Mr. and Mrs. David and Carmen Vasquez, of Chula Vista, parents of Marissa Vasquez and Mr. Cayetano Urias and Elvia Saldana of Shafter, California, parents of Gabriel Urias, are proud to announce the engagement of Marissa Vasquez and Gabe Urias. The couple met as undergraduate students at UC Berkely in 2004.

 Ms. Marissa Vasquez received her M.A. in Counseling from the University of San Diego. She is planning to apply to a Ph.D. program at UCSD. She is currently the Project Coordinator of a 3 year evaluation of the Sweetwater Union High School District and SDSU’s Compact for Success Program.

 Gabe Urias will recieve his B.A. in Philosophy from San Diego State University in May 2010. He is currently applying to Law School in San Diego and hopes to practice immigration law in the future. Gabe is currently conducting philosphical research and has been named on the Dean’s List for each semester. Gabe has also been serving the community of National City as a Math Tutor for the GEAR UP Program.

 On October 8, 2009 Gabe proposed to Marissa under a romantic starlit sky in Coronado, Ca. It was a special moment for the couple as they celebrate their 5 year anniversay. They plan to  be married in Spring of 2011.  Both parents, friends, relatives wish them the best in the future.

 Brown was not exactly being prophetic, but simply painting a realistic picture of the California’s future. The picture of California’s future became a little clearer this week.

  According to a report released this week by the Legislative Analyst Office – the non-partisan agency that reviews and monitors budget issues for the Legislature – California’s budget shortfall is projected to swell to $21 billion by June 30, 2011, the end of the 2010-2011 State Budget year. 

 Adding to the bad news, the report also projects continued budget shortfalls of billions of dollars for the next several years especially when federal stimulus dollars and revenues from the temporary tax increases end.

 What all this means is that this year’s budget wrangling that dragged on well beyond mandated deadlines, causing IOUs to be issued for only the second time since the Great Depression, did little for the future of California. This year’s fiscal budget was passed, based heavily on borrowing, fiscal tricks, overly optimistic projections, and stimulus funding. Lawmakers cut billions from education, healthcare and social services while temporarily hiking income, sales and vehicle taxes. And despite future economic growth the outlook is bleak at best.

 While prison spending continues to grow due to an inability to cut spending, there will be serve cuts made to social services. We are already seeing education cost rising with UC students dealing with a staggering 32% fee hike, community colleges eliminating courses, and K-12 class sizes increasing.

 For the Hispanic community the future means having to survive on fewer services and opportunities, as social service cuts disproportionately affect minority communities. This impact is felt greatest in education.

 With future budget cuts looming, K-12 class size reduction initiatives may be abandoned for larger class sizes. Community colleges which have been the gateway to higher education will be offering fewer core courses, and the cost of attending four year universities will be too expensive for our best and brightest young students to continue on with their education. A whole generation of young students will suffer the consequences of the California budget crisis.

 Once again while the local communities and cities suffer, the Democrat and Republican legislatures will once again fight the age old problem of increasing tax revenue versus more and deeper budget cuts.

 The state legislature procrastinated on their budget plan for this fiscal year – missing the State Constitutional deadline – and eventually ending up with a budget that was slapped together. The budget was so flawed that it required the Governor to call a special session to come up with a better plan. This year we urge the Governor to call for an early special session and begin the laborious process of pounding out a budget, instead of waiting for the legislature which has shown a history of delaying the difficult decisions.

 El Día de Acción de Gracias es un feriado netamente norteamericano. Un día dedicado a dar gracias por las bendciones recibidas durante el año. Es el único feriado en el calendario que no se ha comercializado, que no tiene raíces paganas y el cual lo pueden celebrar todas las religiones que conviven en esta gran nación.

 En la historia de norteamérica hay un sin número de eventos de Acción de Gracias antes de la llegada de  los Peregrinos a las costas del hoy en día estado de Massachussetts. Pero fueron los Peregrinos Puritanos los que capturaron la imaginación  de nuestra cultura y dejaron una marca indeleble de cómo y por qué dar gracias.

 “El resúmen de William Bradford, el primer gobernador de la colonia puritana, sobre su llegada es muy elocuente: “No tenían amigos que los recibieran ni posadas dónde abrigarse o recuperar las fuerzas, deterioradas por la intemperie; ni casas, ni mucho menos ciudades a donde encaminarse a pedir socorro… Además, qué podían ver sino un espantoso y desolado yermo, lleno de bestias salvajes… toda la región, llena de bosques y matorrales, tenía aspecto violento y cruel”. Y los “padres peregrinos” eran habitantes de la ciudad, no acostumbrados a trabajar la tierra. Sólo con la ayuda de indios amistosos, que les enseñaron a pescar y a sembrar maíz, lograron sobrevivir. Después de su primera cosecha, indios y peregrinos celebraron conjuntamente la Acción de Gracias, festividad del cuarto jueves de noviembre que los estadounidenses observan desde entonces”.

 Abraham Lincoln emitió una proclama en 1864 decretando la celebración del Día de Acción de Gracias el último jueves de Noviembre. En 1939 el prsidente Franklin Delano Roosevelt, durante la depresión, el penúltimo jueves de noviembre para que la temporada de compras navideñas fuese más larga. Este cambio no se convirtió en ley hasta el 1942.

 A pesar de los cambios de fecha, siempre fue la historia de los puritanos de la  plantación el Plymouth la que estableció el carácter de la celebración. Darle gracias a Dios por  el triunfo de los inmigrantes contra la adversidad, los peligros, la zozobra y la incertidumbre que encontraron en una tierra extraña. Este acto de contriccion del extranjero que  sobrevive y triunfa en una tierra extraña y en una cultura diferente, es lo que le da el carácter ecuménico al Día de Acción de Gracia. Todos los que hemos pasado por eso, sin importar al Dios que adoramos, le damos gracias por el triunfo de nuestro espíritu.

 Hoy en día esta celebración toma un matiz diferente. Si lo analizamos bien, el primer Thanksgiving es evidencia de los peligros de la inmigración sin control. Los nativos aceptaron y ayudaron a sobrevivir a los recien llegados. Pocos años después de su llegada los inmigrantes sembraron la destrucción de destrucción de los nativos. En una de sus reuniones dominicales la puritanos, hombres de leyes, decidieron que toda la tierra pertenecía a Dios. Este precepto se adoptó por unanimidad. Meses después, en otra de sus reuniones, se presentó otra moción. Si toda la tierra es de Dios, solo los que creen en Dios pueden tener tierra. Esta vez la moción se adoptó pero no por unanaimidad. Poco tiempo después se separaron  los grupos y eventualmente se crearon las 13 colonias originales de Estados Unidos. Los inmigrantes aseguraron la destrucción de los nativos y obviamente no se ha olvidado de las conseuencias de no tener una política migratoria que asegure la subrevivencia de los nativos.

 Este Día de Acción de Gracias debemos celebrar las bendciones recibidas. Aunque el presente es difícil, el futuro es brillante. Estados Unidos es la tierra prometida. Es la sociedad que corrige sus errores, conoce sus debilidades y utiliza sus fuerzas para producir una vida mejor para cada nueva generación.  Ese es el sueño americano, el saber que nuestros hijos vivirán mejor, estarán más educados y tendrán más oportunidades que nosotros.

 Happy Thanksgiving.

José R. Uzal (uzal@msn.com) escribe para el Latino Semanal, en West Palm Beach FL, sobre temas de interés para los hispanos parlantes.

 We need to wipe out hunger in America. It’s a sin that it not only exists but is actually increasing in the richest nation on Earth.

 Tens of millions of Americans are unable to feed their families. Because of widespread poverty, they simply cannot afford adequate nutrition. With the current recession and crippling joblessness, this is a crisis that requires our immediate attention.

 Last year, more than 49 million people lived in households that lacked consistent access to adequate nutrition, according to a new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), “Household Food Security in the United States, 2008.”

 The numbers break down this way: 32.4 million adults and 16.7 million children (almost one child out of every four) were “food insecure,” meaning that due to a lack of resources, they have difficulty providing enough food, the report said. The sobering statistic of 49 million Americans with inadequate nutrition is 13 million more than the previous year, and the highest since the government started recording such numbers in 1995.

 Of these struggling Americans, 12.1 million adults and 5.2 million children lived in households with very low food security, meaning that one or more family members had to skip meals and disrupt their eating patterns because they could not afford to buy food.

 The Department of Agriculture study comes on the heels of a shocking report that about half of children in the United States are on food stamps at some point in their childhood. The report, “Estimating the Risk of Food Stamp Use and Impoverishment During Childhood,” was published in the November edition of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

 Using 29 years of data, the report concludes that one in three white children and a staggering 90 percent of black children will qualify for food stamps.

 “American children are at a high risk of encountering a spell during which their families are in poverty and food insecure as indicated through their use of food stamps,” according to the authors, Mark R. Rank and Thomas A. Hirschl. “Such events have the potential to seriously jeopardize a child’s overall health.”

 Rank and Hirschl point out that poverty and food insecurity are two of the most detrimental economic conditions that can affect children’s health.

 “Children in poverty are significantly more likely to experience a range of health problems, including low birth weight, lead poisoning, asthma, mental health disorders, delayed immunization, dental problems and accidental death,” they write.

 These statistics are more in line with a developing nation, not an economic superpower such as the United States. And it is hard to imagine America remaining a prosperous country — or a major competitor on the world stage, for that matter — while a substantial portion of its people suffer from empty stomachs.

 We need swift and bold action from the White House and the Congress. No child in America, no adult in America, should go hungry.

David A. Love is a writer and human rights advocate based in Philadelphia. His blog is davidalove.com. Reprinted  from“The Progressive” web magazine. He can be reached at pmproj@progressive.org

 Elected officials’ religious views should be their own private affair, neither imposed by them upon the nation, nor imposed by the nation as condition to holding public office. This means their private religious views should not be imposed via the current debate over health care reform.

 Important life decisions are responsibilities of individuals and families, not of government or religious groups. On that, most of us can agree. There is also a strong history of separation of church and state in America, and one of our founding principles is of freedom from religious intolerance. That’s why I was deeply offended when Roman Catholic Church bishops lobbied Congress on health care reform in order to deny millions of women access to abortion.

 As an American I am proud of our constitutionally guaranteed right to worship or not as one sees fit, and of our prohibition of government-imposed state religion. But what started out to be about health care for all has morphed into a referendum and debate on abortion unduly influenced by the church. Health care legislation passed by the House of Representatives compromises our personal choices and subverts the principle of abortion neutrality.

 The Stupak-Pitts amendment potentially goes farther than any other federal law to restrict a woman’s access to abortion. By prohibiting women who receive partial federal subsidies from buying insurance plans that cover abortion, the Stupak amendment bans abortion coverage by any insurer participating in the health exchange. The amendment favors one religious view of abortion and enlists the federal government as enforcer. As such, it is an egregious assault on the rights of women and an enormous step backward for those who believe in separation of church and state.

 President Obama has said, “If you’re happy and satisfied with the insurance that you have, it’s not going to change.” But this House proposal potentially reduces health care coverage for the more than 80 percent of typical employer-based insurance plans that now cover abortion.

 Women supposedly will be able to obtain abortion coverage by purchasing a separate, single-service “rider.” However, according to the National Women’s Law Center, in the five states that currently require a separate rider for abortion coverage, there is no evidence that plans offer such riders. Furthermore, women are unlikely to buy a rider to cover abortion, because they do not plan for unplanned pregnancy or one that is needed for medical or health reasons.

 A number of national polls have shown that Americans strongly believe health insurance should include complete women’s reproductive health services and that women have a full range of choices offered. A recent poll commissioned by Moving Forward, a values-based research initiative developed by the Women Donors Network and the Communications Consortium, found that a majority, 56 percent, believe those receiving subsidies should be able to purchase a health insurance plan that covers abortion. The House proposal does not reflect that view.

 Meaningful reform has the potential to bring health care to more American women and their families than ever before. But Congress should not be in the business of restricting choices for women, particularly for religious reasons. As presidential candidate, John F. Kennedy said, “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute … where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source — where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials …”

 Instead of kowtowing to Catholic bishops, Congress should stand up for what the majority of Americans want in health care reform — and they want choices, not limitations.

West is a public health consultant who lives in Philadelphia. She is a member of the Women Donors Network and involved with their Moving Forward initiative.

 Un nuevo romance político empieza a entretejerse en la política norteamericana. No es la relación amorosa entre el político y la estudiante universitaria, ni mucho menos es un escándalo sexual que endulza las cámaras de los paparazzis y el micrófono de los chismosos de la televisión y la radio.

 Es más bien un romance calculado, prosaico, documentado en un libro de más de 400 páginas. Se trata de Sarah Palin, ex gobernadora de Alaska, ex candidata a la presidencia, ex alcaldesa de Wasilla y ex ganadora de un concurso de belleza, cuyo libro, Going Rogue: An American Life, trata de reconquistar el corazón del electorado norteamericano con una versión propia y llena de contradicciones.

 Como un espadachín de la mitología china, que busca vengar la intolerancia de sus agresores y la frialdad de sus amigos que la abandonaron en la batalla decisiva de su vida, la ex gobernadora de Alaska arremete sin pudor contra sus ex aliados y enemigos.

 Fue ella, de acuerdo a su versión, la víctima del sistema político y unos medios de comunicación maliciosos y condenables.

 Las críticas que propició su famosa entrevista con Catie Couric, presentadora de noticias de la cadena CBS, fue el resultado de una maquinación despiadada.

 Recordemos que en algunos momentos cruciales de la famosa entrevista, Palin se negó a contestar preguntas comunes y corrientes. Couric insistió, por ejemplo, que mencionara a uno de los medios por el cual se informaba del entorno mundial de la política exterior del país. Palin no supo contestar; simplemente señaló que “lee todos [los libros, revistas académicas y periódicos]”. El electorado nacional entendió que básicamente no lee nada.

 Por otra parte, en su libro, Palin lanza dardos mortíferos contra el equipo de John McCain. Al jefe de su campaña a la presidencia, Steve Schmidt, virtualmente lo crucifica. No le gustó que la censuraran y que no le permitieran utilizar su propia estrategia y virtudes políticas.

 Cuando la campaña estaba cuesta arriba, específicamente durante el debate con Joe Biden, Palin hizo relucir sus dotes personales. Sin embargo, su presentación coqueta, acompañada de guiños y el uso de un lenguaje populacho, en vez de cambiar su imagen de mujer inmadura, refortificó la creencia de que no estaba lista para la vicepresidencia.

 Hoy, Sarah Palin está nuevamente en las páginas frontales de los medios de comunicación. No existe duda de que su libro va a conseguir jugosas ganancias. Sin embargo, su versión no cambia en lo mínimo la percepción de la población norteamericana en torno a su imagen política. Palin continúa siendo una mujer atractiva, social conservadora, hábil en la política, pero con pocos recursos intelectuales.

 Su fama no es única. Los acompañantes de los candidatos presidenciales derrotados normalmente tienden a ser el blanco de los medios de comunicación. Dan Quayle, Joe Liberman, John Eduards estuvieron en situaciones similares.

 A medida que pasen los días y nos acerquemos a las próximas elecciones y se conozcan las nuevas figuras del Partido Republicano, la controversial figura de Palin volverá al aire gélido de Alaska.

 Su romance con su base social conservadora perdurará por unos largos años, pero no llegará a cautivar al grueso del electorado nacional. Como indica el título de su libro, se quedará sola y sin un rumbo real.

Humberto Caspa, Ph.D., es profesor universitario. E-mail: hcletters@yahoo.com

 While Sacramento and Washington scramble, vacillating between economic recovery and the health care debate, many local municipal governments are suffering. As a result of the State dipping into local funds, the mundane act of annual budget cuts, is most immediately impacting the “Main Street” of every city in California.

 Many proactive elected city officials have caught on to the “every city for itself” mantra and have begun developing local economic recovery plans. Others simply have done nothing but become rubberstamps for budget cuts. However the situation at City Hall, a wise economic development plan will focus on attracting new industry and boosting local business. Let us again focus on the later. There is good reason that an a local economic plan focus on boosting local business, namely because it usually accounts for the highest in tax increment revenue for a city’s general fund, second only to property taxes which as several cities have learned the hard way, are not reliable in our current state.

 However, what must first occur is a “reinvestment in the local economy” by the State—that means helping small businesses thrive and thus local economic recovery plans succeed from the top down. The greatest impediment for small business is poor public policy. Most stifling, is the direct impact of regulation on small business which composes 99.2% of business employers in the state. The study, examining 2007 figures, puts the cost of regulation per small business at $134,122 with labor income not created or lost at $57,260.15 and approximately one job loss per business.

 According to Raymond J. Keating of the Small Business & Entrepreneur Council, costs which discourage small business investment arise from government imposed direct and indirect costs to business such as personal income taxes, individual capital gains taxes, corporate income taxes, corporate capital gains taxes, additional income taxes on S-Corporations, alternative minimum taxes for individuals, alternative minimum taxes for corporations, indexing of personal income tax rates, property taxes, sales/gross receipts/excise taxes, death taxes, unemployment tax rates, health savings accounts, healthcare regulation, electricity costs, worker compensation costs, total crime rate, right to work costs, number of government employees, tax limitation states, gas taxes, internet taxes, state minimum wage, state legal liability costs, regulatory flexibility, trend in state and local government spending, per capital state and local government spending, protecting private property, and highway cost efficiency. Yet, in spite of this compendium of costs, the State of California continues to pass new regulations.

 Business regulation has long contributed to heated discourse at both state and federal levels of government, with politicians inciting class warfare to bolster support for regulatory measures.

 However, as the need to attract new industry and boost business becomes ever needed at a state level of economic recovery, we approach the 500 billion dollar cost benchmark of regulation on business—small, local business, and the need to reform regulatory practices becomes ever-crucial. And while some regulation is necessary only to prevent fraud and other white collar-crimes, most regulations on businesses are impeding obstacles to wealth, job growth, and the economic sustainability of our state and local economic recovery plans.

Herrera is President & CEO of the Chula Vista Civic Association, a small business owner, Boardmember of the Chula Vista Taxpayers Association, member of the Chula Vista Chamber of Commerce Economic Development and Public Policy Committees and Chaired the campaign committee to defeat Proposition A: sales tax increase in Chula Vista.

 By Gustavo Arellano

A Que Tener Pelo Largo

 Dear Wab: Mujeres shearing their locks in el Norte has gone on longer than you think—and it’s not just the geezers. “During the 1920s, a woman’s decision ‘to bob or not bob’ her hair assumed classic proportions within Mexican families,” wrote University of California, Irvine professor Vicki L. Ruiz in her 1999 book, From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth-Century America. She was specifically talking about young mexicanas following gabacho youth trends to the consternation of their elders, but you can use that same rubric with nuestras mothers and aunts. I don’t have any empirical data on the number of old ladies with short hair in the U.S. since the AARP isn’t exactly the Pew Hispanic Center of viejitos, but nearly every elderly gabacha the Mexican has ever met, seen, or heard about uses their pelo corto. I’m not a post-menopausal gal, but methinks it has to do with hair loss, a better framing of the wrinkled face, and the creation of an easier platform to dye those pesky grays. Since Mexicans take to American habits like we do to Reconquista, it follows que Mexican ladies copy their gabacha peers. But why the outrageous hair colores? For once, the Mexican will not dare answer a pregunta, because you just don’t question the logic of your madre, whether it’s hair color, superstition or her insistence that Vicks VapoRub and 7-Up cure everything—you just don’t.

 Why is it that Mexicans only want to go back to Mexico after they kill a gringo?

Gabe Ocho

 Dear Gabacho: Such ignorance, such stupidity, such lies! Lou Dobbs, was that you?

 Why do Mexicans put lard in their beans? I don’t know any fit-‘n’-trim Mexicans. Even the skinny ones have a lil’ belly. I just made some excellent refried beans with Goya extra virgin olive oil and butter. Just wondering. 

Skinny White Boy Vegetarian from Dallas who Loves Healthy Tex-Mex

 Dear Gabacho: Refried beans made with olive oil? Why don’t you just add tomato and capers to ruin it even more? Whatever floats your barco, but no need to call us a bunch of fatties along the way. Besides, you’re muy wrong. Not only does the Mexican know too many wabby gym rats, all getting their buff bodies ready to further overrun the United States, but lard ain’t what gives the gordos their panzas. “My friend Rick Bayless is skinny and he loves lard!” says Robb Walsh, author of The Tex-Mex Cookbook and perhaps the most Mexican gabacho after the famous Chicago chef. “As Señor Bayless likes to point out, lard is not unhealthy—it is lower in saturated fat and cholesterol than butter. When rendered at a high temperature, as it is in Mexico, lard has a roast pork flavor that is part of the traditional taste of tamales, refried beans, and moles. Don’t use the hydrogenated stuff in the tub—buy your lard at the butcher shop. And it sounds better if you call it manteca.” One further food insult from me: using Goya products to cook Mexican cuisine is like making your Cuba Libre with Hornitos.

Ask the Mexican at themexican@askamexican.net, www.myspace.com/ocwab, www.facebook/garellano, find him on, Twitter, or write via snail mail at: Gustavo Arellano, P.O. Box 1433, Anaheim, CA 92815-1433!

Live music and dance was performed throughout the day.

 Over 45,000 people attended this year’s Day of the Dead festival, which was held for the first time at Mission San Luis Rey on November 1. This new venue provided a unique space for the event, which added to the cultural ambiance. The blending of Catholic theology with ancient Mesoamerican indigenous religious beliefs of the early sixteenth century was alive and present throughout the Mission grounds as the Mission and the celebration of the Day of the Dead’s long history were brought together in what many commented as “the perfect place for the celebration,” and “in disbelief that there was ever another venue because the Mission is perfect for the celebration.” Down to the arches around Heritage courtyard that enhanced the beauty of the traditional altars adorned with thousands of marigolds, alluring scents of traditional foods and meaningful artifacts set within the arches, the Mission truly served as a great new space for the event.

 The Mission grounds were transformed into different facets of the festival. It included an elaborate activity center for children to learn about the Day of the Dead while making crafts and playing games, an international food court that filled the air with aromas of traditional huaraches and street tacos, to polish sausages and Asian cuisine, a bazaar featuring Day of the Dead memorabilia from around the world, a traditional chalk cemetery, twenty-four altars in the lawn of Heritage courtyard, multiple live music performances, and many different traditional dancers and performers.

 “It’s great to see an intermingling of all the various cultures of San Diego gathered here today to celebrate the Day of the Dead,” said Sarah Garcia of Oceanside. People came from all over San Diego county to honor loved ones who have passed on, and to share in this unique cultural experience that is fast becoming a tradition of a diverse array of cultures represented here in San Diego.

 “Here in the US many cultures come together to celebrate the Day of the Dead,” said Amilcar Chavez, a video-grapher for the event. Many patrons at the event spoke variations of this comment. It was a beautiful day where native celebrants shared the traditions with those who have practiced Day of the Dead their whole lives and with those in the community who came to celebrate the Day of the Dead for the first time. The community truly came together for this event, and the convergence of the many diverse cultures that make up San Diego County came to share in this deeply rooted Mexican tradition was a sight to see.

 “The memory of my grandmother brought me here today. I came to carry on traditions important to her, and to remember and honor her,” said Anthony Serrato, a Palomar College student volunteer. Members of the community came for many different reasons, but a constant theme remained with that of the Day of the Dead, which is celebrating and remembering the lives of loved ones who have died.

 Many people were involved in making this event great, including Cathy Nykiel, Dr. Carlos von Son, Maureen Sullivan (special events coordinator for the Mission), and  the entire Organizing Committee as well as the San Luis Rey staff. Many volunteers helped not only on November 1, but days before in preparation at the Mission.

 Some of the traditional altars were built by migrants from the states of Oaxaca and Mic-hoacán, with the main organizations being Frente  Indigena de Organizaciones Binacionales, Oaxaca Student Organization (OSO), Grupo de San Francisco Uricho and Janitzio de Michoacán, students from Palomar College and Teatro Molcajete from CSUSM. The magnificent double altar at the entrance representing a typical Mexican kitchen was built by Claudia Tipp and her family. These ofrendas represented some of the twenty-four altars that were constructed in the courtyard, which were one of the focal points of this celebration. It takes long hours of work to build these altars, and the migrants that contributed were recognized because of their work.

 In front of these ofrendas and around the Mission grounds live music and dance was performed throughout the day. There were caballeros in costume who danced in front of the altars, a brass band, and many Mesoamerican dancers with elaborate feathered costumes. The Ballet Folclorico from Oceanside performed as well. The Por Siempre Car Club came out with over twenty-five classical cars on display, some with ofrendas in the trunks. There was even a traditional comparsa performed by the Groupo de Teatro Sub-Urbano, with the lead actors being Lorena Campos and Joaquin Gamboa, with a band following led by Hector Garcia.

 This years Day of the Dead celebration was a huge success at the Mission San Luis Rey location. People from all around the county, from all ethnic backgrounds, came to join in a traditional celebration of death as part of the beautiful life cycle. It was a day where traditions and memories were shared that will never be forgotten.