Spring has come! - Story of drowning of Marzanna (Winter is no more!!!) :D

That's the end of story of Marzanna and winter too :) Hope you'll enjoyed it as well as me... well it's impossible :) for me it was really perversive pleasure :D

Drowning of the Marzanna ("frost maiden") is a pagan tradition still popular in Poland. For my ancestors, the custom was associated with the everlasting rhythm of life. It expressed their joy at the coming of spring, which meant a rebirth of nature, promising crops and abundance. The marzanna was a representation of winter, a straw female effigy, dressed in white and adorned with coral beads and ribbons. In Silesia, she was clad in a beautiful wedding dress with a wreath on her head. Villagers carried the marzanna from house to house, then stripped her and scattered the clothes over the fields. Eventually she was drowned in a river, pond, and lake or simply in a big puddle. Sometimes before throwing her into the water the effigy was set on fire. As the Marzanna was carried out of the village one way, on the opposite side the villagers carried in the maik - green branches adorned with ribbons, coral beads and flowers. Over centuries this ceremony evolved into a form of amusement. Today drowning the marzanna is mainly done by children on the first day of spring and an unofficial truants' day.

Obviously I couldn't done all that things (imagine me carrying Marzana through whole London - it would take ages :D), but as every year (despite I'm not a kid anymore... well I am a little :))) I had to do this :) Also, as always on the first day of spring I've wore shorts despite rain and temperature as low as 5°C :)))