March 8th - Women's Day

This past Friday it was Women's Day which is a huge celebration everywhere except the United States. My husband likes to call it Feminist Day considering that the origin of this holiday was tied to the Socialist Party to bring about awareness for the women's suffrage movement and equal rights to women. Nowadays though it is generally a day to appreciate women even though it still has definite political ties.

Of course we don't really celebrate it plus Jon is never home! If you ride the tram on Women's Day though you don't pay the fare so we made sure to do that on Friday. So, Sharon and I headed out to the park and let the kids run wild around.

Most Russians give the women in their life flowers. The yellow flowers above are called "mimosas" and you see them everywhere on this holiday. The meaning of these yellow mimosas are "secret love". The van was selling tulips which are also very popular. I asked the vendor where the tulips were from and they are actually from a warmer region in Russia whose tulips have already bloomed! I wanted to buy some but the day before I got a bouquet of them so I didn't really need them! The pictures are pretty blurry........ I couldn't stop to take them because it was so crowded around there with men buying flowers!!!