St Valentines Day, Festival of the Matchmakers

There are as many as eight possible Valentines Day origins and the three most likely contenders were all early church martyrs.

However, before the Christian Saints, the day started as a festival to honour Juno, Queen of the Roman deities. Juno was sister and consort of Jupiter, mother of Mars, and one of the most important of the Roman pantheon. She had many duties, each with an associated title, as a protector of the Roman people she was Juno Regina, advisor to those about to marry as Juno Moneta and as goddess of Roman women and childbirth, Juno Lucina. From her title “Juno Moneta” we get the word “money” because the Roman mint was built close to one of her temples. For most Romans she was a protector of women as the goddess of marriage, fertility and all aspects of pregnancy and childbirth

Her day was 14 February and the following day was the Feast of Lupercalia.

Lupercalia began at the Ides of February. Members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.

Young men then sliced the goat’s hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips to encourage fertility in the coming year.

Lupercalia was also celebrated as a young lovers’ festival with a novel matchmaking game. On the eve of the festival of Lupercalia the names of the eligible daughters of Rome were written on slips of paper and placed into jars. Each young man would draw a girl’s name from the jar and the two would then be partners for the duration of the festival.

In 496 CE, Pope Gelasius changed the date of the Lupercalia festival to Saint Valentine’s Day, February 14. Associating the matchmaking feast with the martyrdom of Valentine was convenient because the days were almost identical.

So traditionally, mid-February was a Roman time to meet and court prospective mates. More than fifteen hundred years later we continue the tradition

In the Middle Ages, young men and women drew names from a bowl to see who their Valentines would be. They would wear these names on their sleeves for one week. To wear your heart on your sleeve now means that it is easy for other people to know how you are feeling, that you are ready to fall a victim to romantic love. Is your heart on your sleeve ?

Susanna Duffy is a Civil Celebrant, grief counsellor and mythologist. She creates ceremonies and Rites of Passage for individual and civic functions, and specialises in celebrations for women. http://celebrant.yarralink.com

Written by admin on January 9th, 2009 with comments disabled.
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What Are Your Goals For A Vacation

I participate in numerous forums and the question of where to go on vacation comes up frequently. I often suggest Disney World and it usually goes ignored. It left me wondering what it is people are looking for in a vacation.

There is no question that people should go where they want on vacation because they work hard all year to save for it and vacations do not come very often. A vacation should be relaxing, fun, enjoyable, and memorable. I have been on very few vacations that didn’t involve camping at Sebago Lake State Park in Maine. In fact, the only place I have vacationed outside of New England is Disney World. And, to be honest, I really can’t think of any other place I would want to go now that I have been there.

My wife and I went to Disney World for our honeymoon. I was against it when she first mentioned it, thinking we needed to go to Hawaii, Cancun, Aruba, or something more “conventional”. But, we went to Disney and I couldn’t be happier. We stayed at the Grand Floridian Hotel, which is their best hotel. This trip offered everything I mentioned in the previous paragraph and I think people, like me, that dismiss the thought if Disney as a vacation destination really need to rethink their decision.

A trip to Disney will never be boring and it will always be fun, enjoyable, and memorable. You may not think of Disney as relaxing however. After all, you are on your feet all day, walking through the parks in intense heat, most of the year, and standing in lines waiting to get on rides. But, my wife and I both said we could have stayed at the hotel for the week and had just as good of a time. The service anywhere at Disney is superior to any other company I have dealt with. The hotel had a white sandy beach, nice pools, hot tubs, spas, excellent restaurants, and beautiful landscaping to just take a relaxing walk around.

Disney also offers night life like you may find on a cruise or at a Cancun or Aruba. Located in downtown Orlando is Downtown Disney. They have numerous dance clubs, comedy clubs, and the party is brought to the street as each club wheels out their portable bar and serves drinks on the street. At the end of the street is an open stage where they often have live concerts. In addition to this nightlife Disney is known for their entertainment throughout the parks. They put on shows that are amazing. We saw a show that was outside at night. I believe it was called Illuminations. This was a show made up of characters as well as movie clips. The best part was the movie clips were shown on sheets of water spraying up from the lake/pond the show was in.

I have talked so far about what my wife and I like in a vacation but the fact remains, there are many different types of people and thankfully there are unlimited places to vacation. Just in our country alone we have many attractions. You can pick any region of this country and find something worth seeing on a vacation. We have so many different sites that should be seen by all before they die, such as the Grand Canyon, Mount Rushmore, Empire State Building, Washington, DC, and the list goes on.

As much as I enjoyed my trip to Disney I could also see myself in Montana doing some fly fishing. The scenery in that movie, “A River Runs Through It” was breathtaking. I have also watched many shows on Discovery HD and seeing what else is out there really makes you appreciate how lucky we are to be alive and enjoy the scenes nature has created.

Regardless of what you look for in a vacation there is something out there to fill that need. Our travel industry was hurt by September 11th and I still do not think it has recovered fully from that day almost 5 years ago now. But, you should not deprive yourself of seeing some of the places in the world you really want to see just because of a potential terrorist attack. Get out there and enjoy it.

Scott Bianchi operates www.best-internet-bargains.com . He writes on a variety of topics. If you would like to be added to his distribution list for his new articles when they are published just send an email to articles@bestinternetbargains.com .

Written by admin on January 9th, 2009 with comments disabled.
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Digital Photography Helps Keep the Pictures Looking Professional

Before the advancements of digital photography we had to have some really great skills with not only working a camera, but with also the development. Developing film can be quite a task as there has to be a black room and the chemicals have to be all mixed together in the correct ratios. It is quite a project from the beginning to end with taking pictures the old fashion way, but when everything comes together in a perfect way, the end product can be out of this world. Some of the most beautiful pictures in the world have been taken and developed this way.

Digital photography takes out all of the hard work. You still have to pretty good at taking the actual picture, with the lighting and the placement, but not as good as with the old school camera. Once you take the picture, all you have to do is put the memory stick in the little place for it on your computer and it will show up. Here comes the great part, you can fix anything that is wrong, well just about anything with the help of some software. One of the easiest things to fix is the common “red-eye”, very easy to make it go away, you can just match up the persons real color of their eyes and place it right in. Taking pictures is great for weight lose, and since digital photography only takes seconds, instead of using the scale to measure your progress with the diet and weight loss solution Acceletrim you can use pictures. Digital photography is highly recommended.

Written by admin on January 9th, 2009 with comments disabled.
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