So it’s ten o’clock in the morning and we’re in the village square with a bonfire going, the musicians are starting up and we’re handed our first cup of wine of the day. Welcome to St Tryphon’s Day!
St Tryphon is the patron saint of wine growers, and this day is celebrated in the Eastern Orthodox church, but this festival is older than that, and seems to derive from the Greek festivals of Dionysus. February 14th is a major festival, involving blessing of the grape vines, and taking the first cuttings from the vines to ensure a good harvest for the year. All this is accompanied by a lot of drinking, music and dancing.
After the men were given wreaths, made from vines, to wear, the procession went off to visit the lucky person whose vines were going to be blessed. At their house the priest made some ritual blessings, sprinkled us all with wine, and then a smaller group went to take the first cutting from his vines, and sprinkle wine about. Afterwards we all drunk from the chalice of wine, and shared food that his wife had prepared; traditional breads, cakes and meats.
That done, and the harvest secured for the year, we all trooped back down to the village centre for more drinking and eating. The village hall had been decorated the day before, and everyone brought some food and drink. The band played folk songs, everyone danced, and the food and wine was shared around.
This year the expat community in the village had been asked by the mayor to help the Bulgarians celebrate Valentine’s day, as it’s not a well-known festival here, so we’d decorated the hall, and some of us played music and sang love songs to help them get in the mood! The mayor’s wife even devised a game for couples to play, which seemed to involve trying to burst balloons tied to their feet; in the mayhem I couldn’t really see what was going on but everyone seemed to enjoy it.
There was a wine-tasting competition which seemed suspiciously evenly distributed – an English man won third prize, a Bulgarian villager came second, and the mayor won. After that there was more music and dancing, and I even managed to pluck up the courage to give my accordion an airing and show off two of the easiest of the Bulgarian tunes I’ve learned. Everyone seemed to enjoy that I was learning to play traditional songs, even though my hands were shaking so badly I only played one side of the accordion. My shaking hands was mainly stage-fright, but might have had something to do with the fact that I’d been drinking for six hours before-hand.
After that the party drifted off, so some of us came back to our house to carry on, with our last guests going home about midnight.
what stamina! Looks like you are living in a great community.
That was the first thing I thought. What a great community you are living in. Looks like a lot of fun!
Now that’s what I call really getting into the spirit of the community! Well done both – it looked like a wonderful day and I’m sure you will be well thought of for taking such an active part. How’s the head??? :~)