Food, flowers, skulls and social consciousness

UKIAH, CA., 11/11/16 — The Dia de los Muertos celebration in the Eagles Nest at Mendocino College on November 2 was a riotous display of bright paper flowers, candied skulls, and genial young people with faces half-painted in skeletal grins.

Altars were festooned with poems, flowers, and arrangements of food that resembled a still-life in honor of the dead. But the celebration was also a party for the living, with music by the Mariachi Cuarteto, plenty of food, and a benefit for souls not yet departed.