Valborg

Today in Sweden, people are celebrating Valborg. This is a very old tradition, a bit forgotten sometimes. People don't know any longer what they are celebrating exactly.

But I think it has its roots in the celebration of the end of winter although spring has already arrived in the south earlier than that and despite that there is still snow in the north of Sweden. The country is so long (almost 1600 km from north to south) that there are bog differences in climate. The date is just somewhere in between probably.

One characteristic of that day is that they have bonfires where they burn small branches that lay on the ground after winter. Clean up what's left of winter and make it clean for spring and summer. That's the main idea. Read more on Wikipedia.