The Worldwide Girl: Día de los Muertos

I wanna be a real fake

Marina And The Diamonds, "Teen Idle"

Hello, guys! I'm happy being here to introduce you my special Halloween design. I guess, it's going to stay here for a week, till Halloween go out and everybody stops celebrating. But here in Russia we don't celebrate Halloween, and to somehow fill this whole, I've decided to bring a Halloween mood here, to my holy blog.

As you can notice, I've painted my face in unfortunately mainstream way. Yeah, lately this make up has became very popular among young women, so almost every girl tries getting a photo set like that. But I didn't try, I just made and did it. And though everyone wants it, no one knows where this make up came from.

All these beautiful skulls boil down to Mexican traditions of celebrating their Mexican Halloween. Let's ask Wikipedia:

Day of the Dead (Spanish Día de Muertos) is a Mexican holiday celebrated throughout Mexico and around the world in other cultures. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have died. It is particularly celebrated in Mexico, where the day is a bank holiday. The celebration takes place on October 31, November 1 and November 2, in connection with the Christian triduum of Hallowmas: All Hallows' Eve, All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day. Traditions connected with the holiday include building private altars called ofrendas honoring the deceased using sugar skulls, marigolds, and the favorite foods and beverages of the departed and visiting graves with these as gifts. They also leave possessions of the deceased.

I got in touch with Mexican culture a little bit during reading "The Lollipop Shoes" by Johan Harris. The main antagonist Zozie de L'Alba had lived in Mexico for some time and used a lot of Aztec magic against the main protagonists. Many Aztec gods (though to my mind they're totally impossible to pronounce) and holidays were mentioned, so now I have some idea about Mexican culture. I've been feeling like tasting a sugar skull and pan de muerto (Bread of the Dead) - a sweet egg bread. (Oh, damn, I'm so hungry right now, so I almost smell it)

Sugar skulls and pan de muerto

When I read "The Lollipop Shoes", I always remembered about songs by Marina And The Diamonds, especially about "Seventeen" and "Teen Idle". I thing the songs perfectly describe Zozie De L'Alba and her character. Therefore there's unanswered question in my head if Marina has read the book?

I wanna be a bottle blonde

I don’t know why but I feel conned

I wanna be an idle teen

I wish I hadn’t been so clean

I wanna stay inside all day

I want the world to go away

I want blood, guts and chocolate cake

I wanna be a real fake

Yeah I wish I’d been a, wish I’d been a teen, teen idle

Wish I’d been a prom queen fighting for the title

Instead of being sixteen and burning up a bible

Feeling super, super (super!) suicidal

The wasted years, the wasted youth

The pretty lies, the ugly truth

And the day has come where I have died

Only to find I’ve come alive

I wanna be a virgin pure

A 21st century whore

I want back my virginity

So I can feel infinity

I wanna drink until I ache

I wanna make a big mistake

I want blood, guts and angel cake

I’m gonna puke it anyway

Yeah I wish I’d been a, wish I’d been a teen, teen idle

Wish I’d been a prom queen fighting for the title

Instead of being sixteen and burning up a bible

Feeling super, super (super!) suicidal

The wasted years, the wasted youth

The pretty lies, the ugly truth

And the day has come where I have died

Only to find I’ve come alive

Come alive, I’ve come alive

I wish I wasn’t such a narcissist

I wish I didn’t really kiss the mirror when I’m on my own

Oh God! I’m gonna die alone

Adolescence didn’t make sense

A little loss of innocence

The ugly years of being a fool

Ain’t youth meant to be beautiful?

Yeah I wish I’d been a, wish I’d been a teen, teen idle

Wish I’d been a prom queen fighting for the title

Instead of being sixteen and burning up a bible

Feeling super, super (super!) suicidal

The wasted years, the wasted youth

The pretty lies, the ugly truth

And the day has come where I have died

Only to find I’ve come alive

Come alive

Feeling super, super, super!

Come alive

Talking about the make up, so it's also called sweet skull, and as far as I understood, everybody does it for the celebration. Isn't that amazing? There are so many variations of the make up, you can do anything you just imagine. Only rules are a beautiful idea of the skull and flowers, mostly. Though, unfortunately, I have no flower on my header, except some hints in my paintings.

One more symbol of Día de los Muertos is Catrina, or La Calavera Catrina. Originally, Catrina is a 1910–1913 zinc etching by famous Mexican printmaker. La Catrina has become the referential image of Death in Mexico, it is common to see her embodied as part of the celebrations of Day of the Dead throughout the country; she has become a motive for the creation of handcrafts made from clay or other materials, her representations may vary, as well as the hat.