AP PHOTOS: Bolivians pay homage to skulls in annual festival
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Esperanza Mozon asks a marching band to play "Happy Birthday" to the two human skulls she is carrying outside a cemetery chapel in Bolivia's capital.
Every year, hundreds of Bolivians like Mozon bring human skulls adorned with flowers to a cemetery in La Paz, asking for money, health and other favors as part of a festival.
Devotees showed up with the skulls, known as "natitas," for a short Mass on Wednesday. The ritual is celebrated a week after the Day of the Dead and includes music, dance and the lighting of candles.
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The Roman Catholic Church considers the skull festival to be pagan, but it doesn't forbid people from taking part.
The festival is a mix of Andean ancestral worship and Catholic beliefs. Experts say it was common in pre-Columbian times to keep skulls as trophies and display them to symbolize death and rebirth.
Mozon named her skulls Amanda and Ron.
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She got Amanda as a gift from her daughter when she was a medicine student 35 years ago. She says she found Ron in this same cemetery two decades ago.
"I think Ron was waiting for my little Amanda," Mozon said. "Every year, I do this because my 'natitas' take care of me and heal me when I'm ill."