309/365: Candles and plasticine

This is the grave of Maria Kownacka, a writer who lived at the turn of the 19th century. She wrote mainly for children, and was an editor for the children's underground press during WW2. When I was visiting the Old Powązki cemetery for All Souls' Day, hers was the first grave I randomly stopped at.

In this second picture, you can see a little creature with big ears standing among the candles- this is a character from her most famous book. His name is Plastuś, and he's a little plasticine boy who lives in a schoolgirl's pencilcase and has lots of adventures which he describes in his diary. I think everyone in Poland knows him!

I remember making my own Plastuś, it's probably something every child who grew up with the book did at some point. You can see that someone even left a little plasticine figure on the grave.



If you want to read a bit more about our tradition of visiting the graveyards and lighting candles around November 1st, I've written about it on my Poland is Awesome blog ;)


from Powązki Cemetery in Warsaw,
~Ro