Showing posts with label Easter holidays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Easter holidays. Show all posts
Making connections: traditions and rituals of love and devotion, or, When you wish upon a heart
I found another photo that's similar to the one I showed you earlier of the ribbons and pieces of cloth tied at an Islamic shrine in Syria. I took this photo in the lovely garden of a gold onion domed Russian Orthodox church in the Bulgarian countryside, where the branches of a tree were tied with hundreds of strings, many bearing tiny trinkets such as hearts. The universal symbol for love, no? So once again I'm reminded of that 1970s song 'Tie a yellow ribbon round the ole Oak tree...' One theory, from the USA, has the tradition of ribbon-tying dating back to the 19th century when women wore yellow ribbons to show their devotion to their 'sweethearts serving in the US Cavalry (yellow being the official Cavalry colour), and then sees it widening throughout society in the 1970s to signify remembrance of a loved one away in the military or in prison. During the ongoing Iraq War, families of US soldiers have been wrapping large yellow ribbons around their porches. The American Folklore Centre researched the origins of the tradition, finding connections to the Civil War, a prison legend cited in a 1959 book, and even to Shakespeare's Othello. Having travelled all over the world, and seen ribbons and strings (like the locks) in many different countries, I find it baffling that a researcher would only look at Western references and that their research didn't cross more borders, cultures and religions. This academic paper I found on 'Religious practices in the Turco-Iranian world: continuity and change' by Martin van Bruinessen, a scholar from Utrecht University, looks at the long list of 'superstitious' (and therefore anti-Islamic) rituals of Muslim pilgrims in Turkey, who treat visits to shrines as cheap family outings and behave like ordinary tourists; they tie pieces of cloth to the gate of the shrine and ribbons and strings to trees, in addition to lighting candles, placing 'wishing stones' on the tombs, and circling the courtyard trees seven times. The Russian (and Greek) Orthodox Christians do the same thing. I remember participating in the act with my Russian grandparents every Easter, walking around the Church at midnight, holding candles. And I expect they do the same thing in Bulgaria.
Recollecting Easter Holidays and the Renaissance of Caravanning
My childhood memories of Easter: painting hard-boiled eggs red with my Russian baboushka; gluing pastel coloured cotton wool balls onto a silly hat (um, I mean, helping my mum make my Easter bonnet for the class competition); aching legs from standing for hours in the incense-filled Russian Orthodox church; wondering why my Easter bonnet didn’t win; concentrating on holding my candle upright so as not to spill hot wax on myself as we circled the Russian church (it was midnight); hunting for chocolate-shaped bunnies and eggs my dad had hidden in our backyard; and, naturally, eating chocolate, for days so it seemed. My memories are hazy; scrambled together are moments from two separate Easters, the Western Christian Easter we celebrated with the rest of Australia, and 13 days later, the Eastern Orthodox festivities my mother’s Russian side of the family observed. What is clear, though, is that Easter holidays usually involved family caravanning trips away. We’d tow the van to leafy caravan parks by the beach in small towns on the New South Wales coast with strange Australian names like Yamba, Tuncurry, and Mollymook. High on our list of priorities were fishing, swimming, sun, and seafood. By day we’d be on a boat or on the beach and in the evenings we’d be cooking barbeques by the van and playing monopoly or cards before bed. The parks were crammed with families who all had the same idea, to catch the last of the warm weather before autumn (fall) set in, so there’d always be long lines for the showers and toilets in the morning, plenty of other children to play with, and people for my folks to have a drink with after I was in bed. In those days, we called and booked our site a few days in advance, sometimes we even rocked up on the day. Either way, we nearly always got an excellent site within splashing distance of the sea. Or at least close enough to be able to walk barefoot down to the beach, and to fall asleep listening to the waves crashing on the shore. But I've already told you enough about my caravanning youth. These days, Australian families book a year in advance for school holidays, and there's such a shortage of parks that government land is being acquired to build more. The Australian economy is booming, Australian families could travel anyway they please. So is caravanning experiencing a renaissance? Take a read: Paradise Fills Up Fast for Nomads.