Reply #3: Dyngus Day

[Sweet Freedom]

My mom and I were just talking about how awful Dyngus Day was for her (boys whipping her with pussy willows all day long). She and her sister used to beg her parents to let them stay home on Dyngus Day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyngus_Day

Dyngus Day or Wet Monday (Polish Śmigus-dyngus or Lany Poniedziałek) is the name for Easter Monday in Poland. In the Czech Republic it is called Velikonoční pondělí or Pomlázka. Both countries practice a peculiar custom on this day.

In Poland, traditionally, early in the morning boys awake girls by pouring a bucket of water on their head and strike them about the legs with long thin twigs or switches made from willow, birch or decorated tree branches (palmy wielkanocne); however, the earliest documented records of Dyngus Day in Poland are from the 15th century, almost half a millennium after Poland adopted Christianity.

...Later the focus shifted to the courting aspect of the ritual, and young unmarried girls were the only acceptable targets. A boy would sneak into the bedroom of the particular girl he fancied and awaken her by completely drenching her with multiple buckets of water. Politics played an important role in proceedings, and often the boy would get access to the house only by arrangement with the girl's mother.

Throughout the day, girls would find themselves the victims of drenchings and leg-whippings, and a daughter who was not targeted for such activities was generally considered to be beznadziejna (hopeless) in this very coupling-oriented environment.