Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Siebenschläfertag

Don't Germans have funny words! Today is - in English - Seven Sleepers' Day, a day with confusing origins and meanings.

Basically it belongs to the Farmers' Almanac of Germany - whatever weather you have on June 27 is the weather you will have for the rest of the summer - for the next seven weeks. Of course farmers care because of the crops and such, but everyone else cares because it's summer and we want sunshine and warm!

So here it was on Siebenschläfertag at 8AM on the Weser in Vegasack: lovely.




Unfortunately, the rest of the day was what you might generously call "variable" : rain, sun, rain, WIND, lots of rain, sun more really strong winds, sun, etc and so on and so on. What WILL these next seven weeks be?


The legend gets connected in some unexplainable way with the story of seven young men who were sealed in a cave because they were Christians in the early Roman Empire. Hundreds of years later, the cave was opened and the young men rubbed their eyes and woke up thinking it had been only a night. Then after some confusion and upset, the then ruling Emperor declared their story a miracle. Then they promptly died. (You wonder about where telling the truth gets you.)


We're hoping for better weather and miracles that don't end in death.

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