After what it feels like an year of lockdown, Easter is again here and it will be another lonely one as we are not allowed to travel, well not without a PCR test and a lot, but a lot of trouble, and we were not smart enough to make an effort to have our parents over (vaccinated and all, because at this Romania is doing very well and most if not all the people I still know there are vaccinated already). Granted, as we are Orthodox it does not feel like it is Easter, but we have the holiday. Weird, but do move on.
So a tradition very dear to my heart is Émaischen which happens on Easter Monday in a town called Nospelt and in later years on the streets surrounding the Marche-aux-Poissons area in Luxembourg city. It is a market selling clay whistles in the shape of birds called Péckvillcher. It is said that those little whistles were made by the potters in the Nospelt area after a day's work with the remaining clay from making pots or whatever the potters were making. More about this tradition and in well formulated ideas you can read here.
For us, as I've told you we do not celebrate the Catholic Easter, Émaischen was a reason to move out of the house, meet our friends and enjoy a market. Well, in Corona Times this is not possible anymore, but the potters in Nospelt thought of ingenious ways to still sell their clay whistles. I've read you can order one online and drive in Nospelt to pick it up on Easter Monday, but also there is a Pop-up Store in the centre of Luxembourg, on Grand Rue nr. 40 where for two days, yesterday and today, you can go and pick up your Péckvillcher.
Why would I buy a dust collecting figurine I will never use, you ask? Because it is tradition and because we need to keep sane and because those potters need to make a living and because we need normal human interactions, we need the stories and if you have kids, because they will love to blow your brains out once they figured out how to use them.
Last year, Ilinca's first Easter, we were all over the place with a small child and a pandemic and the Péckvillcher were on our last brain cell, but this year that Ilinca is a bit bigger and we can communicate better it was great that in this pandemic way we still could have our Émaischen. We went to Grand Rue 40 and she picked her own clay whistle and I've picked one and we made it fun and the sellers were delighted to tell us more about the tradition and about the birds and about their craft.
So if you read this on April 3rd, please go to Grand Rue 40 and buy a clay whistle. I think it brings good luck to hear it sing on Easter Monday.
As usual I am more active on Instagram @mademoiselle.ralu and Happy Easter, friends!
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