dia del amor

Hello friends :)

   I tried desperately to find some quote, some passage, some words of encouragement for today: and I failed miserably. What I stumbled upon were steamy love scene descriptions, love-hate angst and just odd romantic quotes that would not be fitting for today.

Valentine's Day

   I personally think that today is both good and bad. It's an excuse for me, shy-in-the-matters-of-love, to make a move and have it not seem abnormal. Yet it's also a highly commercialised, shallow "holiday" where people are encouraged to "show their love" for each other. Isn't that supposed to be every day? Or at least, is giving a box of chocolates or a bouquet of roses a sign of love, or is it the actions that one does every day that defines love? Whatever it is, I think today is a fun day, like all other "holiday"s. In elementary school, I had the greatest time crafting boxes with construction paper and shoe boxes. Going to school with a plastic grocery bag full of tiny store bought Valentine's with chocolates taped to them. That exciting ten minute time period where everyone rushes to each other's boxes and slips in cards. And then that euphoric moment afterwards, full of laughter and happiness and sweet-eating. The arts and crafts of making Valentines, the free day where all we basically had done was do Valentine themed crosswords, eat chocolates, coloured pictures and socialised. I think that it was one of my most favourite holiday. Of course, I had intentions of making valentines but alas, it never happened. Next year, I will definitely go all out.

I'm not that person who hates Valentine's Day purely because he/she is single. It's not a bad thing to be single on Valentine's Day, no matter how "looked down" upon it is. It's not worth it, you know? 

 Like all holidays, I'm always interested in the historical background. Now in order to convert "pagans" (I find it a derogatory term, as it's biased against all other religions except Christianity  The definition is "non-Christian") Christians would "advertise" their religion by blending in "pagan" festivals with Christianity in order to make it more appealing to the native populations. Valentine's Day is an example of that!

Origins of Valentine's Day: A Pagan Festival in February

While some believe that Valentine's Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine's death or burial--which probably occurred around A.D. 270--others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place St. Valentine's feast day in the middle of February in an effort to "Christianize" the pagan celebration of Lupercalia. Celebrated at the ides of February, or February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus. 

To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at a 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 sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification. They would then strip the goat's hide into strips, dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, gently slapping both women and crop fields with the goat hide. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed the touch of the hides because it was believed to make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would each choose a name and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. (read more)

A Humorous Note 

Apart from all that seriousness, let's add some humour. Right, so though you may not know this  that well, I actually read a lot of manga (Japanese web-comics) and I'm a sucker for shoujo (romance) mangas. In all the shoujo I've read, Valentine's Day has always been sweet and cute and romantic. The girl, having gotten a boyfriend for the first time on Valentine's Day, works hard hand-making chocolate the night before the big day. The boyfriend is always immensely popular amongst all the girls in the school, and is the object of envy for all the boys. So naturally, the boyfriend is flooded with chocolates from other girls (its a custom to give chocolate to the boy one likes. It's this girls that must do this always) and the girl feels insecure. She usually doesn't give the chocolate to him until under some circumstances, the disappointed boy asks the girl about it and she shyly gives it to him. It's a cliché, as you can tell, but it's quite sweet. Here is a page that I bookmarked from a manga where the girl makes chocolate that looks like shit to give to her boyfriend (whom everybody in the school absolutely loves and adores. They literally organise an event for everybody to deliver their chocolates to him. Usui-kun, the boy, doesn't accept any of them, except for this girl's. Which looks like shit) I laughed so much when I read this!

A note, read from top right to bottom left. 

Hoho, quite funny no? "It is a shit, no mistake" Ahahahaha ~cough~ ahem. Anyway: have an amazing, love-filled day! Even if you don't have a partner, hug your parents or call your friends! It's "el dia del amor"; the day of love :)

P.S. I'm really chuffed with myself. Finally made a move on mah crush, but I don't know the results of said move. (Remember how I said I liked Valentine's Day because it's an excuse for the shy to make a move? Well I meant me in there as well) I'll give you a hint on what I did (look at the first picture on this post!) :) :) :) I can't stop smiling, gahh.