I am referencing this saying of the Drowned God of the Iron Islands in the highly popular TV series Game of Thrones, to highlight how we Filipinos consider All Saints and All Souls days as some of our more important holidays.

Of course, it goes without saying that in our current social milieu, All Saints and All Souls days are more now the Halloween kind of Celebration, where children are now being tricked and treated and adults now have an excuse to partake in their fantasies in completely outrageous attire.

Halloween has become like one big Hollywood event of parties and debauchery, and this is not lost on our reliable oligarchs to exploit via their commercial endeavors.

And how we celebrate All Saints and All Souls days is really a far cry from how it was eons ago, when there was no social media around for posterity.

In the good old days, we recall the en masse trickling at the cemetery, where we include our picnic basket of food and pastimes. The fashion statement to be made back then is how we arrange our family around the “nicho” or “puntod” of our dearly departed, and you are considered upper echelon if you have a boom box and mahjong table plus a tent.

As kids, All Saints and All Souls days are more of a journey of a maze throughout the cemetery or “panchon” (a derivative from the word “Pantheon” or temple of the Gods) and the collection of candle wax in every pit stop.

It was really an all-day event, and where family members even schedule their “duty” hours.

Back then, it was really a tribute to the dead and a family reunion, all in one place — the actual graveyard.

It was so simple and so fun, and at the same time so sacred because we never miss it, and we never ignore it.

Perhaps now, our departed are really turning over their graves because it seems we have forgotten them in the midst of our Halloween festivity. I sure wish that just like in the animated film “Coco,” they are having a party of their own in their own paradise, and comforting each other to compensate for the absence in the thoughts and prayers of the living.

For their sake, I hope we can have less Halloween but more All Saints and All Souls days. These are the days of the dead, and it must stay that way.

Because what is dead may never die.
Mark my word.