Mexico’s Day of the Dead : Soul Searching in Oaxaca : The True Spirit of the Festival Can Be Discovered in a Small Village Cemetery --If One Doesn’t Try Too Hard to Find It

“Poor Mexico,” Porfirio Diaz, the country’s former president, once lamented. “So far from God and so close to the United States.”

We beg to differ.

On Nov. 2, in Diaz’s own state of Oaxaca, Mexico seems just the opposite--so close to God and so far from the United States.

On that day Mexicans welcome back the spirits of their deceased relatives by celebrating El Dia de los Muertos --the Day of the Dead.

In rituals that combine the raucousness of an Irish wake and the solemnity of a Jewish Yom Kippur service, families gather at gravesides to celebrate life while remembering their dead.

The ceremonies may sound ghoulish. Some families munch sweets while seated on the graves of their ancestors. Others pay mariachi bands to play tunes for their dead loved ones. Stereos blast. Mescal flows. Cemeteries are transformed from shrines of solitude into bustling block parties.

Yet the experience is stirring, not jarring.

“Fiestas,” said Mexican poet Octavio Paz, “are our only luxury. They replace . . . the theater and vacations, Anglo-Saxon weekends and cocktail parties.”

During the Day of the Dead, Mexicans weave death into the fabric of their lives, thereby making the inevitable seem far less threatening.

“There is nothing,” Paz added, “so joyous as a Mexican fiesta, but there is also nothing so sorrowful.” It was this dichotomy that fascinated us.

Our journey to Oaxaca was a long time coming. The seeds were planted years ago while watching skeletons frolic behind the credits of John Huston’s film version of “Under the Volcano.”

In Los Angeles, with its rich Mexican influences, it is possible to participate in local Day of the Dead festivities and to cruise art galleries laden with whimsical treasures from Oaxaca, a center of Mexico’s folk art culture.

But the more we learned about the Day of the Dead, the further from its heart we felt.

When we finally made our plans to go, visions of sugar skulls danced in our heads. The skulls, ornately decorated confections created for the festival, are only one example of the playful ghouls that embody the duality of the holiday. There are also small plaster skeletons dressed as doctors, housewives, photographers or basketball players--skeletons, in fact, from all walks of life--available at Oaxacan markets and art galleries. There is even pan de muerto, bread baked in skeleton shapes or with disembodied little heads peeking from inside.

By the time we booked our reservations last August, the major hotels on Oaxaca’s main square--at least the ones with telephones--were full. We were fortunate to find a room on the outskirts of town, a 20-minute walk from the zocalo or town square.

We arrived in Oaxaca three days before the holiday, hoping to watch the city prepare. As our cab inched its way through the surging crowd near the zocalo , we felt we were already late for a party:

Music blasted from speakers set up outside the 450-year-old Catedral de Oaxaca. Youngsters, many dressed in native Mixtec Indian huipils, wove their way through the crowd with baskets of gardenias and hand-carved wooden bookmarks. Sidewalk cafes were crowded with diners and drinkers.

The next morning, we set out to gather details about the festival. But the more we asked, the less we knew.

Seasoned travelers said it was best to get out of the big city to witness the ceremonies that capture the spirit of the holiday. They regaled us with stories but were vague on dates and places, and they added that without an invitation, we might feel unwelcome at a rural graveyard.

Several Oaxacans, meanwhile, talked of a grand religious procession in town at the richly decorated Iglesia de Santo Domingo. But most people we encountered were so eager to please that they nodded and smiled in response to whatever we asked

The tourist board was another matter. There, representatives were as forthcoming as Albanian border guards. No, they said, there are no special celebrations for the Day of the Dead here. Go shopping, they suggested. Rent a car. See a play--there’s one about Dia de los Muertos just down the street.

The one thing we felt certain of was that something was happening and we didn’t know where it was.

As the days passed, we explored nearby villages. Several are known for specific crafts--rugs from Teotitlan del Valle, black pottery from San Bartolo Coyotepec and carved animals from Arasola.

We learned that many native treasures are still affordable, particularly when compared to the dramatically rising prices for Mexican folk art in Los Angeles. The idea of meeting the artists in person made our trips into the countryside even more appealing.

In every village we asked about the Day of the Dead. Gradually we learned that each town has its own special way of celebrating the holiday, with some graveside ceremonies actually held on the evenings of October 31 or November 1.

In Teotitlan, for example, we were told by a rug merchant that there was a late-night procession on the night of Nov. 1. We eagerly returned, prepared to stay until morning in order to witness the ceremony. Unfortunately, when we arrived on the merchant’s doorstep, we discovered that we had misunderstood. The only procession he knew about was the one he was making to his aunt’s house for dinner.

Disappointed, but willing to settle for second best, we returned to Oaxaca to check out the procession at the ornately decorated church.

When we arrived, the pews were filled with townspeople deep in prayer. Others held huge religious banners or prepared to march through the city’s streets carrying life-size statues of Jesus, Mary and other religious figures. Outside the church, a brass band played doleful tunes.

The sight was breathtaking--until we realized that we were standing amid a sea of camera-toting tourists, jockeying for position. When the procession began, so did a frenzy of flashes.

One man insisted on moving in for tight video close-ups, shining his spotlight in the eyes of the worshipers. Then there was Bill from Milwaukee, armed with a Nikon and assisted by his wife (“Bill, Bill,” she yelled repeatedly, “the light is better over here, honey”).

What had we missed while being jostled by the hordes? We found out when we ran into a trio of fellow Angelenos the next morning. They said they had gone to the panteon , or cemetery, in the tiny village of Xoxocotlan, on what had been billed by a travel agency as an intimate excursion.

Our friends told of a touching scene, in which townspeople sat at the graves of their loved ones, reminiscing by candlelight.

But, once they arrived, the ceremony was hardly intimate. The “private excursion” turned out to be a packed tour bus. Adding insult to injury, a BBC radio crew arrived and scrambled among the graves to capture it all on tape.

That night, with the holiday at hand and our options next to none, we hired a taxi to Xoxocotlan, hoping that the villagers’ might hold a second, undisturbed ceremony.

The cabdriver assured us our trip would prove illuminating, but when we arrived at the panteon, it was pitch dark. By the taxi’s headlights, we were able to make out the melted wax of memorial candles and the withering petals of grave top marigolds.

We were frustrated, yes, but fearing we had become part of a tourist pack made us think again about whether this festival was something meant to be “captured.” And we did not want the search to ruin our trip. We agreed to enjoy our remaining time by visiting nearby villages on their weekly market days.

With that decision, we learned an important lesson: As soon as we stopped looking, we found what we had been looking for.

It happened the next morning, Nov. 2, on our way to the Thursday market in Zaachila, a small town several miles south of Oaxaca.

We stopped again at the cemetery in Xoxocotlan to get a better look at the decorated graves that we could barely make out the night before. What we found instead was a group of villagers tending the graves and preparing for a noon Mass.

Taped music blasted through a loudspeaker, and every few minutes one of the celebrants took to the microphone to urge fellow townspeople to join in the service.

A simple wooden table, placed over a grave, served as a makeshift altar, and a portrait of Jesus and Mary hung from a nearby tree. As we waited for the service to begin, we chatted with several people about the bittersweet quality of the holiday.

“It is a happy time,” said one, “but we are sad inside.”

The town’s priest, Father Ernesto Cassis, arrived wearing street clothes and work boots. He carried his surplice in a travel bag and slipped it on as the group of 60 or so people gathered around the altar.

There was one last detail. The dead had to be awakened. And so the celebrants set off several bursts of fireworks.

During the service, punctuated by music from a five-piece string band, Cassis read aloud the names of the deceased who were being welcomed back that day. He also led a prayer “for those suffering from violence, for those working for the common good.”

As the Mass ended, we all embraced. The padre thanked us warmly for being a part of the ceremony and asked us to join him and some villagers for a beer at a nearby tienda.

Feeling that we had seen--and shared in--something very special, we continued on to Zaachila.

Music greeted us as we stepped off the bus. A villager pointed around the corner and said “panteon.”

This cemetery, too, was alive with activity. Vendors at the gate hawked candles, flowers and sweets. Families sat on the graves, munching pastry as their children played nearby. Mariachis strolled through, serenading the visitors and their departed relatives. In the midst of it all, an old man silently smoothed the dirt of his wife’s grave.

Each had come to celebrate, in his own way, life and death on the Day of the Dead.