The biggest holiday in Poland of the autumn season is All Saints’ Day called Wszystkich Swietych, celebrated on NOVEMEBR 1st.
All Saints’ Day is a holy day which has been celebrated in Poland and the rest of the Catholic world for many centuries. All Saints’ Day is a national holiday in Poland, and a day when people visit the graves of loved ones and place candles and flowers on their graves. Abandoned graves are also decorated with candles and flowers. If a family has moved away or no family members are able to be present, neighbors will make sure that no grave is forgotten. On this day, all of the dead are to be remembered and honored. The special votive candles, which can burn for many hours, are placed on the graves so that departed souls can find their way through the darkness and flowers, usually mums, are placed so that the dead know that they live on in the memories of the those they left behind. Cemeteries are lit by many hundreds of these candles and at night they can be seen glowing from long distances as darkness descends. Many Poles travel from far and wide to visit family graves on that day and to honor the dead. The holiday is also sometimes known as the Day of the Dead, Dzien Zmarlych.
The next day, November 2nd is All Souls’ Day, or Zaduszki, when the church prays for all departed souls, not only the souls of the saints, but also of those who are still in purgatory. Cemeteries and churches are visited on this day as well.
In recent years, Halloween, which originally was a Celtic holiday, has made an appearance in Poland with children donning costumes and attending parties on October 31st, but the true celebration of the dead in Poland continues to be on November 1st and 2nd when millions of people from all around the country criss-cross the nation to visit the graves of their loved ones. The smell of burning candles wafts across the breadth and the width of Poland and cemeteries are ablaze at night-you can see the glow in the night sky wherever you look.
November 11th is Polish Independence Day and it is the second national holiday in Poland-the first one is Constitution Day celebrated on May 3rd. November 11th is the day that Poland regained its freedom after 123 years of partition by its powerful neighbors, the superpowers of the time: Russia, Prussia, and Austria. November 11th is the same date that the Armistice was signed ending World War I between Germany and the Allies. Poles celebrate both of their national holidays with pride. For a nation that was not free for a large part of its history, it is now happy to celebrate its political freedom with great passion and pride-on both of its national holidays.
