Enriched Traditions of Valentine’s Day around the Globe

Written by Aara Jones
5 · 18 · 18
Enriched Traditions of Valentine’s Day around the Globe

The world is full of so many traditions to celebrate love, but Valentine’s Day is the most famous. You can any special day and make it an addition to your way of celebrating love.

Valentine’s Day is the most loved day of the year. Apparently, it is a way of affirming a life full of love for so many people. Our world is full of diverse cultures and different traditions. Do you know that people celebrate Valentine’s Day differently in many countries? For some, it is all about flowers, chocolates, and cards, but for some, it is about spoons as well.

The mere act of celebrating love joins people around the world, but the way people celebrate it is definitely fascinating.

Unique Ways of Celebrating Valentine’s Day

India

India is rich with different religious practices, but the majority follows Hinduism. In Hinduism, their God of Love is ‘Kamdev’ who carries a bunch of flower bows. Couples fall in love if they Kamdev’s arrow strikes them.

With this story of Kamdev – The God of Love, India also has a number of temples in different states that have sculptures showing erotic lovemaking.

Slovenia

Celebrating Valentine’s Day is about flowers and cards, but for Slovenians, it is not just about that. Some people believe that when a young girl sees the first bird, that bird announces how the girl’s husband is going to be. Some celebrate it by waking on the ice as well.

Valentine’s Day is also called Gregorjevo in Slovenia. 12th March is the exact date for them to celebrate Valentine’s Day. According to Slovenians, birds get married on the first day of spring and 12 March used to be the first spring day for them.

United Kingdom

Like all the other countries, people in the United Kingdom celebrate Valentine’s Day with great emotions. One way of celebrating the love day is by giving flowers, cards, and chocolates to their loved ones while another way, which is equally popular, is Verses penning.

Wales

In wales, the love day is called ‘Saint Dwynwen’s Day’ and celebrated every year on January 25th.  Unlike other countries, Wales celebrates the day by exchanging special spoons with the one they love and they call it ‘Love Spoon’. It mainly means that you are ‘Spooning’ with the person you love.

That’s sweet.

Also, read How Valentine’s Day is Celebrated Across the World?.

China

The Chinese have very thick roots of celebrating their own ‘Love Day’ not for decades, but for centuries. That day is called the “Qixi Festival” – the night of seven. They celebrate the week in early August usually that is on the 7th lunar month’s 7th day.

There is a great love story behind it. The story about Milky Way’s two stars, Zhinu – she was a fairy and Niulang – a mortal man. They had love at first sight and when they got married, the Goddess of heaven got so angry that she created the whole Milky Way to keep the two lovebirds separate from each other. There is a star on the east side of Milky Way called Vega. It represents the fairy. On the west side is Niulang, who cries for his wife and the couple meets only once in a year. This day comes during the Qixi festival.

Young girls, mostly unmarried girls, visit the temple during the Qixi week. They pray to have noble husbands, offer carved melons and fruits, so that the fairy Zhinu, known as the ancient Goddess of relationship and love, may hear their intention.

South Korea

South Korea has adopted westernization so much during the last few years. People here follow the western way of celebrating the Valentine’s Day, as they do it in U.S., Britain, and Canada. They give flowers and cards to their loved ones and spend the day with them. However, their celebration does not end here. On 14 March, men return the favor to their women by giving loved ones flowers and gifts.

In fact, South Korea keeps different celebration on 14th of each month.

Germany

Celebrating love is itself exciting, but in Germany, you would find a little extra something adding to the celebration that is a Pig.

Yes, you read it right. In Germany with flowers and heart-shaped gift exchanging, they also add a pig, which represents luck and lust. It is not necessary to give a live pig. It could be in any form, like a picture, even a sculpture, or any other form one feels the best. In addition to the pig, they also prepare heart-shaped cookies having dreamy phrases or messages, for example, I love you (Ich liebe dich).

You can find even more traditions to celebrate Valentine’s Day but what matters the most is that you are in love and you get love in return. You would agree that whenever you are in presence of love, the feeling itself is a celebration. Now you have to choose a way to celebrate it.

Valentine’s Day Infographic

Here’s an infographic you must not miss. Share it with people you know if it interests you.

Lifestyle Glitz - valentines day infographic

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Author

Aara Jones