Day of the Dead...in Romania

I had no idea that they celebrated Day of the Dead in Eastern and Central Europe, but they do.  It is a Catholic holiday, but it appears that some of the other groups like the Orthodox have taken it on as well.  This year, Halloween was on Saturday and Day of the Dead on Sunday.  Normally on Sundays here, no one is out and everything is closed.  On November 1st, though, there were people out everywhere, and a few of the shops (mostly food) were open.  It wasn't the same feel as Day of the Dead in Mexico with the masks and toys and everything - much more solemn here but also very family oriented.  There were just waves of people walking to the cemetery!  Here are some of the pictures from the day....

We went to the Hungarian cemetery which is right behind the center of town.  Outside the cemetery, there were all of these people selling different types of flowers, wreaths, and candles.

As you can see, there are lots of people going in and coming out.  Even though there were lots of candles, most people went before dark because there are NO lights in the cemetery and it was pretty dark!

I went with Lauren, and she was busy taking her professional photographs.  Her backpack is designed specifically to hold the big cameras.  How neat is that?  I am sure her pics turned out much better than mine.  It was getting a little dark, and I didn't feel right using a flash and being so obvious taking pictures.

It was an interesting cemetery.  Cram-packed, but all the headstones and graves were pretty different.  Of course, families did all sorts of different decorations as well.  Some were very elaborate and others were quite plain.

Again, just packed with people coming and going.

Some just had the flowers lying on top in little bundles and others were actually planted.  What an interesting headstone this one has, with a mask of the person's face.  Kind of creepy!

The ones with lots of candles looked so nice.

Some women arranging the flowers on a grave.  By the end of the night, almost every single gave had flowers and candles.  It was so nice and such a great tradition.  Whole families would come together and kind of hang out for a little bit before heading home.

You can see down the row here, they are all decorated in some way.

I just loved this little girl.  She looked so picturesque holding the candle.

Some more people decorating a grave.

I loved the way the simple white candles looked on the graves.  Just left them burning.  Definitely could not do that this time of year in Texas because of all the dry grass!

Some of the graves had concrete on top and others had dirt in the top with plantings.  This kind of was very nice looking.

Even the headstones were decorated!  You can see the very Hungarian names in this picture, too.

It was a pretty cold evening, so people were all bundled up.  I think this picture is so nice, too.

As it started to get dark, all of the candles just looked so great.

This one turned out particularly well.

Some of the people made designs with the candles, which really showed up when it got dark.  I think this is the last picture I really took because after this it was just too dark for me to do anything.

So, there is All Saints' Day on the 1st and All Souls' Day on the 2nd (I think that is right).  They mostly do things on the 1st here, but a few of the flower sellers were still set up on the 2nd.

I am so glad that I knew that something happened on Novemember 1st, and it was so nice to be here to take in this local tradition.  It was a great experience.  I will be excited to see what else happens at other times.  Easter is supposed to be a particularly fesive time, so we will see!