El Dia de los Muertos
Posted on Nov 04, 2008 under life updates |I am impressed at the effort put into the Day of the Dead here. Not that I was expecting less, I just honestly hadn’t put much thought into how it would manifest itself. Avenida de la Reforma is lined with 10-foot alebrijes and altars running over with offerings of tamales, oranges, carnations, and special bread called pan de muertos. My roommate made a nice little altar in our living room, decorating the walls with those colorful paper cut-outs you sometimes see in Mexican restaurants. A typical food to offer up is baseball-sized skulls made from sugar or chocolate adorned with shiny jewel eyes and glitter. The church down the street had a little display in the side yard with a skeleton figure, flowers wreaths, and a RIP sign for a deceased parishioner.
Me and the girls went to a Halloween party on Saturday attended by mostly Americans. Great costumes. My friend Joy was the best chola I’ve ever seen, but the concept was kind of lost on the Mexicans. Jacquelynne was a Harajuku girl, a sort of sexy clown from Japan, and Melissa wore a hot pink wig and glittery cowboy hat. My costume was also lost on most people, but I’ll try to explain.
“Haley” just does not make sense to people who don’t speak English. It’s not a normal combination of sounds, and it certainly is not pronounced how it looks (some of you might remember my alias Jeili, the phonetic spelling of my name in Spanish). The closest approximation to my name is Heidi, the Swiss fairytale character, which in Spanish rhymes with Haley. Oh, and trying to explain that I don’t have a second last name, which would be my mother’s maiden name, is like saying I was born of a martian petrie dish. I get bewildered looks or confused stammering. To help things along, my boyfriend gave me the pseudonym Heidi Susana Rodriguez Rivera, which is the closest we could get to Haley Suzanne Rogers Rabyor. It has actually come in handy quite a few times, when it doesn’t matter if the person on the other line knows your real name or not. Since people think my name is Heidi anyway, I decided to take on that role for Halloween. I think the idea was better than the lax execution, but you be the judge.
Told you the chola was good.
November 8th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
As usual, you have brought the ’sunshine’ of laughter into my world today. In many ways (the story expressed here being the second, no THIRD, time today this idea has come from distant but connected-to-me places), the notion to rename myself has presented itself. However, if I wasn’t in the process of being about to fork over thousands upon thousands of potatoes to buy what could become my final sacred spaceplay palace, I would! I think Alicia Rivera has the nicest ring to it. If you are interested in why Alicia, check out “Yes, I can” at moonbeammcqueen.wordpress.com
love you sunshine!