April Fool's Day

Spaghetti harvest, 1957
projectbritain.com

April Fool's Day is celebrated in many countries in the world on the 1st of April every year. It is not a bank holiday but people are used to making jokes to relatives and friends. Also, the television and radio take part in this festivity making jokes to their audience. In 1957, the BBC explained how families in Switzerland picked spaghetti from the trees as you can see in the photo. If you want to see the complete video, you can.

What is its origin?
 The origin of this festivity is not really clear but it has its oringins in Roman times. Nevertheless, the closest to truth that we know may be related to the changing from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar which started in the 16th century but which, due to the bad communications system of the time, wasn't accepted in England until 1752. In the Julian calendar, New Year was celebrated on the 1st of April and in the Gregorian on the 1st of January. It seems that people who started celebrating it on the 1st of January laughed and played tricks on people who celebrated it on the 1st of April on this same day. Even though all of this, there are references to this celebration in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales which dates back to the 14th Century!!!

If you want to learn more about this celebration, you can go here. Do we celebrate April Fool's Day in Spain? What date do we celebrate something similar? Leave your comments!!!