Excerpt:  Imagine hundreds, maybe even a couple thousand Detroiters walking around Mexicantown. They’re drinking hot chocolate, eating tamales and kids are carrying “sugar-skulls” that look like Halloween treats of sorts, and everyone is walking to the beat of a mariachi band. Every now and then people duck into one building or another to check out a cultural art exhibit — but all you can see from the street is the smoke of rising incense and candles, a few picture frames and what looks like a psychedelic skeleton. Welcome to Dia de Muertos. “In the future, we want to see Detroit embrace the celebrations of Day of the Dead in Mexicantown the same way it has embraced Paczki Day in Hamtramck,” Maria Elena Rodriguez, president of the Mexicantown Community Development Corporation (MCDC) hopes.

Dia de Muertos is one of the most interesting, if not important, celebratory traditions found in Hispanic culture. Misunderstood by many to be a day of mournful memory, it really couldn’t be more opposite. Dia de Muertos is a celebration of life and death.

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