My BetweenTimes...: SPRING EQUINOX

As I don't belong to any religion, to me and many other people, Easter is the time to celebrate Spring , but Easter is definitely religious holiday with its customs and traditions.

Generally I love traditions, but I am just about to make a statement here. I hate Easter time, well particularly one Easter tradition in the Czech Republic where I come from. Before I tell you about it, I would like to talk about Easter in general and the traditions of other countries I also lived in -the UK, Germany, France and now the US, so that you understand that it was really nothing to look forward to – FOR A GIRL! when I still lived in the Czech Republic.

Where does the word 'Easter' come from? It is believed that long ago some people in Europe worshipped the Goddess of Spring 'Eostre' and that Easter got its name from her. They thought that the sun died in winter and was born again in Spring and the goddess brought the spring and with it the sun would get stronger. Others believe that the word comes from two old pagan spring festivals. The old European pagan festival of 'Ostara' that celebrated new life and Arabian Sun festival of 'Ishtar'.

The early Christians took over the festivals and turned the pagan festivals of new life to mean the new life that Jesus gave the world when he rose from the dead.

Easter is the time of the Christian year when Christians remember the Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Unlike Christmas, when Jesus's births is celebrated, Easter is celebrated around the same time of year that Jesus was killed. This is because Jesus died at the time of the Jewish Passover festival. The fist Jewish Christians added Easter celebrations to the Passover festival and because Jesus rose from the dead on a Sunday, Easter Day became the first Sunday after Passover.

Over the years, the Christian festival moved in date slightly from the Jewish Passover, so they don't now have the same date, but sometimes they are very close. The Christian date for Easter also follows the moon, so it aslo changes every year. To make things even more complicated, Orthodox Christians celebrate Easter, like Christmas, on a different day to Catholic and Western Christians.

Easter officially starts with Lent. LENT is the period of 46 days before Easter (Lent last for 40 days but you don't count the Sundays). It starts on Ash Wednesday and ends on Easter Day - Easter Saturday. It is a time to prepare for Easter. The last week of Lent is called Holy Week.

The day before Lent is SHROVE TUESDAY which is also known as MARDI GRAS in other countries.
Mardi Gras begins on or after Epiphany and finishes on the day bofore Ash Wednesday. Mardi Gras season is festival season, also known for eating richer, fatty foods before the fasting rituals of Lent. It means 'fat Tuesday' in French.

HOLY WEEK starts on Palm Sunday and finishes with the celebration of Easter Sunday. In many churches, during Holy Week, special services are held on everyday up to and including Good Friday. Holy Week is a special time for Christians. Although every day is important, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday are very special.

PALM SUNDAY is the first Day of Holy Week. It is called Palm Sunday because the people were so happy to see Jesus, they took branches from the Palm and Olive Trees and waved them in the air. Today, to remember that day, Christians all over the world go to special Palm Sunday Church Services. They often receive small crosses made from Palm leaves or other local woods.

GOOD FRIDAY is a very important day when Christians remember that Jesus died for everyone. The 'Good' in Good Friday comes from old English when Good meant Holy. So you could call Good Friday 'Holy Friday'. There are parades all over the worls to celebrate and remember Good Friday.

EASTER EVE or HOLY SATURDAY is the day between Good Friday and Easter Day. It represents the one full day that Jesus was dead. It is also sometimes known as Holy Saturday. Most churches do not have any services on Easter Eve until the Midnight service to start the celebrations of Easter Day. It is also the last day of Lent. This day si also sometimes incorrectly called Easter Saturday. Easter Saturday is the Saturday following Easter Sunday, not the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.

EASTER MONDAY is the day after Easter Sunday and is a national holiday in many countries. In some places it is called Ball Monday.

Rabbits and hares, eggs and chicks are often associated with Easter because, in Pagan times, they were signs of fertility and new life.

Here are some of the Easter traditions and customs I remember or was told about when I lived in:

GERMANY
Germans enjoy a very long Easter weekend. Good Friday (Karfreitag) and Easter Monday (Ostermontag) are public holidays and banks, offices and shops are closed. The schools are closed for usually two weeks around the Easter weekend.

Several days before Easter you will see spring flowers on display and traditional Easter trees – decorated with hanging eggs. The eggs are hollowed and decorated in many different styles.

There is a custom of boiling eggs, the symbols of new life, which began in Germany. The bright colours represent sunlight and growth. Nowadays, the Easter eggs are also exchanged as presents.

Other symbol is the rabbit – Easter bunny (der Osterhase) which symbolizes fertility (It was imported to America as Easter bunny by Dutch settlers in Pennsylvania). The first edible Easter bunnies were made in Germany around 1800.

Easter Sunday is the most important of the holiday weekend. Families gather for the Easter lunch that includes coloured eggs and a lamb-shaped cake among others. In the morning, parents hide baskets filled with coloured, hardboiled eggs, chocolate bunnies, sweets and other little presents for the kids and many families attend an Easter service. I is a good day to visit a local market in search for arts and crafts.

Egg races (Eierlauf) are held in some villages on Easter Monday.

The celebration of Mardi Gras is called Karneval, Fasching or Fastnacht and the most famous parades are in Cologne and Düsseldorf. Easter bonfires are lit in the north regions of Germany to chase away the winter and prepare for the spring.

Frohe Ostern! Happy Easter!

FRANCE
Different regions have different traditions, but one in common - children Easter hunts for eggs hidden in the gardens, homes and playgrounds. Children prepare nest in their gardens and houses for the Easter bunny (le lapin de Pâcques) who will arrive during the night, bringing chocolate eggs. On Easter Sunday the children look for the eggs left by the Easter bunny.

The children also throw the raw eggs up in the air and catch them so long until someone drops one. Sometimes the raw eggs are rolled down a gentle slope and the surviving egg wins.

Some traditional food are doughnuts (les beignets) , pancakes (les crepe) or waffles (les guagres).

Church bells do not ring on Good Friday or Easter Saturday. Sometimes children are told that the bells have gone off to see the Pope. The bells ring again on Easter Sunday and children are sometimes told that they are coming back to deliver their eggs on Easter morning. So, in the candy shops you can also find chocolate flying bells.

There is also something else you can find in the shops around Easter – a chocolate fish - poisson d’Avril - April fish. It is not originally related to Easter , but to the 1^st of April –Fools Day. Children try to stick a paper fish onto the backs of adults and run away shouting “Poisson d’Avril !”

Joyeuses Pâcques! or Bonnes Pâcques! Happy Easter!

UK
Special Easter parades are held as well and the Battersea Park parade in London is a very popular one.
Easter Monday is a favourite day for funfairs with rides and roundabouts, one of the oldest is held on Hampstead Heath in London.

Morris dancing is a traditional English form of folk dance which is also performed in other English-speaking countries such as the USA and Australia. The roots of the dancing are probably dating back to the Middle Ages. In the dance men dress up in costumes with hats and ribbons and bells around their ankles and dance through the streets.

Easter bunny made it to the UK as well :-). Also here, the eggs are painted, decorated or dyed, and then hidden around the garden for an Egg Hunt. Egg rolling competitions take place too.

Hot cross buns were first baked in Englang to be served on Good Friday. These sweet yeast buns contain raisins or currants and sometimes chopped candied fruit. Before baking, a cross is made on the top of the bun. The cross is filled with sugar icing after baking. I really like them.

USA
I am sure that everybody have heard about Mardi Gras in the New Orleans which features lots of fun activities.

Otherwise, the Easter traditionas are very similar to the ones in the UK and Germany.

Easter egg hunts and egg rolling are two popular traditions. The White House Easter Egg Roll, a race in which children push decorated, hard-boiled eggs across the White House lawn, is an annual event. The first official White House egg roll occurred in 1878.

I believe that top-selling Easter candy have been the marshmallow Peeps which are coloured marshmallows in the shape of chicks.

CZECH REPUBLIC
So, the German, French, British and American kids seem to have lots of fun during Easter…..and Czech girls... well they get whipped!

Easter in the Czech Republic lasts two days – Easter Sunday and Monday.

The Easter tradition is not so popular in the cities anymore, but in the country and regions with strong folklore like Moravia, where I come from, it is very different.

Girls make Easter eggs and boys make Easter whip (pomlazka) which is made of willow branches and decorated with colourful ribbons. Its original meaning is to chase away illness and bad spirits and to bring health and youth for the rest of the year to the person who is whipped with the young willow twigs. On Easter Monday (Velikonocni Pondeli) young boys would whip young girls lightly on the legs and in some regions douse them with water which has a similar meaning. As a reward, the girls would give boys decorated eggs (kraslice) or candy.

The whipping should be symbolic, but let me tell you, I still remember “the symbolism” on my legs. We are not talking only about young boys. Anybody of the male gender can participate on this. Unfortunately, today the men are also given shots of plum brandy (slivovice) and as the men progress through the village, by early afternoon, they don’t seem to remember anything about the symbolic meaning of the tradition. So you stand there with the fake smile on your face waiting to be whipped and then reward the men with eggs, alcohol and nowadays even with some money.

How would you like this tradition?

What saves my Easter is the art of egg decorating which I really enjoy. There are many ways to decorated them. You can dye egg shells different colours if you hard boil them in water with differnt things in it. 'Spinach leaves' make them green, 'beetroot' red, 'tea bag' dark brown, 'onion skin' yellow and 'red cabbage leaves' light blue. You can also use food colouring powder, but this is more fun.

If you want to keep the decorated eggs, you first have to empty them by blowing the content in a bowl through small holes that you make on both ends of the egg with a needle or a pin. Hollowed eggs can be decorated in so many beautiful ways!