Saiful Islam Raju

200480896

Moving to Canada as an international student to a new culture taught me a great deal

about different cultures. The cultural shock was not to Canadian culture but to Mexican culture.

As people in my apartment were from Mexico, I was exposed to Mexican culture for the first

time. At first, their level of socialization and getting energy from it intrigued me. They would

consider anyone their friend after just having one conversation and used to bring all their friends

over and cook for them to have a "fiesta" together every weekend. Lonely period of time, which I

adore, used to be a punishment to them. As I continued living with them, I noticed The

Mexicans had also a very strong kinship as they spent hours talking to their family of orientation

over cell phones. Their "family tends to have a major influence on them, providing a sense of

identity, community and support." (Evason, 2018). They were never tired of mentioning their

family and relatives back in Mexico. All these really convinced me to dive into their culture and

family traditions.

What drives them so much to be socially inclined? Is there any cultural significance of

being family-oriented and extraversion? Can their behaviour be explained by the terms

interdependent cultural selves?

And then I learned about their most popular ritual called the Day of the Dead also called

“Día de Muertos” - which I first thought was the Mexican version of Halloween - when "all

spirits of the dead are believed to return to the world of the living"(Lopez, 2023). The spirits of

the dead, as believed by a majority of Mexicans, visit their family and relatives and celebrate

with the living. Day of Dead "takes place to remember loved ones who have died and celebrate
their memory by welcoming their spirits back into the homes of relatives." (Caruso, 2023) The

living decorate the graves of their ancestor with colourful flowers and present food and then

decorate houses, neighbourhoods, streets and even the local city to welcome the dead. "In houses

all over the country, families carefully place photographs of their ancestors on an altar beside

candles. (Lopez, 2023) They perform these rituals once every year it is deeply embedded in their

culture for thousands of years. No wonder, if people from the culture love celebrating with the

dead and believe it to be important then their high socialization and they getting energy from it is

plausible. The reason Mexicans love to socialize as one of the "amigos" said is that they want as

many as people possible to remember them, even after their death so that according to their

belief they can visit the most number of relatives and friends when they are dead. He further

added that in their culture family, relatives and friends are most valuable. " One’s family is the

most important aspect of life for most Mexicans. It is believed that “what God has united cannot

be separated by man." (Evason, 2018)

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 Reference List

Evason, P. (2018). Mexican Culture. Cultural Atlas. https://culturalatlas.sbs.com.au/mexican-

culture/mexican-culture-family

Lopez, O. (October, 2023). What Is Day of the Dead, the Mexican Holiday? The New York
Times. https://www.nytimes.com/article/day-of-the-dead-mexico.html

Caruso, S. (October, 2023). Everything to Know About the Day of the Dead. People.
https://people.com/human-interest/day-of-the-dead-everything-to-know/

Thomson, Charisma. “Lecture notes” [PowerPoint]. (2019):

https://urcourses.uregina.ca/course/view.php?id=31195