Eggs-tra Special Easter !

Easter has always been special for me since the time I moved to Cyprus.
Even though I do not have the tradition to celebrate, it’s really great to see the festivities all around.

This year's Easter was more special since the two branches of Christianity (western and eastern orthodox) celebrated Easter on the same date...which I understand happens only few years in a century!
This gave me the opportunity to see the Easter celebrations in Austria and Germany, which we visited during our Easter holidays this year :-)

We couldn't miss the special Easter market that was everywhere.

The egg symbolizes the start of new life, just as new life emerges from an egg when a chick hatches.

The oldest tradition is to use dyed or painted chicken eggs. But a modern custom is to substitute with chocolate eggs or plastic eggs filled with confectionery such as jelly beans.

These eggs are often hidden, allegedly by the Easter Bunny, for children to find on Easter morning.

There were lot of other stores in this easter market....

....but our main focus remained on the ones selling some delicious easter sweets and pretzels :-)

My little girl amused with the size and colour of these eggs ;-)

Apart from the eggs, some special easter toys for kids....

......and some entertainment from this super huge "chicken" :-)

More on Austria and Germany in the coming posts. Keep visiting and do write in your views :)

(Images by Anupama Puneeth. Information courtesy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter_egg)