Grants are available for community groups to remember their absent friends

To Absent Friends, the people’s festival of storytelling and remembrance, returns in November, and organisations from across Scotland are being invited to take part, with the help of a small grants scheme.

The festival, started in 2014, gives people across Scotland the opportunity to remember loved ones who have died, through stories, celebrations and acts of reminiscence. November has long been associated with remembrance of the dead, through traditions like Samhain and All Souls’ Day. To Absent Friends is reviving those lost traditions and helping to create new ones. In previous years, the festival has featured storytelling evenings, poetry nights, photography exhibitions, concerts, scrapbooking workshops, cafes of reminiscence, and hundreds of private acts of remembrance, but all ideas are welcome. The more creative, the better!

Organisations can apply for grants of up to £250 to hold events as part of the festival. They are specifically keen to hear from small, local organisations. This is a great opportunity to remember someone in the local area and for children and young people to participate in. Intergenerational applications will also be considered.

Full details of how to apply are available on the festival website, which also has many more suggestions for ways in which people can participate. The deadline for applications is Friday 24 August.

To Absent Friends will take place across Scotland from 1 – 7 November 2018. For further information contact Robert Peacock or call on 0131 272 2735.