A Retired Teacher in Mexico City: "Day of the Dead" Street

Although the Day of the Dead season ended last weekend, I still have more pictures to show you. Last Sunday, Alejandro and I went to Tlahuac, a district in the far southern part of Mexico City. Each year, one of the streets in Tlahuac goes all out in decorating for the Day of the Dead season. Alejandro and I visited the street last year and decided to return this year.

The tradition of decorating the street began with one of its families, the Jaen family, who are dedicated to the art of making figures of "cartonería", a type of rock-hard papier mache. Since 2011 the family has been producing items of "cartonería" to decorate the street for the Day of the Dead. They inspired the other residents to decorate also, and now the entire five blocks are a colorful and festive display of "ofrendas", "catrinas", skulls, marigolds and cut paper banners waving in the breeze. Although the street has not been "discovered" by many foreign tourists, people from all over Mexico City come to see the decorations. Some residents have set up stalls selling food, drink and handicrafts to the visitors.

This year, the centerpiece of the festival is a enormous mask of the Aztec rain god Tlaloc created by the Jaen family.

They chose Tlaloc because in the past year, Mexico has suffered from extreme drought and disastrous floods. The display is dedicated to the people of the state of Guerrero, a state which was ravaged by Hurricane Otis last year and Hurricane John this year.

More figures created by the Jaen family...