Welcome to another edition of
Live & Learn Thursday!
Join the party... follow your hosts and link up your post!
This week I have something short and silly I'd like to share with you... but hey, it was news to me!
Have you ever heard of Boxing Day?
Right after Christmas, my bloggy friend Jenni and I were emailing back and forth and she mentioned that she did not realize people would actually still blog on Boxing Day... apparently it's almost as important as Christmas Day! Jenni is an English girl, so I knew immediately this must have something to do with the UK.
My first imaginings as to what this strange "Boxing Day" entailed went something like this: people sitting around watching an important boxing match, dressed up in their champs colors and eating delicious appetizers and drinks... kind of like the English version of Super Bowl Sunday, right? But then I remembered that Europeans are really more into soccer football, and as far as I knew Premier League matches didn't call for national holidays, so I must have been off.
Holy moly!! Boxing Day is traditionally the day following Christmas Day, when servants and tradesmen would receive gifts, known as a "Christmas box," from their bosses or employers. Today, Boxing Day is the bank holiday that generally takes place on December 26. It is observed in the United Kingdom, Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, South Africa, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago and other Commonwealth nations. Say what?!
I sat, fuming, from my desk at work.
And what were these alleged "bank holidays?"
Shut the front door! A bank holiday is a public holiday in the United Kingdom, Commonwealth countries, and other European countries. Although there is no automatic right to time off on these days, banks close and the majority of the working population is granted time off work or extra pay for working on these days. Currently, there are 17 bank and public holidays! I checked this against my company's holiday schedule (which includes just 10.5 paid holidays throughout the year) while gradually beginning to simultaneously seethe with anger and turn green with envy. Not fair, dude.
But there you have it... Boxing Day: Not a sporting event.
Hi! I just found your blog from Erin @ Life.Fun.Football. I didn't know ppl really celebrated Boxing Day either.. Just went and stalked you. :)
ReplyDeleteI work closely with our group in the UK and they don't get Christmas Eve off, but they do get Boxing day off. We have family is Australia and apparently it is a big shopping and cricket day too! Learn something new everyday!
ReplyDeleteWow, I kinda taught you something! Yay!! But hold on a sec, 17 bank and paid holidays?! Where did you get that? I can tell you, in England we get 8 bank holidays in a normal year. Scotland I believe get one extra over the course of the year, but we also take them on different days which is kinda weird. We did get an extra bank holiday for the queen's diamond jubilee, and one for Wills & Kate's wedding though. On Boxing Day there is a full football fixture list 《PROPER football, using feet ;) 》 and this year is only the second time in the whole of our relationship that Ben's team haven't played at home and I got to spend the day with him!
ReplyDeleteHahaha! I am right there with you girl!! Someone mentioned boxing day in an email to me the other day so I had to google it and figure out what the heck they were talking about. I had NO idea!!!
ReplyDeleteGrowing up so close to the Canadian border I have always heard about Boxing Day and I have always assumed it was related to the sport of boxing! HA! Well, now I know better. Thanks Sarah!!
ReplyDeleteI say we pack up and MOVE!
ReplyDeleteHaha. My family spent Christmas in England one year and were planning on traveling on Boxing Day. Little did we know EVERYTHING other than one bus company was shut down that day. :-)
ReplyDeleteWe def do not get 17 public holidays in Australia. But yes, a day off for Boxing Day where you eat left overs, or go shopping (think Black Friday), or watch the cricket. We get about 10 public holidays a year in Melbourne, including one for a horse race!
ReplyDeleteI just counted them up off the Wikipedia article, but it sounds like not everyone gets that many so that makes me feel better... about my own situation anyway! LOL
DeleteI learned this from Jenni too! So crazy. The first thing that I thought of was people boxing up presents or boxing up old things to make room for new things, lol! I want to celebrate Boxing Day, fun!
ReplyDeleteHahaha! :) Thanks for the lesson....and for conveying your seething jealousy! ;)
ReplyDeleteI'm moving!
ReplyDeleteI totally think it's nuts for people to actually be working on Boxing Day!! It's terrible! Here, everything is still shut down. Except stores. It's kind of like our version of Black Friday, except the deals aren't nearly as good!
ReplyDeleteI never realised the US didn't do 'boxing day'. We may have bank holidays but don't you have a holiday to something or someone almost every month?
ReplyDeleteAt my company we get 10.5 paid holidays per year, so I guess that's almost one every month. That's including the major ones like Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Year's Day...
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