After wrapping everything up with work late on Friday night, we headed to Huejutla, hidalgo for Día de los Muertos. The area is known as the Huasteca and includes parts of the states of Veracruz, Hidalgo, San Luis Potosí, and a little of Puebla. There is a very distinct culture and still many indigenous people that live in the area, which is partly why Xantolo (the name given to the festival for día de los muertos in the Huasteca) is so different from other parts of Mexico. The altars are all adorned with an arch made of marigolds and instead of the traditional looking bread (pan de muertos), the bread is made in the form of animals and people. There are also traditional dances, one where the men dress up as women and another called “Comanche” where the dancers wear wooden masks and represent the link between the living and the dead.
Altar
Bread in the form of dolls, flowers, and animals
More bread, hanging from the arch over the altar
Papel picado
Row of altars
From Huejutla, we crossed into the state of Veracruz and went to the town of Tempoal. Planning on only spending the morning there, we arrived to find that the dances and festivities were later in the day. However, the market was already busy and there were a series of altar displays. The above photos were from Tempoal. Planning on returning to Tempoal in the afternoon for the dances (and they were shooting a TV special), we headed to Tantoyuca, another small Veracruzana town with one of the best markets I have seen. The zocalo of Tantoyuca was also filled with altars and people in wooden masks.
On the bus back to Tempoal you could see preparations for the night´s events on the dirt roads to the smaller towns. People had their bundles of marigolds and the men were already in their dresses and masks for the dances.
After waiting through the TV introduction for the night´s actual events (there is a huge push to get more national recognition for Xantolo and it is virtually unknown to international tourists, we were the only gringos in the area), some of the most amazing dances I have seen in Mexico began. All the dances were set to a trio playing Huapongo music (you can hear it in the video clip). There were a mix of men, women, and children, all dancing in hand-craved wooden masks with amazing outfits. Each colonia (neightborhood) in Tempoal had a dance group representing them and each seemed to get better and better as the night went on. The governor even stopped by for a while which was cause to set off the end of the preformance fireworks in the middle of the event.
After waiting through the TV introduction for the night´s actual events (there is a huge push to get more national recognition for Xantolo and it is virtually unknown to international tourists, we were the only gringos in the area), some of the most amazing dances I have seen in Mexico began. All the dances were set to a trio playing Huapongo music (you can hear it in the video clip). There were a mix of men, women, and children, all dancing in hand-craved wooden masks with amazing outfits. Each colonia (neightborhood) in Tempoal had a dance group representing them and each seemed to get better and better as the night went on. The governor even stopped by for a while which was cause to set off the end of the preformance fireworks in the middle of the event.
