Day Of The Dead

Today in Brazil it was Day of the Dead or "Dia dos Mortos". In the afternoon around 5 we all went to the cemetery where about 250 people were gathered to hear the Catholic Priest give a sermon. Then everyone went their separate ways to look for the grave sites of their family members. Grave sites in Brazil are very different than in the US. They have little "houses" of different sizes depending on how many coffins are inside but they are roughly about 8 to 11 feet high and about 10 feet on each side. They have shelves to put pictures of the dead, flowers, candles and other things inside the house with a window and metal bars to protect them. Sometimes they have doors to walk in. The actual coffins are embedded in the cement, of which the house is made. Each house has a plaque telling the name and birth/death dates of the person. We visited Nana's family gravesite which held her father, brother, and mother; and later the site of Paulo's grandfather, and Bernardo's cousin who was tragically hit by a drunk driver in 2006.