Holy Week is a significant religious observance for the Roman Catholics and some Christians around the world. It is the week preceding Easter and it begins on a Palm Sunday. Traditionally, it is a week of somber reflections before Jesus’ death. While Holy Week is solemn and sorrowful it is also celebrated with a lot of anticipation about the joy of Easter.

Holy Week Traditions and Observances

ITALY

In Procida, Italy, a wooden statue of Christ, made by the Italian sculptor Carmine Lantriceni in 1728, is paraded through the street on the island off the coast of Naples.

In Sicily Italy, a day-long passion procession featuring twenty floats of lifelike wood, canvas and glue sculptures of individual scenes of the events of the Passion is being held. It is known as Misteri di Trapani or the Procession of the Mysteries of Trapani.

GUATEMALA

In Guatemala, Holy Week incorporates processions with images of saints carried on huge wooden platforms. Locals, both men and women, who are frequently in purple robes, holds the heavy “andas”. The procession is led by a man holding a container of incense accompanied by a small horn and flute band.

MEXICO

Yaqui Indians in Mexico, commemorate Holy Week with both rituals and theater. The celebration starts on Wednesday evening in which people arrive at the church on horseback and begin to crawl and dance naked on the floor. Light begins to go out and people begin the whipping, screaming and crying to the sound of ceremonial music of sacrifice.

INDONESIA

In Java, Indonesia, Christians hold a Good Friday processions in the city of Magelang where locals carry crosses.

ISRAEL

Holy Week in Jerusalem, Israel is celebrated with series of masses and processions starting on a Palm Sunday. Being the world’s foremost pilgrimage destination during Holy Week, thousands of people from around the globe go to this place to join other Christians with the reenactment of Jesus’ journey until his death on the cross.

PHILIPPINES

Holy week in the Philippines begins on a Palm Sunday where people carry palm fronds called “palaspas” to church to be blessed by the priest. They bring those palms home and use it as shield against evil spirits by putting them in front of the door or at the windows. Beginning Holy Thursday, most businesses big or small, are closed and work in both private and public offices are suspended. Most people return to their home provinces to observe the holidays by joining masses, processions and other local practices and traditions like pabasa (epic poem narrating Jesus’ life and death by singing), senakulo (Passion play) and pinitensya (public penance).

National Beer Day which is observed in the US on April 7 every year, marks the day that the Cullen-Harrison Act was enacted into law. This was Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first step towards ending the Prohibition which banned the brewing and selling of beer in the US for 13 years. Upon signing the legislation, President Franklin D. Roosevelt made a famous remark – “I think this would be a good time for a beer.” The law went into effect on April 7, 1933.

The Cullen-Harrison Act

Senator Pat Harrison, a politician from Mississippi from 1911 to 1919 and Representative Thomas H. Cullen, a politician from New York who has been a member of the US House of Representatives from 1919 to 1944 were the sponsors of the law. This law legalized the sale in the United States of beer with an alcohol content of 3.2% and wine of similarly low alcohol content.

How National Beer Day started

In 2009, Justin Smith of Richmond, Viginia created the first National Beer Day. He started a Facebook page that was noticed by the Colorado Beer Examiner. Justin’s promotion of the new holiday was rewarded when Untappd – a beer drinking app – created a badge for National Beer Day. The app rewarded participants that checked a beer into the app on the 7^th of April. Since then, the National Beer Day trends yearly on April 7 using the hashtag #NationalBeerDay.

San Diego is the 8^th largest city in the United States and second largest in California. It is often referred to as “America’s Finest City” for its great hotel accommodations, mild year-round climate, pristine beaches and abundance of entertainment.

One of the major attractions and most-loved destinations in the city are the various theme parks which feature thrilling rides, fun shows and delicious foods. Here is a list of some of those theme parks that the kids and the kids-at-heart will surely enjoy.

Legoland

Legoland California in northern San Diego County is filled with towering LEGO statues. It opened on March 20, 1999. It is composed of nine sections -The Beginning, Explorer Island, Heartlake City, Fun Town, Castle Hill, Miniland USA, Imagination Zone, Pirate Shores, and Land of Adventure. A Sea Life aquarium which opened in 2010 can also be found adjacent to Legoland. This Lego wonderland is full of fun water rides, hands-on activities and entertaining shows.

Seaworld

SeaWorld San Diego, the first SeaWorld park, opened on March 21, 1964 is one of the best theme parks in San Diego for its thrilling water rides, entertaining shows and a variety of beautiful sea creatures. It also features a variety of educational shows and exhibits including “Turtle Reef” and the “Shark Encounter.”

San Diego Zoo

San Diego Zoo in Balboa Park San Diego, California houses around 4,000 animals of 800 rare and exotic species in a beautiful 100-acre tropical garden. It is a timeless attraction for all ages featuring spectacular bioclimatic exhibits like Monkey Trails, Absolutely Apes, Ituri Forest, Rain Forest Aviary, Polar Bear Plunge, Gorilla Tropics, Sun Bear Forest and Tiger River. The zoo also has the largest population of the endangered and lovable Giant Pandas in the U.S.

San Diego Zoo Safari Park

 The San Diego Zoo Safari Park, formerly Wild Animal Park is a 730-hectare zoo in the San Pasqual Valley area of San Diego, California. It is one of the largest tourist attractions in San Diego County visited by 2 million people annually. The park houses a large array of over 2,600 animals, some wild and endangered. The park is noted for its California condor breeding program, the most successful program in the United States.

April Fool’s Day is celebrated yearly on April 1 where people play pranks or practical jokes and spread hoaxes. This is a popular activity since the 19^th century where even newspapers, magazines and other published media report fake stories which are explained the next day or below the news section in small letters.

April Fool’s Day Traditions

In UK, an April Fool joke or prank is revealed by shouting “April Fool!” at the recipient. The joking ceases at midday and a person playing a joke after midday is the “April Fool” themselves.

In Ireland, a victim is entrusted with an important letter to be given to a specific person, the person would then ask the victim to send it to someone else and so on. The letter actually contains the message “send the fool further.”

In Poland, April 1 is celebrated with so many jokes told, various hoaxes prepared by people, media and even public institutions.

In Italy, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, and French-speaking areas of Switzerland and Canada, the tradition is known as “April fish,” where people attempt to attach a paper to the victim’s back without being noticed.

Top April Fool’s Day Pranks and Jokes

In 1962, in Sweden, there was only one television channel and it was shown in black and white. The station announced that their researchers discovered that covering the television screen with a pair of tights would cause the image in the television appear with colors. Thousands of viewers fell for the hoax where even fathers rushed through the house to find stocking to place over their tv sets.

In 1957, a news show broadcast by Panorama reported a 3-minute video footage of a family in southern Switzerland pulling pasta off spaghetti trees. Hundreds of people phoned the BBC to know how they could have their own “home-grown spaghetti.”

In 1977, the Guardian published a “special report” about a country located in the Indian Ocean called San Serriffe, consisting of several islands that form the shape of a semi-colon. The Guardian’s phones rang all day that the readers want more information about the “perfect sounding” holiday spot.

In 1998, Burger King published a full-page advertisement in USA Today about their new menu: the Left-Handed Whopper, especially designed for the 32 million left-handed Americans. It had the same ingredients as the original Whopper, but all the condiments were rotated 180 degrees. Thousands of customers went into the restaurant to order the new sandwich while many others requested for the right-handed version

In April 1978, a barge towing a giant iceberg appeared in Sydney Harbor. Dick Smith, a local adventurer and millionaire businessman, promoted this iceberg from Antarctica saying he was going to carve the berg into small cubes and sell it to public for ten cents each. These cubes promised to improve the taste of any drink they cooled. Local radio stations provided blow by blow coverage but when it started to rain, the firefighting foam and the shaving cream which made the berg, washed out and the white plastic sheets beneath were revealed.