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Sunday, June 21, 2015

The Midsummer Festival and NYC Tradition

On Friday, June 19, 2015 my family and friends attended the annual Swedish Midsummer Festival in Battery Park City in downtown Manhattan.
Happy, relaxed and a bit retrospective
At this unique celebration, adults and children come together to picnic in the grass, decorate the midsummer pole, make flower wreaths, play traditional games and Polska dance to authentic fiddle music.
Midsummer, also known as St John's Day, or Litha, is the period of time centered upon the summer solstice, and more specifically the Northern European celebrations that accompany the actual solstice or take place on a day between June 19 and June 25 and the preceding evening. The exact dates vary between different cultures. The Christian Church designated June 24 as the feast day of the early Christian martyr StJohn the Baptist, and the observance of St John's Day begins the evening before, known as St John's Eve.
In Sweden the Midsummer is such an important festivity that there have been serious discussions to make the Midsummer's Eve into the National Day of Sweden, instead of June 6. It may also be referred to as St. Hans Day.
The program presented at the Battery Park featured traditional music by Paul Dahlin and fiddlers from the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis, folk dances from Barnklubben Elsa Rix and Swedish Folkdancers of New York, and pole dancing led by Scandinavian folklorist and singer Ross Sutter. Food stands offered delicacies from New York's finest Swedish restaurants and food purveyors.

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