Dziady marked in Belarus today

Dziady, the day when the dead are commemorated, is marked in Belarus on November 2. Traditionally, people believe that the dead turn into sprits after death and it is necessary to please them so that they affect the living in a good way. People visit relatives’ graves and commemorate them during supper.

Autumn and spring Dziady have a lot in common. However, November Dziady is also good for summing up the results of the year and thinking about the sense of your own life.

Dziady became the day of commemoration of the victims of Stalin’s repressions for the democratic community in Belarus: almost 130 representatives of the Belarusian intellectual elite where killed before this holiday in 1937.  The tradition to commemorate the repressed in Kurapaty appeared at the end of the 1980s. The Christian Conservative BPF Party organized the traditional manifestation on October 30. The action was allowed by the authorities and nobody was detained