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April behaves the way it wants, is a saying we have here in Salzburg, Austria. It refers to the weather, because in April you can have everything what the seasons have on offer: it can be really hot an warm, you can have big white flakes covering the earth and have days of extensive snow, it can be foggy and rather dark and it can be just spring.
The first oft April is a very special day – April fool's day. Don't believe it if someone tells you spectacular tales or even if there are news that are hard to believe. It could be that someone is making fun of you.
In April 2011 we have all the Easter holidays, starting with Palm Sunday on the 17th of April – on this day you can see children with their "Palmbuschen" on their way to or from church. "Palmbuschen" consist in our region of seven different bushes which you arrange like a bouquet on a stick. The blessed "Palmbuschen" are punt into acres and grassland to beware them from harm.
The following week has more holidays of the catholic church which end with the highest church holiday: Easter. With Easter Sunday on April 24. This Easter week is the last part of Lenten season, in catholic rural region people don't eat meat on Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday until noon.
Children are looking forward to Easter Sunday, which will be on 24th of April 2011. On this Easter Day Easter Bunny will hide colourful painted eggs, chocolate eggs and Easter Bunnies made of chocolate and maybe some Easter presents.
The Easter holidays end with Easter Monday – a day where schools and all shops are closed (except for web stores of course).
This last week of April has another surprise for us: April 30 – Walpurgis night, the night of the witches. In the so called "Rupertigau" the region of Salzburg and its surroundings including Bavaria and Berchtesgaden there is a tradition for the night from the 30th of April to the first of May: the night of Phillippi. All that is not properly stored and put away - will be put somewhere else. Usually the youth of the village will stroll around the farms and look out for stuff and it could be that you will find a pushcart on the roof of a tool shed, usually the "found" objects are all put on display on the main square of the village. For tourists of Salzburg, Freilassing, Ramsau and Berchtesgaden that means: expect to see strange things on May first.
This tradition and its output is especially public as on May first people gather on the main square of the village to put up the Maypole and to celebrate the first fair of the year.
As photo for our April calendar sheet we choose a heart in the lawn, a lawn sprinkled with daisies and wild strawberries. The heart is made out of crochet circles, a work-in-progress (wip) picture for a big crochet blanket, a hexagon blanket to be precise.
Print out your calendar sheet April (pdf, 1.3 MB)
13.03.2011. 18:23