Obskure Feiertage aus aller Welt

Obscure and unique hol­i­days from around the world range from cul­tur­al, nature-based, to pure­ly fun, such as Bhutan’s Blessed Rainy Day (Sept 22), which wash­es away sins, and Mexico’s Night of the Radish­es (Dec 23), fea­tur­ing intri­cate radish carv­ings. Oth­er, less­er-known cel­e­bra­tions include La Tomati­na in Spain (mas­sive food fight), Japan’s Moun­tain Day (nature appre­ci­a­tion), and Inter­na­tion­al Talk Like a Pirate Day (Sept 19). 

Here are some of the most obscure and unique hol­i­days world­wide:

  • Night of the Radish­es (Mex­i­co – Dec 23): Arti­sans in Oax­a­ca carve giant radish­es into detailed, the­mat­ic scenes.
  • Blessed Rainy Day (Bhutan – Sept 22): A day mark­ing the end of the mon­soon sea­son, where rain is believed to be blessed by the Bud­dha.
  • Siz­dah Be-Dar (Iran – April 2): Known as “Nature Day,” peo­ple spend the day out­doors to avoid bad luck asso­ci­at­ed with the 13th day of the Per­sian New Year.
  • Che­ung Chau Bun Fes­ti­val (Hong Kong): Fea­tures a “bun scram­bling” com­pe­ti­tion to climb tow­ers of sweet buns.
  • La Tomati­na (Spain – August): Thou­sands gath­er in Buñol for a mas­sive, chaot­ic toma­to fight.
  • Yule Lads (Ice­land – Dec 12–24): 13 trick­ster fig­ures who vis­it chil­dren over the 13 days before Christ­mas.
  • Pic­nic Day (Aus­tralia – Aug): A pub­lic hol­i­day in the North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry dat­ing back to the late 1800s.
  • Moun­tain Day (Japan – Aug 11): A recent hol­i­day (2016) cre­at­ed to encour­age appre­ci­a­tion of the out­doors.
  • Day of the Sea (Bolivia – March 23): Remem­bers the loss of coast­line to Chile dur­ing the War of the Pacif­ic.
  • Radunit­sa (Belarus): A day for ances­tor ven­er­a­tion, often involv­ing clean­ing graves and hav­ing pic­nics with the deceased.
  • Inter­na­tion­al Talk Like a Pirate Day (Glob­al – Sept 19): A light­heart­ed, unof­fi­cial hol­i­day to speak like a pirate. 

These, along­side oth­ers like Cheese Piz­za Day (Sept 5) or Dig­i­tal Detox Day (March 5), show­case a mix of deep tra­di­tion and mod­ern whim­sy. 

I real­ly meant to do one design for every day of the year — to cov­er the com­plete range of pos­si­ble date down to 29th of Feb­ru­ary. But I soon found that 366 is a mighty tall num­ber. So this will just have to wait.

Mean­while, here are some of the designs I DID make:

International Sloth Day
20 October

Sloth Day

Hey ho, it’s Monkey Day today!
December 14th

Mon­key Day

Maybe the sweetest of them all …

Cake Day