FACTBOX: The Day of the Dead's global spread

(Reuters Life!) - The Day of the Dead festival has its origins in a pre-Hispanic Aztec belief that the dead return to Earth one day each year to visit their loved ones.

Now observed by Catholic communities around the world, thousands of people from Manila to Mexico celebrate the festival reuniting the living with the dead on Nov 1 and 2.

ASIA:

-- Little-known elsewhere in Asia, the Day of the Dead is a national holiday known as "Araw ng mga Patay" in the mainly Roman Catholic, ex-Spanish colony of the Philippines.

-- Huge traffic jams form around cemeteries and street vendors do a roaring trade, selling food, flowers and candles. Buses and ferries are booked weeks ahead as millions of people go to their homes in the countryside for the long holiday.

-- After cleaning tombs and setting up gazebos around gravestones, people light candles for dead relatives and have grave-top picnics and parties on November 1, often staying overnight to take an unofficial holiday on Nov 2.

EUROPE:

-- European Catholics have celebrated All Saints Day in honor of the dead on November 1 since Pope Gregory IV set the date around 835 A.D., with November 2 later set as All Souls Day.

-- November 1 is now a public holiday in several countries with large Catholic populations, including Austria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Spain.