Tutorial Transcript

Welcome to German Holiday Words. My name is Alisa and today’s holiday is Tanz in den Mai “Dance into May”. Yeah, this is a very traditional and fun holiday so let’s get started. Tanz in den Mai “Dance into May” It actually is a very regional holiday and it’s from Rheinland. It’s actually where I am from. It’s near Bonn, Koblenz, Köln area and it’s from April 30th until May 1st. It’s a very traditional holiday. A lot of men actually go out together and I’ll be talking about it more during the whole video, but I think it’s a very special holiday. Brocken Blocksberg “Brocken, the highest peak of the Harz Mountain range” Brocken Blocksberg “Brocken is the highest peak of the Harz Mountain range” Auf dem Blocksberg haben sich die Hexen versammelt und ein Feuer angezündet, um die bösen Geister zu vertreiben. “On the Blocksberg is where the witches met and lit a fire and vanquished all the evil spirits.” Hexenfeuer “witches fire” Das Hexenfeuer wurde angezündet, um die bösen Geister des Dorfes zu vertreiben. “The witches fire was lit up to vanquish the evil spirits from the village.” If some of you are interested in the history about witches were actually hunted in the past and were themselves actually lit up on fire because everybody else believe that they had a certain power. And it’s actually very interesting and of course, it’s a bit scary, but that all ended. So yeah, let’s talk about the new way of this holiday. Maibaum “maple” Der Maibaum wird in der Nacht vom 30. April zum 1. Mai aufgestellt. The maple is raised up only at girls’ houses and it’s actually the boyfriend who does it and usually, the boyfriend can’t carry that alone because it’s a very tall tree so he gathers his friends and they drink before and then they have trucks and they go into the woods and they chop down the tree. And then they bring it to the girl’s house during the night and then rise it up and, yeah, usually some guys actually decorate the tree and do all these fun things and write the girls’ names. It’s kind of a love act. Yeah, so you don’t have to be boyfriend/girlfriend and I think it’s a really cute and sweet act. When it’s a leap year, it’s actually the opposite so the girl has to get the maple and add beer to it and give back to the guy she likes for all those years of hard work too. Waldmeisterbowle “may wine” Which is a popular drink during May. Yeah, so as I mentioned before, all the guys before they chop off the maple, they gather together and drink. Of course, it doesn’t have to be the waldmeisterbowle. Die Waldmeisterbowle ist ein Getränk aus verschiedenen Kräutern gemischt mit Sekt. “The may wine is a drink made of different herbs and sparkling wine.” Thank you for watching the German Holiday Words. I hope you enjoyed this holiday. Let me know what you think of it and if maybe some of you guys in this big world had a similar holiday, I would love to know, leave in the comments. Don’t forget to subscribe and hope to see you soon! Bye!