Plan B Forum

Once upon a time, many many years ago in Finland, they say (they being the geologists and such) there used to be wild grapes growing all over.  How do they know this?  From studying the remains of bears found in that area.

Well, one season a bunch of grasshoppers (i.e., locusts) with a voracious appetite for grapes happen to hop on into Finland.  What to do?

Enter our great Finnish hero, St. Urho!  Waving his pitchfork and chanting "Heinasirkka, heinasirkka, menetaalta hiiten" (which in English means "Grasshopper, grasshopper, skoot!") he drove the grasshoppers out of the vineyards.  Now, I'm sure everyone in Minnesota wished that getting rid of mosquitoes could be that easy.

The Finnish grape farmers (viners?) were very protective of their fields because they didn't have much of a growing season (note: It isn't exactly like the Italian or French vineyards up there).  So, rumor has it that they injected vodka into their grapes to give them a bigger alcohol content.  I guess this is an early version of "organic farming" regarding pest control?

Feeling so happy and grateful to Urho, they declared him a saint.  This was done on March 16, the day before St. Patrick's Day.

Every year since then, the Finnish people have celebrated St. Urho's Day on March 16.  The official colors are purple to represent the grapes and green to represent the vines ... or the dead grasshoppers, depending on whose version you hear.

The St. Urho's Day ceremony begins at sunrise.  Women and children go down to the lakeshore and chant "Heinasirkka, heinasirrkka, menetaaltta hiiten" or "Grasshopper, grasshopper, get outta here" if you don't speak Finnish (after all, it's pretty easy to remember).  The men dress in green and gather at the top of the hill and then start a procession down to the lake kicking and waving pitchforks to scare off the imaginary grasshoppers.

No one is exactly sure when or how, but along the way the men change into purple clothes.  I assume they use a fashion technique called "the layered look"; otherwise, use your imagination on the wardrobe change...

The celebration also includes singing, dancing polkas, drinking wine (grape juice for those who are underage), and having mojakkaa (pronounced "moy-yah-kah"), a kind of fish soup which is what St. Urho ate to give him his strength to fight grasshoppers.

-"BB"-