Easter from long ago or the funniest traditions one have ever heard of

Easter celebration brings together a lot of traditions, partially religious, partially pagan, which are respected especially in the rural areas from Bucovina . I will present in the following lines some of these customs – personally, I consider them both funny and incredibly important in order to understand the Romanian popular mentality.
• If a woman hasn’t finished weaving and embroidering the cotton shirts until the Holy Thursday, Joimărița (literally, this means the Holy Thursday Woman) will punish the poor guilty woman by beating, burning or eating her! No wonder why everyone finishes her work in time…
• Dead people come to visit their loved ones who are still alive over the Easter holiday – this involves that they should have water, food and a big fire to keep them warm when the night falls down.
• If you don’t eat anything during the Holy Friday, you will be healthy all year long and, in addition, you will know 3 days in advance when your life will come to an end.
• Once you get off the bed on the Holy Friday morning, you have to step on a small piece of iron, while on the Easter morning you have to step on a bed linen – all these should save you from wounds and itching in the coming summer.

• Easter eggs, cakes and bread can be prepared only on Thursday and Saturday. But hang on to this! – trays should be introduced in the oven only with the right hand, in a moment of complete silence. Moreover, the trays number has to be even, if you want to avoid the death of your beloved husband.

• People who crack red eggs on Easter will meet again in the after life.
• A nap is completely forbidden on the Easter day, if you don’t want to be sleepy all year long. Also be careful and keep away from salt, otherwise you will have sweaty hands in the following summer.                                                   
• On Sunday morning, unmarried girls used to hold a red egg in their breast or to stick egg shells to the house doors, in order to attract men.
• In the second day of Easter, that is Monday, boys used to wet girls by throwing them in a river or in a lake. Don’t get angry, girls, if that happens to you – that means someone will soon pop the question .

Easter goodies
As I was saying, this celebration represents a great opportunity for women to prove their great cooking skills. Unfortunately, this usually means that the full-of-calories Easter meals will be followed by digestion medicines and, even worse, by visits to the doctor. Although exaggerated appetite and food excess aren’t at all encouraged by the orthodox fasting tradition, the Romanian Easter goodies make food abstinence seem science fiction. Lamb roast has an important place on the table, together with the beautifully-colored eggs and the sweet-perfumed cakes. However, no meal should ever start without cracking the eggs, an opportunity to compete for “the toughest one”. Don’t be surprised if you hear everyone saying “Hristos a înviat!”-“Adevărat a înviat!” (“Jesus is resurrected!” – “He’s truly resurrected!”), these exclamations are used both when cracking eggs and when greeting someone during Easter holidays.