Those Places Thursday: Easter in Büren, Germany, 1982

Some notes from my travel journal:

Easter Saturday (aka Holy Saturday, April 10, 1982) morning, "I went shopping and took some pictures in the Marktplatz, where they were selling vegetables, flowers, and eggs. I did pretty well shopping despite not knowing much German!"

[That evening, my cousin] "Reinhard and his friends dyed Easter eggs."

According to About.com, German Easter traditions include "many traditional 'Easter [egg] trees' [an Osterbaum or Ostereierbaum], ... [trees or branches] dripping with colorfully decorated eggs. The custom of boiling and painting eggs, the symbols of new life, began in Germany; the bright colors represent sunlight and growth."  Below is my cousin Ulrike with her Ostereiebaum and other Easter decorations in her apartment in Bonn:

 Segelfluggelände [Glider Field or Flugplatz] Büren August 2009 / Felix Stember /  CC BY-SA 3.0

Later that evening, I "went up to the Easter fire [Osterfeuer] at the Flugplatz [the glider plane field], but it was too cold and snowing to stay long."  About.com says, "On Saturday evening, regions in the north of Germany will light Easter bonfires, chasing away the dark spirits of winter and welcoming the warm season."  Here's the Osterfeuer from Büren in 1982:

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