Kalengirl's Weblog

In Panama, we have four holidays in November, three in December, two in January, three in February and the list continues. When a holiday falls on a weekend, the following Monday will be a holiday. The reasons for the holidays in November are Independence from Spain, separation or independence (depending on your definition) from Colombia.

Last Monday (May 3, 2010) was a Bank holiday and Boyfriend, the in-laws and I went to visit the Winsor Castle. There were many people in town that day because of the long weekend.I have never heard about a Bank holiday before. The first time I read about a bank holiday was couple of month ago, while I was waiting for the bus and started reading the papers around the bus-stop and found the bus scheduled from Monday – Friday, Saturday, Sunday and bank holidays. I asked Boyfriend if they have bank holidays in Denmark and he said they have enough holidays and do not need to make them.

Wikipedia says, the reason for bank holidays was to give people (bank employers) the possibility of attending or taking part in cricket games. Sir John Lubbock, a liberal politician and banker, was the person who came with the idea and yes, he was a cricket lover.

Therefore, there is nothing special to celebrate on a bank holiday. If I am not mistaking all our holidays in Panama, represent a special event that happened in the past, well except for the four days in February (carnavals).

People working on essential jobs receive and extra cash for working on bank holidays, just like in Panama, you get pay 2.5 extra per hour (I think…) went you have to work on holidays. However, I do not know how much extra you receive here in the UK.

I bet we would love to have some bank holidays in Panama, don’t you think?

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