St Georges Day: was: Vanity/Self-Esteem / National Day etc

[alhewison]

I wrote:-
> 
> > I confess to being rather jealous of the US and other countries
> > that have a special day to celebrate being themselves.

Catlady wrote:-
> I had the impression that many old countries have their patron 
> saint's day as their national day. For England, that would be St. 
> George. Mexico has an Independence Day but makes a bigger 
celebration  of the anniversary of a famous battle (5 de mayo, battle 
of Puebla).

We do have St Georges Day, but it is not particularly "celebrated" - 
or at least nothing on the scale of say, St Patricks Day in Ireland, 
and still nothing compared to July 4th - both those days are 
celebrated more in Engliah Pubs than St Georges Day. I think that 
once England became a Protestant Country, it played down Saints days -
 although didn't get rid of them completely. The only times I have 
ever in anyway celebrated St Georges Day, is at Guide Parades at 
Church when I was a kid, and more recently with one of my friends who 
has a birthday on St Georges Day! 

Ali

who didn't realise she shared her full name Alison with a hurricane, 
and also glad that however miserable our weather might be (like I 
thought we were supposed to be having summer now, but there's been 
next to no sunshine for a week), but at least we tend not to have 
extreme weather!