Month: February 2019

Candelaria (Peru)

A lively celebration of Candlemas is held in Puno, Peru, for about two weeks, including February 2. On that day priests and laypeople form a huge procession that carries the statue of the Virgin Mary through streets carpeted with yellow flowers. Preparations begin more than a week before, however, with church decorating, feasts, and fireworks. By the second week, hundreds of dancers and musicians have arrived to join the main procession, accompanying it with indigenous dances and colorful costumes. Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

The Wild Hunt

The Wild Hunt was a once prevalent folk myth across northern, western, and central Europe involving a phantasmal group of armed huntsmen, horses, and hounds in mad pursuit across the skies or along the ground. The hunters were variously believed to be spirits, deities, or historical or legendary figures. Seeing the Wild Hunt was thought to presage some catastrophe such as war or plague or the death of the one who witnessed it. The Wild Hunt was often used to explain what weather phenomenon? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Winterlude

A midwinter civic festival held in Ottawa, Canada, Winterlude is primarily a celebration of winter sports. The Rideau Canal, which has been referred to as “the world’s longest skating rink,” is nearly eight kilometers (five miles) long and provides an excellent outdoor skating facility. There is also snowshoeing, skiing, curling (in which thick, heavy stone and iron disks are slid across the ice toward a target), speedskating, dogsled racing, and tobogganing. For those who prefer not to participate in the many sporting events, there is an elaborate snow sculpture exhibit known as Ice Dream. Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Grub Street

“Grub Street” was the name of a street in London known for its concentration of aspiring authors and poets, low-end publishers and bookshops, and writers of low-quality books. It existed on the margins of London’s journalistic and literary scene and became famous for its bohemian society amidst low-rent flophouses, brothels, and coffeehouses. Today, “Grub Street” is used as a pejorative term for hack writers and their literary output. What poet popularized the contemporary image of Grub Street? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary