Top Four Festivals in the World

Saint Patrick’s Day, Ireland

Saint Patrick’s Day is celebrated anywhere in the world where there are the Irish. If you’re going to get involved, there’s no better place than Dublin. This festival runs for five days and five nights in March along with performing arts, literature, tours and food events.

Holi Festival, India

It’s also called the “festival of love” as on the full-moon day in March people get together, forgetting all types of bad feeling towards each other. You’ll mostly see Holi Festival across India and Nepal, but also in other areas with large Hindu populations. It starts by lighting a night-time bonfire (篝火)where people sing and dance. People throw coloured water and powder (粉末) to their friends and families to show love and respect.

Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Scotland

One of the greatest celebrations of arts and culture in the world, the festival runs for three weeks every August throughout the Scottish capital. Artists and performers take to hundreds of stages all over the city to present shows for every taste. The Fringe is run by the Edinburgh Fringe Festival Society to support and encourage the Scottish arts.

Montreux Jazz Festival, Switzerland

There are plenty of music festivals in Europe, but Montreux Jazz Festival held in October near the Lake Geneva is truly one of a kind and is the second-largest jazz festival in the world. It’s not just jazz, though. You’ll find broad-ranging concerts from pop to rock and blues, and best of all, most of the performances are free.

Celebrate!

In Mexico, children often get pinatas (皮纳塔) on their birthdays. Their parents put chocolates and other sweets inside the pinata and hang it on a tree. Then the children hit the pinata with a stick. It breaks and the sweets fall out onto the ground.

A business birthday shows that a company is successful. Many businesses in the USA celebrate important birthdays, like 10, 50 or 150 years. Companies hold parties and send cards. Sometimes they make TV advertisements. It is a good chance to advertisements. It is a good chance to advertise the business.

As well as a birthday, many people in Southern and Eastern Europe also celebrate their name days. In Greece, name days are more important than birthdays. People have big parties and open their houses to anybody who wants to come. People bring small gifts, often flowers or a box of sweets.

In Muslim countries across the world, people celebrate Eid. Eid means festival or celebration. During Eid, people visit family and friends, as well as people who are sick or in hospital. They give presents, such as sweets and food. Children receive toys, too. Children often wear special traditional clothes during the Eid celebrations.

In China, people often celebrate birthdays by eating with family or friends, and the last dish of the meal is always noodles. The noodles are long and thin. You have to eat them in one piece. You can’t cut them. In Chinese culture, long noodles mean you will have a long life.

It’s hard to imagine the San Francisco Peninsula and the Marin Headlands connected by anything but the Golden Gate Bridge, as if its red beams (梁), constructed 75 years ago, were always part of the permanent landscape.

A delicate fireworks display recently celebrated the bridge’s 75th anniversary, but you can still celebrate on a smaller scale and catch a lot more. Try shopping for some anniversary souvenir, joining in a guided tour, or simply going for a walk across the 1.7-mile-wide bridge.

Beyond the bridge, the beloved City by the Bay is still appealing with secret San Francisco musts to keep the celebration going. Here are a few more:

This Prohibition-style “private” saloon requires a password to enter. Dark, intimate and decorated faithfully like the 1920s, this is the ideal spot for business dealings. Cell phones are prohibited, which only adds to the authentic atmosphere.

A favorite among locals and tourists, this activity center has dozens of trampolines (蹦床) to jump on, trampoline walls to bounce off. Space is rented by how much time you want to bounce about, but be cautious about overdoing it; jumping around for even 10 minutes is exhausting!

For anyone who wished that film “Night at the Museum” could be real, every Thursday night the California Academy of Science offers a simulated (模拟的) rainforest and aquarium, all under the same roof. There’s also live music, several bars and a different theme every week.

It may be called a museum. It’s full of wind-up toys, dancing puppets, shooting galleries and vintage arcade games. Some of the exhibits may seem frightening, but this is a unique trip back into the history of how we have fun. Bringa pocket full of coins.