Rainy day play

I changed this from my original posting, as I desperately wanted to enter something in the See Us! group.

Today's challenge was to blip rain. There was no shortage of it. After many rapid shots from the bus, I ended up with a very out-of-focus tree shot, which I played with in iPhoto. The result is this egg.

My grandfather in Argyll had a large marble egg, wich he kept on the mantelpiece. I think it was orange, but I am sure my sister TMLHereandThere will correct me if it was otherwise. Sometimes, we children were allowed to play with it, and I have a half-memory of rolling it around on the rug in front of the fire. We weren't allowed to cart it around, because it was heavy and slippy.

As an adult, I have a fine collection of stone eggs and marbles of various sizes, and some papier mache ones that come from Kashmir, via Bahrain. I've had some for over 20 years, so I can no longer remember all their histories. They just are.

Almost twenty years ago, I spent Easter in the South Moravia, part of the Czech Republic. The tradition there is for women to gather hens' eggs to hardboil and dye using wax, plant materials, cloth, and coloured dye. The resulting eggs are more beautiful lnd elaborate than any I have ever seen in this country. the egss are known as Kraslice. Then, the fun begins!

On Easter sunday morning the men, young men and little boys go out in groups, 'armed' with a plaited switch of willow with ribbons of red, white and blue woven through. They knock on the doors of young women, in some cases hauling them out of bed, and proceed to beat them with the willow, while reciting a verse. Much slivovice is drunk. Then the girls give eggs to the men. You can sort of see where this is going...

The eggs I attempted were rubbish, but I did get beaten by a male friend, Lad'a, who assured me he was doing a favour. We had many drunken discussions over the course of the year about the role of women in society, and never once agreed, but continued to meet and get even drunker. We even went to Vienna one weekend, so his friend could buy a wetsuit, and ended up on the fabulous ferris wheel in Vienna's 1930s Prater amusement park.

More on easter beating:

Traditional Easter Beating

One Czech Easter tradition is frowned upon by women of the West and is seen as quite barbaric. This Czech practice is the traditional Easter beating, or whipping, of women with a pomlázka. This practice dates back to ancient pagan fertility rites when beating certain plants and trees was supposed to increase their fertility for the coming season. This rite is still practiced by some tomato growers who say a good bruising of the plants will increase tomato yields.

The pomlázka is a switch made from braided willow branches by Czech men, though nowadays it's also possible to buy the pomlázka already made. The men take these pomlázka, on Easter Monday, and "beat" the women in their homes and towns, while chanting the following poem:

Hody, hody, doprovody *Feast, feast, to visit come along

Dejte vají?ko malovaný Give me a painted egg

Nedáte-li malovaný If you will not give a painted egg

Dejte aspo? bílý Give me at least a white

Slepi?ka vám snese jiný Hen who will give another egg

*Loosely translated from Czech to English by my Czech husband.

This traditional Easter "beating" or "whipping" is viewed by Czech women as a very positive statement of care from their men. Surprisingly, the beating is supposed to grant the women good health, fertility, strength and happiness till the next Easter. The beating is not supposed to cause any physical harm to the women, and is only a fun part of the ancient celebration of springtime in the Czech lands. After the beating, women are supposed to give the men gifts of kraslice, alcohol, candy, food, or small coins as a way of thanking them for their beating. One more note, women and girls have the opportunity to return the favor of the Easter beating received from their men by pouring cold water over their men's heads. Many women take advantage of this opportunity, and many a man has a cold Easter shower.

Surce: http://successfulliving.hubpages.com/hub/Czech-Easter-Fun-Ancient-Practices