ELLY GRIMM
• Leader & Times
The annual Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebrations have concluded and this year, a former Liberal student brought that tradition to his current home.
McPherson College senior and former Liberal student Fabian Camacho received a grant from the McPherson College Horizon Fund to build an ofrenda to celebrate Día de los Muertos, which took place Nov. 1. An ofrenda is a shrine created to honor family members and loved ones who have died. Ofrendas often include photos, candles, marigolds, and decorations, and Camacho's ofrenda featured all those elements, along with spaces for anyone to display a photo of a loved one or even a pet.
The project was on display in the Miller Library lobby on campus through Nov. 10, and Camacho said the idea for the project had been percolating for some time.
“During my sophomore year at McPherson College, I was sitting at my desk and Día de los Muertos was right around the corner, and I remember thinking how cool it would be to do something to commemorate the day. I'd seen some photos of some friends' ofrendas on social media and what they'd put together, and seeing those photos made me think something like that would be really cool in the library on campus,” Camacho said. “That's when it started, but I wasn't really sure how to go about doing such a project or what all it would entail or how it would be received by everyone on campus. At that point, it was just an idea I had and I ultimately put it away due to some other stuff I had going on. The next year, I had the thought again, and since McPherson College has its Horizon Fund, they'd sent out emails to everyone and asked if they would be interested in applying. I remember thinking it would be neat to use that to put together a community ofrenda at the school, but I ultimately felt too nervous to fill out the application and again didn't do it. So this year, I got that email again and finally filled out the application and got awarded those funds.”
After everything was approved, Camacho said, he started buying materials and preparing to put everything together.
“I'd started buying some bits and pieces this past summer, there were a few things I was able to get – and on sale too, luckily enough. Then from there, there were a few things I put together on my own and painted,” Camacho said. “So I'd been gathering everything, and then when it came time to setting everything up in the library on campus, my mother came and visited me one weekend and helped me build everything up. We were there that Saturday from opening until close putting everything together and making sure everything was right, and there were definitely some small challenges we encountered during the actual construction, but I was really proud of how everything came together.”
After everything came together, Camacho said he was very proud.
“When I started here, I felt rather like an outlier among everyone since I'm from Southwest Kansas and Hispanic, and there aren't very many who fit in either of those demographics on campus,” Camacho said. “As I've gone through school though, I've gotten more integrated into the community and met so many amazing people and made a lot of friends. This is my senior year of college, and in the past year, I started bringing more of my culture to the community here and there. I run a saxophone quartet on campus and decided to take that in a newer direction – the quartet used to be strictly classical music, but these past couple years, we've done more jazz and pop and doo-wop and other music that encourages people to get up and move more, and we've also included some Hispanic music in our repertoire. Classical music is great, but we definitely wanted to inject some flavor into that, and I'm glad to have been part of that because not only is it about sharing music, but also about educating people in the community about different cultures. I'm an elementary education major, and obviously, a big role of educators is to share new information and educate people about the world around them, and this ofrenda is a great way to do that. And I'm really glad I finally got to do this my senior year because it makes me feel like I'm leaving college on a good note.”
Camacho said the response to the ofrenda garnered many positive comments.
“There were multiple comments about how pretty the display is and how it reminds them of similar displays they've seen in the past. There were also multiple faculty and staff members at the college who came up and complimented my work and how everything looked, which was amazing,” Camacho said. “The ofrenda was really meant for everyone to be able to take part in, and there were multiple people who added their own photos and decorations and other aspects, which I thought was really lovely, and I would have loved to see even more. And the comments came either directly to me or secondhand from friends who overheard someone saying something. I would love for something like this to keep going. With this being my senior year, I won't be here next year, but wherever I end up after graduation, I'd love to see about doing something like this again. Like I said earlier, it's all about educating people, so if I come across an opportunity to do another ofrenda display, I would love that.”
Overall, Camacho said, he was very happy with how the project came together.
“From the research I've done, a lot of people believe Día de los Muertos originated from ancient indigenous traditions, particularly the Aztec, Maya, and Toltec peoples, who honored the deceased with their own festivals,” Camacho said. “Then, after the Spanish arrived, those traditions merged with what we know as All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day, and it all evolved into the celebrations we know today. It's all about remembering and honoring our loved ones who have died and keeping them in our memories and celebrating their lives. I also want to emphasize how this wasn't just a 'me' effort, I had help from friends and family and others in the community, and I can't thank everyone enough who helped me put this project together.”
