Blogging Social Difference in LA: Week 5

Dia de los Muertos at Hollywood Forever Cemetery

(This week's adventure fulfills requirements:
1. A bus trip
3. A walking trip
5. A visit to a location I have never visited before)

On October 27 I went to the Dia de los Muertos celebration at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.  The cemetery is on Santa Monica Boulevard a few blocks down from the Sunset Strip.  I took the Metro 2 bus from Westwood along Sunset, and then walked down to the cemetery entrance on Santa Monica.  I got on the bus around 5:00 pm.  The people on the bus varied in age and ethnicity.  There were students and student groups, families, adults, and elderly individuals on the bus together.  Although I didn’t know any of the people on the bus or very much about them besides what they look like and how they acted during our short journey together, the bus seemed to be a place where, going across Robert E. Park’s assumption, different worlds of the city do interpenetrate one another.  Before the quarter is over, I would like to do another blog post specifically about a bus line that runs through various neighborhoods. 

A corner in Beverly Hills seen from the Metro 2 

As the bus drove through Beverly Hills I noticed walls and in particular large hedges that separated the houses from Sunset Blvd.  At first this made me think of Frederich Engels’ observation about the boulevards in industrial Manchester.  In Engels’ Manchester, boulevards lined with walls or small shops hid the squalor and poverty form the view of the wealthy, middle-class commuters who used the boulevards to get from their outer ring suburban homes to work in the central business district.  This doesn't exactly make sense in Beverly Hills though.  Although the boulevard itself may not be the most upscale place, the homes and streets of Beverly Hills are nothing to keep hidden form the elite eye.  I realized though that the opposite of what Engels observed in Manchester is occurring in Beverly Hills.  Instead of guarding the squalor behind the street from the wealthy commuters, in Beverly Hills the walls guard any unsightly activity or people using Sunset Boulevard from the homes and residents of Beverly Hills. 

By the time I got off the bus at Sunset and Gordon, it was dark outside.  I was by myself and hadn’t thought about the fact that I might have to walk in an area that I didn’t feel safe in at night.  The blocks down to the cemetery were a little scary.  The streets were lined with apartments and small houses with small yards and driveways surrounded by chain-link fences or gated in.  Some houses had bars on the windows and there were empty parking garages in between the houses.  There were some Halloween parties going on but the street was mostly empty besides a few young men standing in groups on the sidewalk.  As I got closer to Santa Monica Blvd though, there were more people who were in groups and in costume, clearly walking to the cemetery.  Although the area in front of the cemetery was crowded with strangers and I still felt a little uncomfortable because I was alone, I felt much safer especially because there were many families and small children around. 

Gordon Street, in between Sunset Blvd and Santa Monica Blvd

Marigolds--the flower of the dead in many cultures, an Aztec steele, and a (Catholic) cross
welcome visitors to the cemetery. 
Dress at the festival ranged from jeans and sweatshirts to embroidered dresses with traditional skull face paiting to Aztec dancer costumes complete with feathered headdresses and modernized with rhinestones and glitter. 

I was a little surprised at how many little kids I saw outside the cemetery.  Many were dressed up with their families but it was getting late and there were a lot of people.  Because there were so many children though, I felt safe and welcome at the festival.

After meeting up with a friend who goes to high school in San Pedro and waiting in a long line to get tickets, I finally entered the cemetery.  Right inside the gates two different groups of dancers performing.  One group was of traditional Mexican folklorico dancers and the other dancers were dressed in Aztec costumes.  Lining the walkways were altars decorated with traditional day of the dead decorations: paper flags, papier-mâché skulls and figures, photos of the deceased and their favorite things in life, and candles and electric lights everywhere.  My favorite altar had a piece of canvas and markers to write the names of our own loved ones who are no longer with us.  This altar made me feel truly welcomed and included at the festival.   

Traditional and vibrant decorations adorning many graves include paper flags and flowers, electric lights, photos of the celebrated loved ones, and painted paper mache skulls and figurines of important cultural individuals and events.
This altar ended up winning third place in the annual altar contest.

The tradition of Day of the Dead is one of the most cultural events out there.  With roots in Aztec culture and celebrated in conjunction with the Catholic holy days All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day, Day of the Dead is celebrated around the world.  In this way it is a truly hybrid tradition even though it is decisively Mexican in origin.  At the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, individuals, friends, and families of all ethnicities and ages gathered to remember their deceased loved ones, admire the crafts and altars, and take part in the music, food, and atmosphere of the festival.  I think the celebration of Dia de Los Muertos at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery goes against Robert E Park’s observation that “the city is a mosaic of little world which touch but do not interpenetrate.”  People of different backgrounds and different experiences come together to celebrate and remember and honor the dead here.  Maybe it is because respect for the dead, missing those we love who have died, and even death itself are something that we all as humans have in common, regardless of our differing ethnicities, races, class, gender, or sexuality. 

Walking through the cemetery to see the altars and graves, looking at the crafts for sale, buying pupusas and aguas frescas, and listening a band at a stage was one of the best experiences I have had so far in Los Angeles.  Everywhere in the cemetery was extremely crowded, but I never felt unsafe or overwhelmed.  My friends and I kept remarking on how it felt kind of like being at Disneyland.  I think that the commonality, whether it was the commonality of celebrating and remembering death or of enjoying life, of all of the people there made the cemetery a place of common ground where all were welcome and wanted. 

We watched the band Ozomatli performed on the main stage while we ate pupusas purchased from one of they many vendors:

The band and their music are a true representation of cultural blending and hybridization of cultures to create a unique and specific new type of music and significance.  Find out more about the band and their music at the Ozomatli's official webpage: http://www.ozomatli.com/

Everyone at the cemetery was glad to have others there to celebrate with them and share the memories and love for our departed loved ones.  I felt tied to the other people at the cemetery in culture and value.  I think that this feeling might be what the sociologists following the theories of structuralism were grasping at when the speculated that shared cultural, or moral, values and beliefs are what makes a differentiated, specialized society of individuals hold together.  Whether structuralist thinkers like Durkheim and Talcott Parsons were entirely correct in stating that we need “something” i.e., cultural values and traditions, or widespread societal values to keep us together as a society, I think that they were talking about real and significant feelings and phenomena.  At the Dia de los Muertos celebration at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery I felt included as a member of the festival and the larger Los Angeles society because of these common feelings about death, remembering and loving our deceased friends and family, and partaking in good food, dancing, and music with other people who felt the same, even though many of them were from different experiences, backgrounds, and classes than myself.    

In remembering and honoring the dead, Dia de los Muertos celebrates life

Me with two of my friends and former campers from UCLA UniCamp

The event webpage: http://www.ladayofthedead.com/
Get a taste the festival from this video complied from the 2010 festival, found on the event's webpage: 

References:
Engels, Friedrich. "The Great Towns." The Blackwell City Reader. Ed. Gary Bridge and Sophie Watson. 2nd ed. Malden, Mass: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. 11-16. Print.