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Early Closing and Holidays

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cjp

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Early Closing Day, for those too young to know, was a day in the week when the shops closed early at lunchtime. In some cases shops closed all day. We all knew this and life adapted.

It still happens in some villages but in London this early closing has vanished.
What happens in your area?

Today I was out and about getting fresh baked hot cross buns from a local baker and saw supermarket car parks full to the seams. What a waste of a super sunny day's holiday.
People's choice I know but a day without food shopping is not something I find hard to live with and, truth to tell, I could have managed without the fresh hot cross buns and fresh baked bread.

How did you spend Good Friday and what will you do Easter Monday?
 
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Xenophon PCDGS

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Thinking of the introduction of horse racing on a Good Friday for the first time, one has to ask why there should now be a bank holiday on this day, as the Christian reason for its existence now seems totally subjugated by the power of Mammon. Even the local vicar of a church near to the Lingfield Park racecourse was on TV expressing hope that some visitors to the racecourse would try to visit the church there, not to attend any Good Friday service but just to see how nice the church was (and hopefully make a donation to the upkeep of the church). The story of Jesus upsetting the tables of the merchants and money changers in the grounds of the synagogue springs to mind.

Any one with any views upon this matter ?
 

deltic

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I watched the re-enactment of the Passion in Trafalgar Square London
 

yorkie

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... as the Christian reason for its existence now seems totally subjugated by the power of Mammon. ...
The reason we have a holiday at this time of year, traditionally, is to celebrate the Spring Equinox. It's only in recent history that Christians took over traditional British holidays and changed the dates around to suit them :p

This long-standing tradition was here long before Jesus appeared before Pontius Pilate :p
 

Xenophon PCDGS

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The reason we have a holiday at this time of year, traditionally, is to celebrate the Spring Equinox.

How well publicised is this matter to which you allude when being taught in schools and in general usage ? If what you say is correct (a matter which I do not doubt for an instant), why is this matter not made clear.

Can you inform us when the festival of the Spring Equinox was last clearly celebrated as the major festival in Britain, noting that this country has seen invasions by Romans, Angles, Jutes, Saxons, Vikings and Normans to name but a few, all of which may not have felt this to be a festival to celebrate.
 

Shimbleshanks

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It still happens in some villages but in London this early closing has vanished.


Except of course, our adjectival local sub post office which closes on Wednesday afternoons, which I onlyb discovered after struggling up a steep hill to get there the other day. Wish I could take half a day off, just because I felt like it...
 

Kite159

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Good Friday was spent sitting on various trains around the London area.

(How can SWT get away with charging regular weekday parking rates on a bank holiday when it's a weekend service?)

Easter Monday will be spent on the Heart of Wales line.

---

The local post office used to close early on Wednesday, now it doesn't open at all on Wednesdays, but the shop it sits in doesn't close early anymore (would be better if they converted it into a Post Office Local, better operating times), the other shop in the village closed earlier in the year :(
 

Butts

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Early Closing Day, for those too young to know, was a day in the week when the shops closed early at lunchtime. In some cases shops closed all day. We all knew this and life adapted.

It still happens in some villages but in London this early closing has vanished.
What happens in your area?

Today I was out and about getting fresh baked hot cross buns from a local baker and saw supermarket car parks full to the seams. What a waste of a super sunny day's holiday.
People's choice I know but a day without food shopping is not something I find hard to live with and, truth to tell, I could have managed without the fresh hot cross buns and fresh baked bread.

How did you spend Good Friday and what will you do Easter Monday?

Working in Glasgow .....:lol:
 

reb0118

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My town, Bo'ness, still has an early closing Wednesday for the local shops. Tesco & the like do not participate however.
 

radamfi

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In the Netherlands, many shops are closed on Monday morning, or even the whole of Monday. (All Mondays, not just Easter Monday).

Sunday shopping is allowed, but still less common than in the UK.

Good Friday is probably the least important holiday in England. Some bus companies (including TfL) run a Saturday service on Good Friday whereas they run a Sunday service on other public holidays. In some parts of the East Midlands, even a Friday service is operated. In some areas of the country, Good Friday was never really observed as a holiday until relatively recently.
 
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Xenophon PCDGS

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In the Netherlands, many shops are closed on Monday morning, or even the whole of Monday. (All Mondays, not just Easter Monday).

Sunday shopping is allowed, but still less common than in the UK.

Good Friday is probably the least important holiday in England. Some bus companies (including TfL) run a Saturday service on Good Friday whereas they run a Sunday service on other public holidays. In some parts of the East Midlands, even a Friday service is operated. In some areas of the country, Good Friday was never really observed as a holiday until relatively recently.

The Banking and Financial Dealing Act of 1871 created four formal bank holidays in England:-
Easter Monday
Whit Monday
The first Monday in August
Boxing Day (26th December)

It was not felt necessary to formally create bank holidays in that said Act for both Good Friday and for Christmas Day, as it was noted that these had been recognised as common law holidays before records began.
 

Techniquest

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We still have shops that close both all day and half day on Wednesdays here. Most of them don't open at all on Sundays, with only 3 of them that open at all on Sundays.

Good Friday is a day of graft for me, always is and I'm glad buses operate as normal for me on it as it saves making special arrangements to get to/from work. Easter Saturday was also a day of graft, today I'm chilling on here, in front of the TV and on the PS3 as well as family stuff. Easter Monday I'm lazing at home this year, the others are all going in for a couple of hours.

We only shut because the shop's over a certain square footage, which apparently means shops are forced to shut on Easter Sunday and Christmas Day. If you were contracted to work today, you had to book it off or go into work, it's not a guaranteed day off with pay as we all thought.

I'd very happily scrap Good Friday and Easter Monday, they're normal days to the vast majority of us so give us our normal public transport and service/retail industries back on those days! Yes I'm grouchy as I can't go on a bash tomorrow thanks to no buses running from here to Hereford. So I'm staying home, not necessarily a bad thing as I'll get some spreadsheeting done but I also really want a trip on the rails!
 

scarby

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No one here lives in an area with early closing days then?

Certainly as already touched upon, in some European countries there are still very quiet days - try Germany on a Sunday, also as mentioned some Mondays as well.

It is also still fairly common (though in decline) for a lot of shops in various parts of Europe to shut up shop from around 1pm-3pm on Saturdays.

Certianly in comparison to the parts of Europe I have been to/lived in, the UK has very lengthy opening hours. Though shops don't tend to put their shutters up at 5.30 as in the UK. Or or the other hand open clothes stores etc as early as 9am (why?). Most hardware/clothes stores etc in most parts of Europe wouldn't bother opening until 10 or even 11am.
 

Kite159

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In the Netherlands, many shops are closed on Monday morning, or even the whole of Monday. (All Mondays, not just Easter Monday).

Sunday shopping is allowed, but still less common than in the UK.

Good Friday is probably the least important holiday in England. Some bus companies (including TfL) run a Saturday service on Good Friday whereas they run a Sunday service on other public holidays. In some parts of the East Midlands, even a Friday service is operated. In some areas of the country, Good Friday was never really observed as a holiday until relatively recently.

SWT were running a Saturday service on Friday, Southeastern was a Sunday service.
----

I would be quite happy if the powers that be define the Easter weekend to be around a fixed point (i.e. First Friday in April is Good Friday), get away from the variable time where one year it can be the 20th march, the next it being the 20th April
 

SS4

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Thinking of the introduction of horse racing on a Good Friday for the first time, one has to ask why there should now be a bank holiday on this day, as the Christian reason for its existence now seems totally subjugated by the power of Mammon. Even the local vicar of a church near to the Lingfield Park racecourse was on TV expressing hope that some visitors to the racecourse would try to visit the church there, not to attend any Good Friday service but just to see how nice the church was (and hopefully make a donation to the upkeep of the church). The story of Jesus upsetting the tables of the merchants and money changers in the grounds of the synagogue springs to mind.

Any one with any views upon this matter ?

Perhaps it's because Christianity itself is on the wane? Given Christianity's subjugation of prior festivals (as Yorkie alluded to) this is quite ironic. It seems rather strange to me to celebrate unsubstantiated rumour anyway.

Supermarkets around here were closed and I saw less people than usual on my way to and from work so I'm guessing people stayed in, then again it was cloudy
 

Butts

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It must be borne in mind that the restrictions on Sunday Trading that exist in England and Wales do not apply in Scotland. (I wonder why ? :idea:)

Indeed Tesco in Falkirk was open from 0800-2000 today Easter Sunday which although longer than English and Welsh hours on a normal Sunday , was in fact less than it is scheduled to be open on any other Sunday.

It's strange whenever the prospect of extended trading hours on a Sunday in England and Wales is mentioned USDAW throws a wobbler, yet I have never heard of any campaign up here to reduce the Scottish Hours on a Sunday into alignment with those South of the Border.

What's good for the Goose is surely good for the Gander :roll:
 

W-on-Sea

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I was quite astounded, in St Petersburg, about 18 months ago, to find Gostinny Dvor - which I suppose one might describe as a cross between a department store and a shopping arcade - it's quite prestigious now, large, historic, and right in the centre of the city, open at 10pm on a Sunday!
 
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radamfi

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I've just looked on the Tesco website at Easter opening hours in Scotland. Each of the 'Extra' stores I checked were open 24 hours a day, even at Easter. Some of the 24 hour superstores (not Extra) were also open 24 hours a day at Easter, but most of them were open fewer hours on Easter Sunday.

You would have thought that Tesco in Ireland would have very limited opening hours over Easter (considering its religious reputation) but all the Extra stores in the Dublin region are open every day over Easter and the standard Sunday opening hours are 0600 to midnight.
 
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Techniquest

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I would be quite happy if the powers that be define the Easter weekend to be around a fixed point (i.e. First Friday in April is Good Friday), get away from the variable time where one year it can be the 20th march, the next it being the 20th April

Yes! This is well overdue and it's high time that Easter wasn't moved every single year. For one, it makes it very difficult to predict sales and organise staff levels properly and for two, the constant moving of it is just outlandishly stupid. If we're supposed to be celebrating a miraculous event, why is it on a different date every year? I'm not doubting the ability for him to come back on different days if he wanted to, but I just don't see how it works.

We'd be better off letting those who want to celebrate Easter do so and let the rest of us get on with our lives as normal.
 

Xenophon PCDGS

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Perhaps it's because Christianity itself is on the wane? Given Christianity's subjugation of prior festivals (as Yorkie alluded to) this is quite ironic. It seems rather strange to me to celebrate unsubstantiated rumour anyway.

I am sure you are true to your beliefs in both Aston Villa and what you say above, but do you take these bank holidays even though you express your reservations ?
 

LowLevel

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Bank holidays have no meaning to me any more except in remembering not to charge passengers peak fares - I worked Friday till 2330ish, Saturday till 2130ish, off yesterday but only because I've just got up to go to work for just before 0400.

On the plus side I'm anticipating a nice quiet morning!

The life of a railwayman eh! :D
 

455driver

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How did you spend Good Friday
On holiday sat on the beach with the kids.

and what will you do Easter Monday?
Driving trains for flat money (no time and a half etc, no time off in lieu), like I do on all the bank holidays where it is a rostered working day. ;)
its just a normal working day but because its a bank holiday they can cancel my booked job and move me up to 2 hours and extend the job by 2 hours as well!<(
 
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michael769

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This long-standing tradition was here long before Jesus appeared before Pontius Pilate :p

Actually that is not true. We ware fortunate enough to have written records of how the dates of Easter were chosen as as part of the creation of the Holy Roman Catholic Church during the Council of Nicaea in 325, as a replacement for the Hebrew celebration of passover. Early Christians had already adopted the practice of celebrating Easter during Passover on the basis that the Last Supper was itself held on passover - again there are ample written records of this practice thanks to considerable disagreement on how the dates of both Easter and Passover should be calculated. Many non English languages use the same (or very similar) word for Passover and Easter.

So nothing to do with paganism I am afraid.

We actually don't know that pagans even celebrated the spring equinox as there was no written records prior to Julius Caesar and the only reliable archaeological evidence for possible prehistoric celebrations is at the solstices (and even that evidence dates to several thousand years before Roman times, which means that we cannot be sure that such traditions had not died out by that time).

The belief in a pagan celebration of the equinox is probably a Victorian fantasy most likely invented by Margaret Murray who along with Gerald Gardener made much of what we believe to be our pagan past. These folks and their adherents may well have created a pagan calendar of celebrations to fit the Christian calendar rather than the converse as is often claimed today.

Even the supposed name of the pagan goddess of Easter - Ēostre - is from a language - Old English - which did not exist until around 600AD, about 400 years after people started to celebrate Easter.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Anyhoo back on topic.

When I was young (1970s) the local early closing day was Tuesday and may local retailers closed at 1PM (indeed in those days most still closed between 1PM and 2PM for Lunch on weekdays - most stayed open through lunch on a Saturday).

However by the time I was in Secondary School (1981) this tradition was dying out, starting first with the larger stores it spread quickly to all, and by the time I left School it was something of a memory, and Sunday opening was becoming the norm.

In those days Scotland did not take the Easter Holidays (or any of the English bank holidays, instead taking a local early Spring holiday the dates of which were set individually by local authorities - in my back yard Glasgow happened to set theirs to coincide with Easter Monday, while Paisley set theirs to be the week after. In my hometown of Barrhead the Post office used to follow the Glasgow Holidays whilst most other businesses followed Paisley.

As well as the locally set holidays that were once well observed Scotland also had it's own national Bank Holidays which were largely unobserved (unless the happened to fall on a local holiday) even by banks.

Widespread observance of Good Friday and Easter Monday as holidays is relatively recent up here (in the West of Scotland the local government reorganization prompted many of the new councils to align their holidays with Glasgow's - which were already aligned with the English holidays), ironically this practice has developed during a time where observing the other public holidays was on the wane.

Today (at least in Edinburgh and its surroundings) Easter seems to be the only public holiday that is sufficiently observed to cause a noticeable reduction in road and public transport traffic - even though it is not officially a holiday (The official Edinburgh holiday was April 14th).
 
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DaveNewcastle

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. . .
The belief in a pagan celebration of the equinox is probably a Victorian fantasy . . . .
I think this re-description of British cultural history during the 19th century is generally correct; the spirit of realism, romanticism and the reinvention of traditional folk-arts, all contributing to the enthusiasm for de-christianisation in popular Victorian culture. That popular move ran in parallel with the intellectual enthusiasm for science and positivism, the hunt for reason in nature was on, and Victorian England found it everywhere!

Anyhoo back on topic.

When I was young (1970s) the local early closing day was Tuesday and may local retailers closed at 1PM (indeed in those days most still closed between 1PM and 2PM for Lunch on weekdays - most stayed open through lunch on a Saturday).
Edinburgh shops used to adopt Saturday as the early closing half day, which meant that most working people would only have Saturday morning available to go into the city centre shops. I expect that that practice would have changed by the 1970's.
 
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