Día de Muertos is a holiday celebrated on November 1 and 2 in Mexico and among Mexican communities abroad, when families gather to remember relatives and friends who have died. Families build home altars called ofrendas, decorated with marigolds known as cempazúchitl and loaded with the favourite foods and drinks of the dead. They also visit graves with gifts, and the celebrations can be humorous, with stories about amusing moments shared about the departed. Sugar skulls and pan de muerto bread are shared among the living, and people write playful mock epitaphs called calaveras literarias about friends. The holiday falls in the Christian Allhallowtide season, and while some see Indigenous Mexican roots in it, others see a local form of a tradition brought by the Spanish.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.