Easter is here.

 We celebrate Easter on 1st of May this year, but the British celebrated it on the 27th of March.

In most years Western Christian Churches and Eastern Ortodox Churches celebrate Easter on different dates.That is because the churches base the dates on different calendars: Western churches use the Gregorian calendar, the standart calendar for much of the world, and Ortodox churches use the older, Julian calendar.

    Englishmen  has some the same traditions as we have, but there are some differences.

The origin of celebrating Easter lies in both pre-Christian religions and Christianity. In one way or another all the customs of spring holidays are the "salute to spring" marking rebirth.

 The word "Easter" is named after Eostre, the Anglo-Sax on goddess of spring. A festival was held in her honour every year at the vernal equinox (on March, 22d).

On Easter Sunday, many children wake up to find the baskets of candy. The Easter  Bunny have also hidden the eggs that the grown-ups decorated earlier that week.

The Easter Bunny is a rabbit-spirit. Long ago, he was called the "Easter Hare", hares and rabbits have frequent multiple births so they become a symbol of fertility.

Children hunt for the eggs all around the house.

Neighborshoods and organizations hold Easter egg hunts, and the child who finds the most eggs wins the prize.

 Egg Hunts are very popular and you can find many big celebrations in London such as the famous Kew Gardens Egg Hunt, Kensington Palace Egg Hunt, Handel House Museum, Bunnies at the London Eye among the others.

The hot cross bun is a traditional bun for the Englishmen. People eat hot cross buns on Good Friday before Easter Sunday. There is a white cross on its top.

Early Egyptians, Greeks and Romans marked their loes of bread with symbols to honour their gods and goddesses. Another belief was that eating hot cross buns on Good Friday served to protect the home from fire.

 Egg-rolling is a tradition Easter pasttime which still flourishes in Northern England, Scotland, Ulster, the Isle of Man, and Switherland. 

It takes place on Easter Sunday, or Monday, and consist of rolling coloured, hard-boiled eggs down a slope until they are cracked and broken after which they are eaten by their owners. At the begginning of the 20th century we had the same tradition in Ukraine.

At the end we can consider that all these traditions, Ukrainian or English ones,  have the same aim. And I can say only one - Happy Easter!