three days of halloween ... who could ask for more?

At the moment we find ourselves in San Salvador, El Salvador. Our days since leaving Mexico City have been filled with long bus rides, beautiful vistas amidst chilly highland colonial cities, night time debauchery, rainstorms, and three full days of halloween costumes. Upon leaving Mexico City we decided to go to San Cristobol in Chiapas Mexico rather than Oaxaca. As some of you may be aware there has been ongoing protests and escalating violence that has lead to a number of deaths and the entry of the Federal Police into the center of Oaxaca City. Therefore, we decided it would be safer to head to Chiapas to take in the Day of the Dead celebration.

What we found in San Cristobal was lovely cobbled streets jam packed with travelers, a thriving mayan community, and children eager to trick or treat. Kids get to trick or treat for 3 nights- on Halloween, All Saint´s day and Day of the Dead. Some even tried to stretch it to four nights. I found myself a bit sad that for the first time in my life I would not be dressed in a costume to offically celebrate Halloween. Instead we were consigned to make the best of it by buying candy and sitting at a park in the Centro to hand out to the passing trick or treaters. Upon recieving candy the kids would yell ¨"Viva La Tia!!!" which means long live the auntie or... even better, long live those who spoil you best.

Halloween lead into Day of the Dead. We struggled to get a sense of the day by simply wandering the streets along side all the other tourists and so we took a tour to the indigenious community of Chamula. At first we worried we had signed on to a guided shopping trip but things quickly inmproved as our guide once prodded with questions was extremely knowledgeable and very giving. We visited several churches and a cementary where hundreds of people were gather around graves, temporary food booths set-up, and an endless expanse of marigolds lay before us. Indeed a beautiful day to see the way in which others honer their ancestors. In hopes of further understanding this unique day we went to mass. I will say that again, we went to Mass in a Catholic Church.... with no new revelations to behold but just as I remember. Wondering if there was something more we were missing in this day we found ourselves in a Dance Club where the waiters all wore the image of skeletal death, painted faces, black clothes, flaming drinks and .... coreographed dances to boot.
Having taken all that we could for the day we lumbered off to our hostel for a few hours rest before catching the morning bus to Guatemala City. 13 hours of bus travel and we arrived travel weary in a damp and dirty city. Note to self- tequilla in never a good idea before a long bus ride on winding roads climbing off into the horizon. that´s all for now.