu at La Conspiración de 1809, just at the back of Morelia's cathedral. In the photo, you see a pavlova, a crisp meringue filled with frutos rojos (red fruits)–in this case, Michoacán's locally grown strawberries, blackberries, and red raspberries. Driscoll's also grows blueberries here in Michoacán. The company leases fields from their owners and trains local workers to cultivate, harvest, and pack the berries.

Next time you're in your supermarket, take a close look at the Driscoll's label. Many of the berries that you purchase, no matter where in the world you live, are grown in Mexico. Click on the photo for a larger view. Photo courtesy Driscoll's.

A doorway to a private home in the community Santa Fe de la Laguna, Michoacán.

Elotes tatemados (roasted young corn, still in its husk) for sale in a large Mexico City market.

These are also elotes (young corn), boiled rather than roasted at the same market stand. It's hard to choose which to buy, roasted or boiled, both are so delicious!

Chambarete entomatado (beef shank cooked in a sauce of tomate verde (tomatillos), onions, chile, and other spices) until the meat is falling-off-the-bone tender. Available daily at Fonda Marceva in Morelia's centro historico. It's one of my favorite things on their menu. Photo courtesy my friend Eddie Álvarez.

Preparing fresh chicharrón (fried pork skins) at a market booth. Book a market tour with me and we'll visit this booth–and we'll have a taste of hot-from-the-vat chicharrón. Everybody loves its crisp, greaseless texture and taste.

Escobetillas (stiff brushes made from plant root material bound together with thin wire), used for scrubbing dirty dishes. Seen in a Oaxaca market. Each one measures approximately 5"-6" in length.

My longtime friend don Rafael, a copper worker in Santa Clara del Cobre, Michoacán, for 62 of his 70 years. In the photo, he's demonstrating a hammering technique to one of my tour groups. Each beautiful copper item in this workshop is entirely made by hand. Let's go!

Souls burning in Hell, nicho, San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato. Wood carving.

Longaniza (the long sausage without links) and Oaxaca-style chorizo, with small round links, displayed on a market stand, Oaxaca City.

Two little devils at once, 2019 Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales, Oaxaca. Wait, what, two? Yes, in the background is a hand dolly, known here in Mexico as a diablito, a little devil.

Puerco estilo cubano (Cuban-style roast pork). The men on the right-hand side of the photo sit on benches and turn, turn, turn the spits until the pork is tender, juicy, and ready to serve. I've eaten big plates of this meat every year for the last three years. It's truly something to look forward to at the Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales, Oaxaca.

The Unión de Palmeadoras (tortilla makers' union) from Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca had a wonderful booth set up, selling hand-made Tlaxiaco-style tortillas. Those are fiery chiles pequín, in the dish.

The fiestas patronales in San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro featured Moorish dancers. These two young men posed for me.

San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro is widely known for one of its several artesanías (handcrafts): these are velas escamadas (elaborate, hand-made beeswax candles). These particular candles were placed at one side of the main altar; other banks of candles were placed throughout the church. Beautiful but ephemeral, the candles are meant to be burned.

Golden cempasúchil and wine-red pata de león are Mexico's most typical flowers for Día de los Muertos.

Right now, Mexico's fresh guasanas (garbanzo beans) are in season. Not dried, these are harvested fresh and steamed lightly in salt water. Each pod contains two individual green, fresh garbanzos; we eat them like edamame, squeezing the garbanzos out of the pods directly into our mouths. Some people like to douse a bagful with liquid chile (what you see in the bottle), but I prefer the clean, green taste of the guasana.

One of my favorite places to go, whether wit
h old friends or with tourists new to Mexico City, continues to be Azul Histórico. The food is exquisite, the restaurant itself is marvelously beautiful, and the service is always attentive. Here, the "hostess" is a catrina, all gussied up Oaxaca-style for Day of the Dead.

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23 de November de 2019
Where in the World is Mexico Cooks!? A Look Back at Our 2019 Wanderings.

In February, Mexico Cooks! returned to live once again in Morelia, Michoacán. It's been a joyful return, to the welcome of wonderful old friends, well-remembered streets and markets, and the beautiful colonial city itself. I found a terrific house in Morelia's Centro Histórico, walking distance to most anywhere I need to go. You can expect to hear a lot more from me in the months to come about the cuisines, customs, and creativity of the people of Michoacán. The photo above is Morelia's Cathedral by the light of the full moon.

Workshop for creating a flavored salt. In a volcanic stone molcajete (that's part of it, in the photo), I ground roasted maguey worms, dehydrated pineapple, sea salt, and a chile de árbol or two. The flavor of mine was just so-so; a fellow behind me made a fantastic salt, flavored with a roasted scorpion. Who knew! Each of us participants got to bring our salt home in a test tube.

Late this spring, a friend and I traveled to San Miguel de Allende, where we saw friends and tried some of San Miguel's many restaurants. My personal favorite meal was brunch at Marsala: Cocina con Acentos, a truly innovative and delicious Mediterranean niche in the center of the city. The photo shows my plate of Marsala-style eggs Benedict, accompanied by a bottomless mimosa. In addition to a full menu of brunch choices, one is also invited to partake of the buffet of freshly baked scones, cheese biscuits, marmalades, a magnificent house-made terrine, and a number of other take-what-you want items. I can't wait to go back!

One of the highlights of the trip to San Miguel de Allende was the opportunity to meet in person a man I have long admired from afar. Charles Hall manages Rose Anne Hall Designs, a highly successful family business which produces mouth-blown glass items for the home, as well as the most beautiful hand-made candles in Mexico. Under Charlie's direction, the business dedicates itself to hiring people with disabilities–or what would appear to be disabilities–but who are enabled by the opportunity to create. Charlie is a businessman, a philosopher, and a humorist, and a wonderful human being.

In the lovely traditional kitchen of good friends in Santa Fe de la Laguna. It's always a privilege to be with them.

Cocido, or caldo de res, in my own kitchen and ready to serve. So simple, and so delicious.

Embarcadero San Pedro near twilight, Pátzcuaro, Michoacán.

If you've been reading Mexico Cooks! for very long, you know that I have a strange fascination with pig heads. The staff at this market booth are all great people and love showing off their wares. This handsome fellow has a mouthful of alfalfa. They are also a bunch of goofballs: they always encourage my market tour clients to kiss the snout–and I must say that in the spirit of fun, quite a few do!

These miniature chairs–about the size to seat a one-year-old baby–were all but viral on Facebook when I uploaded the photo. Turned upside down with potted plants on the bottoms of the straw seats, the chairs make a charming entrance into my home.

Last–but definitely not least–was my outrageously wonderful end-of-June birthday party, with the crowning touch of this spectacular cake. A huge shout-out to the Colegio Culinario de Morelia, to chef Joaquín Bonilla, to chef Juan Carlos Montaño, and to the crew who brought and served this marvelous creation. Between the delicious cake, the just-right frosting, the assortment of cookies and candies–and gold leaf!–that decorated the masterpiece, party guests were thrilled and so was the birthday girl. Such a wonderful birthday gift! Mil gracias a todos ustedes del Colegio!

Come back next week for a look at the rest of Mexico Cooks!' year 2019.

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16 de November de 2019
Calabaza en Tacha :: Hard-Shell Winter Squash in Syrup

Looking for something different to serve for Thanksgiving? How about calabaza en tacha—calabaza de Castilla (a winter squash) cooked in a deliciously sweet syrup? As a side dish instead of sweet potatoes–or in addition to sweet potatoes!–this Mexican-style squash is sure to be a hit with your family and guests. Photo courtesy Mercado Libre.

María de la Luz Padilla, the marvelous woman who spoils Mexico Cooks! by doing all my housework, gave me a squash. She brought two home from her rancho (the family farm) out in the country, one for her and one for me. The 8" diameter squash wasn't very big, as winter squash go, but it was plenty for me. Mari's first question, after I had happily accepted her gift, was whether or not I knew how to cook it. "Con piloncillo y canela, sí?" (With cones of brown sugar and cinnamon, right?)

Here's a crosscut of a really big calabaza de Castilla. It measures about 22" in diameter. Mexico Cooks! photo, Mercado de Sonora, Mexico City.

Even though I knew how to spice the squash and knew how to cut it apart, knowing and doing these things turned out to be worlds apart. Faced with the project, I waffled and hesitated, intimidated by a large vegetable. The squash sat on the counter for several days, daring me to cook it before it molded. Then one of the cats toppled it over and rolled it around the counter, so I moved the squash outside onto the terrace table and gathered my nerve.

On Sunday, I finally decided it was Cook the Squash Day. Mari was due to arrive early on Monday morning and it had to be done before she scolded me for letting it sit for so long. I chose pots, knives (a 10" Sabatier carbon steel chef's knife, more than 50 years old, was my go-to knife), and gathered the rest of the simple ingredients for a mise en place.

The squash with the first section cut out.

Cutting the squash in sections was the only difficult part of preparing it. The shell of the squash is hard. Hard. HARD. I was careful to keep the knife pointed toward the wall, not toward my body. With the force I needed to cut the squash open, one slip of the knife could have meant instant and deep penetration of my entrails. Later that night, my friend Araceli told me that her mother usually breaks a squash apart by throwing it from her home's second floor balcony onto the concrete patio! The next morning, Mari told me that her husband had cut their squash apart with a machete. I felt really tough, knowing that I'd been able to cut it open with just a big knife and a few pointed words. (That's shorthand for 'the air turned blue above my counter').

The squash, cut into sections and ready for the pot. On the counter behind the squash is a 1930's Mexican covered cazuela (casserole), the top in the form of a turkey.

Once I had the (expletives deleted) squash cut open, I scooped out the seeds and goop and cut it into sections more or less 4" long by 3" wide. I did not remove the hard shell, nor should you.

Piloncillo (raw brown sugar) cones in two sizes. The large one weighs 210 grams; the small one weighs 35 grams. I use the small ones in the recipe below.

Meantime, I had prepared the ingredients for the almíbar (thick syrup) that the squash would cook in. Mexican stick cinnamon, granulated sugar, and piloncillo (cones of brown sugar) went into a pot of water. I added a big pinch of salt, tied anise seed and cloves into a square of cheesecloth and tossed the little bundle into the water. The pot needed to simmer for at least three hours, until the syrup was thick and well-flavored.

Clockwise from left: Mexican stick cinnamon, anise seed, piloncillo, and cloves.

Several hours later (after the syrup thickened well), I added the pieces of squash to the pot. Cooking time for this very hard squash was approximately an hour and a half over a low-medium flame.

As the squash cooks in the syrup, it softens and takes on a very appetizing dark brown color. Calabaza en tacha is one of the most typically homey Mexican year-round dishes for desayuno (breakfast) or cena (supper). Well-heated and served in a bowl with hot milk and a little of its own syrup, the squash is both nutritious and filling.

Squash for breakfast! On Monday morning, Mexico Cooks! served up bowls of squash with hot milk, along with a slice of pan relleno con chilacayote (bread filled with sweetened chilacayote squash paste). Mari thought my squash was almost–almost–as good as hers.

Calabaza en Tacha estilo Mexico Cooks!

Ingredients
One medium-size hard shell winter squash (about 8" in diameter)
6 cups water
14 small cones of dark piloncillo (coarse brown sugar)
2 cups granulated sugar
4 Mexican cinnamon sticks about 2.5" long
2 pieces of orange peel
1 Tbsp anise seed
1 tsp whole cloves

Preparation
Heat the water in a large pot. Add the piloncillo, the granulated sugar, the orange peel, and the cinnamon sticks. Tie the anise seed and the cloves into a cheesecloth square and add it to the pot. Cook over a slow flame until the liquid is thick and syrupy, approximately three hours.

While the syrup is cooking, prepare the squash. Cut it into serving-size pieces as described above. If the squash shell is very hard, take adequate precautions so that you do not hurt yourself as you cut it in sections. You can always throw it from your second-floor window onto the patio!

Add the squash pieces to the thickened syrup and simmer until the squash is soft and takes on a deep brown color. Cool for 15 minutes or so before serving. Re-heat for desayuno (breakfast) or cena (supper). Serve with hot milk poured over it.

Makes about 16 servings.

¡Provecho!

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9 de November de 2019
Noche de Muertos in the Heart of Michoacán

Remember me as you pass by,
As you are now, so once was I.
As I am now, so you will be,
Prepare for death and follow me.
…from a tombstone

What is death? We know its first symptoms: the heart stops pumping, breath and brain activity stop. We know death's look and feel: a still, cold body from which the spirit has fled. The orphan and widow know death's sorrow, the priest knows the liturgy of the departed and the prayers to assuage the pain of those left to mourn. But in most English-speaking countries, death and the living are not friends. We the living look away from our mortality, we talk of the terminally ill in terms of 'if anything happens', not 'when she dies'. We hang the crepe, we cover the mirrors, we say the beads, and some of us fling ourselves sobbing upon the carefully disguised casket as it is lowered into the Astroturf-lined grave.

Octavio Paz, Mexico City's Nobel Laureate poet and essayist who died in 1998, is famously quoted as saying, "In New York, Paris, and London, the word death is never mentioned, because it burns the lips."

Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán panteón (cemetery), Mexico Cooks! photo. These fellows sing to la Descarnada (the fleshless woman) on November 2, 2009.

In Mexico, on the contrary, every day is a dance with death. Death is a woman who has numerous affectionate and humorous nicknames: la Huesuda (the bony woman), la Seria (the serious woman), la Novia Fiel (the faithful bride), la Igualadora (the equalizer), la Dientona (the toothy woman), la Pelona (the bald woman), la Patrona (the boss lady), and a hundred more. She's always here, just around the next corner or maybe right over there, behind that pillar. She waits with patience, until later today or until twelve o'clock next Thursday, or until sometime next year–but when it's your time to go, she's right there, ready to dance away with you at her side.

November 2013 altar to La Santa Muerte (Holy Death), Sta. Ana Chapirito (near Pátzcuaro), Michoacán. Devotees of this deathly apparition say that her cult has existed since before the Spanish arrived in Mexico.

In Mexico, death is also in the midst of life. We see our dead, alive as you and me, each November, when we wait at our cemeteries for those who have gone before to come home, if only for a night. That, in a nutshell, is Noche de Muertos: the Night of the Dead.

In the lower center portion of this photograph, you can see the Quiroga, Michoacán, panteón municipal (town cemetery). Late in the afternoon of November 1, 2013, most townspeople had not yet gone to the cemetery with candles and flowers for their loved ones' graves. Click on any photograph for a larger view.

Over the course of the last nearly 40 years, Mexico Cooks! has been to countless Noche de Muertos events, but none as mystical, as spiritual, or as profoundly magical as that of 2013. Invited to accompany a very small group on a private tour in Michoacán, I looked forward to spending three days enjoying the company of old and new friends. I did all that, plus I came away with an extraordinarily privileged view of life and death.

A magnificent Purépecha ofrenda (in this case, an altar in the home of beloved friends) in the village of Santa Fe de la Laguna, Michoacán. This detailed and lovely ofrenda was created to the memory of the family's maiden aunt, who died at 74. Because she had never married, even at her advanced age she was considered to be an angelito (little angel)–like an innocent child–and her spirit was called back home to the family on November 1, the day of the angelitos. In Santa Fe de la Laguna, relatives, friends, and neighbors who arrive at the house to pay homage to a deceased person bring fresh fruit to place at the foot of the altar. This altar filled an entire room of my friends' home. Be sure to click on the photo to see the details of the altar. Fruits, breads, incense, salt, flowers, colors, and candles have particular symbolism and are necessary parts of the ofrenda.

Detail of the ofrenda casera (home altar) shown above. The altar included her favorite rebozo (shawl), placed just above her photograph. Several local people told Mexico Cooks! that the fruit piled on the altar tasted different from fruit from the same source that had not been used for the ofrenda. "Compramos por ejemplo plátanos y pusimos unos en el altar y otros en la cocina para comer. Ya para el día siguiente, los del altar pierden su sabor, no saben a nada," they said. 'We bought bananas, for example, and we put some on the ofrenda, and we put the rest in the kitchen to eat. The next day, the ones in the kitchen were perfectly normal, but the ones from the altar had no taste at all.'

Preparing a family member's ofrenda (altar) in the camposanto in a tiny village in Michoacán. The camposanto–literally, holy ground–is a cemetery contained within the walls of a churchyard. The candles used in this area of Michoacán are hand made in Ihuatzio and Santa Fe de la Laguna.

Come with me along the unlit road that skirts the Lago de Pátzcuaro: Lake Pátzcuaro. It's chilly, the puddles splash up as we drive, and the roadside weeds are damp with earlier rain, but for the moment the sky has cleared and filled with stars. Up the hill on the right and down the slope leading left toward the lake are tiny villages, dark but for the glow of tall candles lit one by one in the cemeteries. Tonight is November 1, the night silent souls wend their way home from Mictlán, the land beyond life.

At the grave: candlelight to illuminate the soul's way, cempazúchitl (deeply orange marigolds) for their distinctive fragrance required to open the path back home, smoldering copal (frankincense) to cleanse the earth and air of any remnants of evil, covered baskets of the deceased's favorite foods. And a low painted chair, where the living can rest through the night.

Watching through the night. This tumba (grave) refused to be photographed head-on. From an oblique angle, the tumba allowed its likeness to be made.

"Oh grave, where is thy victory? Oh death, where is thy sting?"

Noche de Muertos is not a costume party, although you may see it portrayed as such in the press. It is not a drunken brawl, although certain towns appear to welcome that sort of blast-of-banda-music reventón (big blow-out). It is not a tourist event, though strangers are certainly welcomed to these cemeteries. Noche de Muertos is a celebration of the spirit's life over the body's death, a festival of remembrance, a solemn passover. Years ago, in an interview published in the New York Times, Mexico Cooks! said, "Noche de Muertos is about mutual nostalgia. The living remember the dead, and the dead remember the taste of home."

One by one, grave by grave, golden cempazúchitles give shape to rock-bound tombs and long candles give light to what was a dark and lonely place, transforming the cemetery into a glowing garden. How could a soul resist this setting in its honor?

"Our hearts remember…" we promise the dead. Church bells toll slowly throughout the night, calling souls home with their distinctive clamor (death knell). Come…come home. Come…come home.

Waiting. Memories. Prayers. No te olvido, mi viejo amado. (I haven't forgotten you, my beloved old man.)

Next year, come with me.

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2 de November de 2019
Day and Night of the Dead, Mexico :: More Cultural Aspects

Night of the Dead (Noche de Muertos) grave decoration for a young man who died in a bicycle accident. The bicycle is life-size. Seen in the Panteón Municipal (town cemetery), Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán.

Several weeks ago Paco (a friend from Michoacán) and I were talking about differences in cultural attitudes among citizens of Canada, the United States, and Mexico. We ended by discussing the Noche de Muertos (Night of the Dead) customs here in Mexico.

Paco told me that before the Spanish conquerors, Mesoamerican natives considered death to just be a simple step toward a new life. Life was a circle: time before birth, time here on earth, time after death constituted a continuum with no end, like a golden ring on a finger. Communication between the spirit life of the living and the dead was an ordinary experience.

With the arrival of the Spanish and their Christian beliefs, the indigenous people were taught new ideas. Thoughts of death produced terror: in the final judgment, the just would receive their reward, and sinners would receive their punishment. The difficulty lay in not being counted among the sinners.

The original pre-Hispanic remembrance celebration of the dead took place during the Aztec calendar month dedicated to Mictecacihuatl, the goddess of the dead. That month of the Aztec calendar corresponds to present-day July and the beginning of August. Post-conquest Spanish priests moved the celebration to coincide with the eve of All Souls Day, which falls on November 2. It was a useless attempt to change what the Spaniards regarded as a profane New World festivity of mumbo-jumbo into a Christian solemn occasion. The modern day result is a festival characterized by a mix of pre-hispanic and Catholic rituals—a purely Mexican event.

In the late 1800's, José Guadalupe Posada popularized the notion of death partying through life.

Today in Mexico, death is played with, made fun of, and partied with. We throw our arms around it in a wickedly sardonic embrace and escape its return embrace with a side-step, a wink, and a joke.

Noche de Muertos (Night of the Dead) is celebrated during the chilly night of November 1, ending in the misty dawn hours of November 2. For Mexicans, the celebration represents something more than maudlin veneration of their dead relatives. The celebrations of Memorial Day in the United States or Remembrance Day in Canada are all too frequently devoted to a fleeting moment's thought of those who have gone before, with the rest of the day passed in picnicking and the anticipation of the soon-to-arrive summer holidays. In many parts of Mexico, the living spend the entire night in communion with the faithful departed, telling stories, swapping jokes, wiping away a tear or two.

Sugar hatchling chicks and funny spotted cows, ready for use on your ofrenda (altar) commemorating a deceased loved one.

The idea that death is found in the midst of life (and life in the midst of death) has given rise to different manifestations of extraordinary and original expressions of popular art in Mexico. Among those are the custom of making and decorating sugar skulls (often with the name of a friend or relative written across the forehead), pan de muertos (bread of the dead), drawings in which much fun is poked at death, and calaveras, verses in which living and dead personalities—usually celebrities in the arts, sciences and especially in politics—are skewered by their own most glaring traits and defects. We wait impatiently for the newspapers to give us the most hilarious of the annual poems.

Traditionally, ofrendas (personalized altars) are prepared in the home in honor of one or more deceased family members. The altar is prepared with the deceased person's favorite foods, photographs, and symbolic flowers. Traditions vary from community to community.

In Michoacán, the altar may be decorated with special breads and bananas. In Oaxaca, other foods and fruits are used. It's most common to decorate an altar with hot pink and deep purple papel picado (cut tissue paper) as well as with foods, flowers, and personal objects important to the deceased.

In many places, public ofrendas are set up in the town square, the local Casa de la Cultura, or in shops. Many public altars honor national heroes, personalities from the arts, and little-known friends or well-known public figures.

We use bottles of beer or tequila or another of the dead person's favorite drinks, a packet of cigarettes or a cigar, a prayer card featuring the deceased's name-saint and another of the apparition of the Virgin to whom the deceased was particularly devoted.

Foods on the altar can include a dish filled with mole poblano or other festive food that the deceased enjoyed in life, a pot of frijoles de la olla (freshly cooked beans), platters of tamales, pan dulce (sweet bread), and piles of newly harvested corn, pears, oranges, limes, and any other bounty from the family's fields or garden. The purpose of the offerings is not to flatter and honor to the dead, but rather to share the joy and power of the year's abundance with him or her.

Dolls made of cartón (cardboard) are usually sold at special markets specifically devoted to Day of the Dead items. The cempasúchil (gold flowers) and the flower known by several names: cordón del obispo or pata de león or even terciopelo (bishop's belt, lion's paw, or velveteen, the magenta flowers) adorn most graves and ofrendas (altars honoring the deceased).

In Michoacán, wild orchids are in season and blooming; these too are often used to decorate graves. Photo courtesy El Mural.

Approximately 75% of the literally millions of Mexican cempasúchil flowers used for Day of the Dead are grown in the state of Puebla.

The fresh flower most commonly used everywhere in Mexico to decorate both home altars and at the cemetery is the cempasúchil, a type of marigold. According to my friend Francisco, the cempasúchil represents reverence for the dead. Wild mountain orchids, in abundant bloom at this time of year and cut especially for the Noche de Muertos, signify reverence toward God. Dahlias, the floral symbol of Mexico, are also used profusely on both home altars and in cemeteries. In addition, huge standing coronas (wreaths) of colorful ribbons and artificial flowers adorned with lithographs of saints, various manifestations of the Virgin Mary, or Jesus are used more and more frequently in Mexican cemeteries.

Because the social atmosphere of this celebration is so warm and so colorful—and due to the abundance of food, drink, and good company—the commemoration of Noche de Muertos is much loved by the majority of those who observe it. In spite of the openly fatalistic attitude exhibited by all participants, the celebration is filled with life and is a social ritual of the highest importance. Recognition of the cycle of life and death reminds everyone of his or her mortality.

Catrines, in this case clay figures of well-dressed skeletons, represent the vanity of life and the inescapable reality of death.

On the day of November 1 (and frequently for several days before) families all over Mexico go to the cemetery to clean and decorate the graves of their loved ones. With machetes, brooms, shears, hoes, buckets, metal scrapers and paint, the living set to work to do what needs to be done to leave the grave site spotless.

Is the iron fence around the plot rusty? Scrape it and paint it till it looks brand new. Are there overgrown weeds or bushes? Chop them out, cut them back. Have dead leaves and grass collected at the headstone? Now is the time to sweep them all out. There is usually much lamenting that the grave site has been allowed to deteriorate so much throughout the year—this year we won't let that happen again, will we?

Sugar skulls are a Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) tradition in Mexico. Buy one and have the name of your friend written on the forehead with stiff sugary icing. Your friend will be delighted with the gift.

In many places, November 1 is celebrated as the Day of los Inocentes or Angelitos (the Innocents, or Little Angels)—the little children who have died. In Michoacán on the Day of the Little Angels, the baptismal godparents are responsible for bringing a wooden frame for the flowers, for bringing the cempasúchil and the wild orchids. The godparents bring sugar angels or animals similar to the sugar skulls. They may also bring new clothing for the dead child, and a new toy or two. At the parents' home, preparation of food and drink is underway so that family and friends may be served. Cohetes (booming sky rockets) announce that the procession, singing and praying, is proceeding to the cemetery.

In the late evening of November 1, girls and women arrive at the graves of adults with baskets and bundles and huge clay casseroles filled with the favorite foods of the deceased. A bottle or two of brandy or tequila shows up under someone's arm. Someone else brings a radio and wires it up to play.

Watch a bit of the tradition: Day of the Dead in Mexico

A tiny sugar skeleton band, made in Michoacán for the Noche de Muertos.

In another part of the cemetery, a band appears to help make the moments spent in the cemetery more joyful and to play the dead relatives' favorite songs. Sometimes families and friends adjourn to a nearby home to continue the party. There's even a celebrated dicho (saying) that addresses the need for this fiesta: "El muerto al cajón y el vivo al fiestón." (The dead to the coffin and the living to the big blowout.")

The shimmering lake is made of flower petals!

Although the traditional observance of Noche de Muertos calls for a banquet either at the cemetery or at home during the pre-dawn hours of November 2, families in the large urban areas of Mexico City, Monterrey, Guadalajara, and others, families may simply observe the Day of the Dead rather than spend the night in a cemetery.

Their observance is frequently limited to a special family dinner which includes pan de muertos (bread of the dead). In some areas of the country, it's considered good luck to be the person who bites down on the toy plastic skeleton hidden by the bakery in each round loaf.

A small nicho (shadow box) by artisan Miguel Paredes, representing a Day of the Dead taco stand. An excellent place to buy this kind of nicho is Bazar Sábado in the San Ángel neighborhood of Mexico City. The outdoor and indoor market there is open every Saturday, and these little boxes are available year 'round.

Friends and members of the family give one another little gifts which can include tiny clay skeletons dressed in clothing or set in scenes which represent the occupations or personality characteristics of the receiver. The gift that's most appreciated is a calavera (sugar skull), decorated with sugar flowers, sparkling sequins, and the name of the recipient written in frosting across the cranium.

The pre-Hispanic concept of death as an energy link, as a germ of life, may very well explain how the skull came to be a symbol of death. That symbol has been recreated and assimilated in all aspects of Mexican life. The word calavera can also refer to a person whose existence is dedicated to pleasure—someone who does not take life seriously. The mocking poems of this season, the caricatures drawn with piercingly funny accuracy, the sugar skulls joyfully eaten by the person whose name they carry: all of these are an echo of pre-Hispanic thought, inherited by present-day Mexico.

From Guanajato: skeletal figures made of cartón (cardboard).

This tradition which recognizes that death is a part of the circle of life brings ease and rest to the living. Hearts heal, souls reaffirm their connections. Though beyond our view, the dead are never beyond our memories. Every November 1, the dead come home, if only for the night.

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26 de October de 2019
Día y Noche de los Muertos en México: Day and Night of the Dead in Mexico :: A Preview of Customs

Highly decorated, very large cartonería (cardboard) skull for Noche de Muertos. One of these might be placed on a home ofrenda (altar) dedicated to the person of one's choice.

Panteón Municipal (Municipal Cemetery), Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán. In recent years, grave decoration has included traditional flowers, candles, and modern plastic wreaths, all of which you see in this photo. The white flowers in cans are nube (babies' breath) and clavel (carnations); the gold flowers are cempasúchil, and the wine-colored flowers are pata de león (cockscomb), all traditional. The wreaths are plastic flowers.

Mexico Cooks! will be touring Morelia and surrounding areas again during this special time of year. We'll be attending one or another special Noche de Muertos event every day for an entire week. Traditional ofrendas (altars dedicated to the dead), spectacular crafts exhibits, concerts, and annual concursos (contests) will fill our days and nights. Known in most parts of Mexico as Día de los Muertos (the Day of the Dead), here in Michoacán we call it Noche de los Muertos (Night of the Dead). By either name, the festival as it's celebrated in Mexico is unique in the world.

These four-inch-long skeletal figures, laid out on their petates (woven reed mats), are hooked up to intravenous bottles of either beer or tequila! They are given as gifts or added to a loved one's home ofrenda.

Tiny sugar footwear, in styles from baby booties to high-heeled pumps, are ready to be given as gifts to special friends or for placement on an ofrenda.

Mexico celebrates death as it celebrates life, with extreme enjoyment in the simplest things. Life and death are both honored and natural states.

The home ofrenda (altar) may memorialize a cherished relative, a political figure (either reviled or beloved), a pet, or a figure from the entertainment world. Traditional decorations include cempasúchil (marigold) and cordón del obispo (cockscomb) flowers, which are used in profusion in churches, cemeteries, and homes. Here in central Michoacán, wild orchids, blooming at this time of year, are also used to decorate graves, primarily in rural areas.

Sugar skulls are often inscribed in icing with a living friend's name and given to that person as a small token of admiration.

In October 2010, Chepo, my long-time cat companion, died. For Noche de Muertos, I created this ofrenda in his honor. It includes his favorite cat food (bottom left corner), his favorite toy (that little white pipe cleaner spring at the bottom right corner), candles, a sugar mouse, and a sugar fish, several photos of him, a big sugar cat between the photos, a large butterfly in remembrance of the many enormous dark-brown moths that he caught and delivered to me, and his ashes, in the wooden box at center. Click on the photo to enlarge it for a better view.

Relatives take favorite foods and beverages to the grave of a loved one gone before. It's said that the dead partake of the spirit of the food, while the living enjoy the physical treats at the cemetery. Mexican friends tell me, "In the morning, after our night-long vigil at the cemetery, we do eat the food that has been on the grave all night, waiting for our relatives to return from the más allá (the great beyond). The funny thing is that the food has no taste at all; our deceased relatives have eaten all the flavor–the flavor of home."

Pan de muertos (bread of the dead) is typically decorated with bone-shaped bread and sprinkled with sugar. The bread itself is flavored with orange and anise. In Michoacán, pan de muertos in the shape of human beings is often hung on ofrendas both in a private home or in a cemetery.

This miniature ofrenda (altar) is filled with tiny representations of treats that the deceased loved in life. Click on any photo for a larger view.

Several years ago, an article in the New York Times quoted Mexico Cooks! about the Noche de los Muertos: "There's a mutual nostalgia. The living remember the dead, and the dead remember the taste of home." That nostalgia imbues the cities and villages of Michoacán at this time of year just as surely as do woodsmoke and the scent of toasting tortillas.

Looking for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours. And be sure to book your Mexico Cooks! 2020 Dia/Noche de los Muertos tour as soon as possible! We'll reserve space for you and your group to make sure you don't miss anything!

19 de October de 2019
Charrería, The Gentleman’s Sport in Mexico

A few Septembers ago, a friend and I spent a marvelous weekend of charrería (the sport of the horsemen) in Guadalajara. The Quinto Campeonato Nacional del Charro (Fifth National Championship Charro Competition) was held there in conjunction with the Festival Internacional de Mariachi. We drove to Guadalajara on a Saturday in a monumental rainstorm, arriving with high expectations for our stay, without an umbrella and a lot of trepidation about the amount of water that was pouring from the sky. We waited and watched from our hotel's balcony as the rain cascaded and then, little by little, tapered off to occasional drops.

Maru and I hopped in a cab for the ride to the Unión Ganadera Regional (the charro arena). Our cabbie regaled us all along the way with tales about charreadas and the dangers of the maneuvers the charros undertake. Our excitement and anticipation of the day was building and we were among the first to arrive for that day's 11:30 am contests. Three teams of charros would compete each day for three days; on the fourth day, each prior day's winning team would compete for the national championship.

We watched as workers decorated the perimeter of the stands with garlands of estropajos (fiber scrub pads), hojas de maíz (dried corn husks) and listones de tricolor (heavy ribbons of green, white, and red: Mexico's national colors). When the escaramuza team finished its rehearsal, the charros on horseback began to come into the arena to pick their way through the mud in preparation for the events.The rain had stopped, but the charro arena was a mess of thick mud and deep puddles. The escaramuza (women's sidesaddle precision riding team) was practicing when we arrived, the horses spraying mud as the girls spurred them to a dead run, weaving across one another's paths.

Charrería, the national sport of Mexico and a forerunner of the North American rodeo, originated among the Spanish conquistadors in the sixteenth century. Charros, the Mexican horsemen, adapted the equestrian contests of the Spaniards to produce a uniquely Mexican sport. By the nineteenth century, these contests were essential elements of celebrations on large haciendas, especially those festivities celebrating the herraderos (brandings) and rodeos (round-ups). People came from miles around to take part in the celebrations and to watch the charros exhibit their skills and compete against each other in daring competitions of horsemanship.

When, as a result of the Mexican Revolution, the huge haciendas in Mexico were divided into large ranches, , charros feared the demise of this tradition. They called a meeting in Mexico City on July 4, 1921 to found the Asociación Nacional de Charros. In 1933, the Federación Nacional de Charros was created to govern the different charro associations that emerged across the country. By the late twentieth century, this organization was governing charro associations in both Mexico and the United States. In order to compete in a charreada, or rodeo, all associations must be licensed by the federation and competitors must be certified as charros

Many of us confuse the rodeo of the United States with the charreada of Mexico, assuming they are the same. One outstanding difference between the contemporary rodeo and the charreada is that rodeo is an individual sport, while charreada is a team competition.

The charreadas are performed in a lienzo, or arena, which has two principal areas: one is sixty meters long and twelve meters wide and the second is a circular area with a diameter of forty meters. Unlike the rodeo competitor, the charro does not compete for prize money but rather only for the honor of the sport.

The charreada is highly ritualized and the events follow a traditional sequence. The competition usually begins with a military march played by a group of mariachi. A procession follows, with representatives of the different charro associations on horseback, riding around the lienzo carrying flags and banners. They are followed by the president of the state charro association, the members of the competing teams and perhaps the escaramuza team.

The singer Vicente Fernández completing the cala de caballo.

Once the opening ceremony is completed, the first of nine separate competitions begins. Each separate event is called a suerte. The first is the cala de caballo. During this event, the equivalent of dressage in traditional equestrian competition, judges evaluate the rider's control of the horse. The charro rides at a dead gallop from the end of the rectangular chute of the lienzo to the middle of the arena, where he must rein in his horse within a marked area twenty meters wide by six meters long. He must also lead the horse in rapid right (and then left) 360 degree turns, assuring that one rear hoof of the horse remains firmly in place as the animal spins. The charros are also judged on their ability to control backward movements, the horse essentially moving 'in reverse'.

The second event is the piales en lienzo, during which three charros attempt to rope the hind legs of a horse, steer or bull. The third event is the coleadero, sometimes called colear or el coleo. There are at least eight different methods of accomplishing this feat, but the classic move requires the charro to gallop along side the bull as it bursts from its chute. He must then grab the bull by the tail, wrap the tail around his own right leg and speed his horse forward, causing the bull to lose balance, thereby flipping the bull on its back.

The fourth competition is the jineteo de toros, or bull-riding, during which the charro must ride a bull until it stops bucking. During la terna, which is approximately the equivalent of team roping in a North American rodeo, two riders must rope a calf as quickly as possible. One encircles the neck and the other snares the hind legs.

Water color painting of the jineteo de yeguas.

The jineteo de yeguas is bronco-riding. The seventh and eighth events are the piales and the manganas, where the charro, must rope the hind legs and the forelegs of a running mare and pull it off balance. One event is done from the back of the horse, the other standing in the ring.

The final event is considered the most difficult. The paso de la muerte or "death pass" (above) is an event in which the charro rides his tame horse bareback and at a full gallop, attempting to jump onto a wild horse and ride it until it stops bucking.

A charro may compete in only three events in the state or national competitions; only one individual from each association may compete in all events and he is known as the charro completo. Competitors are judged for style as well as execution.

The charro suit that belonged to Emiliano Zapata.

The adjective 'handsome' barely does justice to the charro. From his wide-brimmed heavy sombrero, fitted with a woven horsehair or tooled leather hatband, to his fine leather or ostrich-skin boots, he is every centímetro the gentleman cowboy.

The national organizations strictly supervise and enforce the dress code of the charros. There are several approved levels of clothing, from working outfits to a full dress suit which can double as a tuxedo for formal occasions. The most familiar charro outfit includes a starched white shirt, subtly colored floppy bowtie, tight-fitting jacket and slender belled pants adorned with rows of botondura, hundreds of silver or gold buttons linked with chains. These elegantly dressed charros are hardly the Wrangler-wearing, mud-covered cowpokes we associate with rodeo in the States or Canada. By 11 am, the crowd began to arrive in the arena. The dignitaries were dressed in costumes styled from the period of the Porfiriato (1876-1910). The women wore long, ribboned dresses with multi-colored skirts, fabulous rebozos (long, intricately patterned rectangular shawls with hand-knotted fringe) were draped around their shoulders and their hair was pulled severely into buns secured by large flowers. Little girls were dressed as beautifully as their mothers and grandmothers.

Charrería is predominantly a male sport. Women perform in only one event, the escaramuza (skirmish). An escaramuza team consists of eight women who perform precision patterns while riding sidesaddle, often to musical accompaniment. This event is traditionally held after the coleadero and before the jineteo.

The adjective 'handsome' barely does justice to the charro. From his wide-brimmed heavy sombrero, fitted with a woven horsehair or tooled leather hatband, to his fine leather or ostrich-skin boots, he is every centímetro the gentleman cowboy.

The men, so elegant in their finest trajes de charro (cowboy suits), looked as if they had stepped out of the 19th century. Bristling mustaches and huge hats were the order of the day. These were the honored guests; the rest of us spectators wore normal clothes, but all jeans were knife-creased, all hats impeccable and everyone was considerably more dressed up than one might expect at a typical rodeo.

The crowd erupted in applause as the announcer introduced each charro and each took his place. Special announcements were made as the famous old charros took their places of honor, and the crowd erupted in applause at every name. It is easy to see why the charreada is a revered sporting tradition in Mexico and to understand why so much reverence is given to the founding fathers.

The grand parade of charros began with blaring music, led by a young woman from the escaramuza team who rode sidesaddle in full Porfiriato-era finery: a deeply ruffled long skirt, ribbons in her hair and the ubiquitous wide-brimmed sombrero, tilted at a just-so angle. Cheers and clapping continued as she led the teams, each with its team banner, around the perimeter of the arena. Then the fun really started.

Charro weddings are spectacular!

All nine suertes were played out that Saturday by the three competing teams. My favorite was the coleadero, in which the bull is let out of the chute as a charro on horseback waits by the chute gate. As the bull comes storming out of the chute, the cowboy's task is to gallop his horse full-tilt alongside the bull, grab the bull's tail, wind it twice around his leg and pull the bull to the ground, by the tail, all within a distance of about 200 feet. The bulls fell hard but always jumped right up and went running to their pens again.

The piales y manganas were spectacular, as the charros handled la riata (the lariat) with enormous skill. We were amazed to see one man first lasso and free the two front feet of the mare. In the second pass around the arena he lassoed and freed the two rear feet of the mare. In his third and final pass around the arena, he simultaneously lassoed all four feet of the galloping mare! No other charro that day was able to match his accomplished roping ability.

Some of the most famous mariachis in the world, Los Camperos de Nati Cano, played during the entire charreada. We were entranced by the music, fascinated by the color and action of the spectacle and thrilled by the acts of bravery and skill that the charros performed. What a day!

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12 de October de 2019