Jetzendorfer 'Frautag' phenomenon

The wee town that my extended family (aunty, uncle and cousins) live in is called Jetzendorf. Once a year, on the 15th August which also happens to be a public holiday in Bavaria, the tiny town transforms into Bavaria's largest one-day market, all because of a phenomenon called 'Frautag'! 

Literally translated 'Frautag' means 'Woman's day', but before you go jumping to conclusions and imagine a radical, hippy-esque market with feminist demonstrations, tame your imagination, because it all has a much more innocent background, in fact, as most traditions within Bavaria, it stems from the strong Catholic history:

Once upon a time, in 1713, on 'Maria Himmelfahrt' (apparently the day of 'Assumption of Mary' in English?) a brotherhood between the people of Jetzendorf as well as the people of Altoetting was founded. Regardless of social class or status, anybody could enter this brotherhood with only a voluntary sacrifice (monetary or otherwise). The most important requirement of joining the brotherhood was to pray a weekly rosary and to come to Jetzendorf on Maria Himmelfahrt for a communal church service.

Pretty soon stall holders and vendors realised that these "brothers" may require sustenance on their pilgrimage, and stalls were set up through the main street of Jetzendorf. And so 'Frautag' was born, the 'Frau' (woman) part of the day obviously referring to Frau Mary.

Fast forward 300 years and the stalls now fill the entire town and have become much more commercialised, however for the Jetzendorfers, it is always a proud day filled with people-watching, and catching up with old friends.

I had been dragging around a cold with me all week, and Wednesday afternoon (pre-Frautag) I definitely had my low point, my entire body was aching from coughing so much! But every year that I have been in Germany around this time my Jetzendorfer family and friends have been nagging me to spend this day with them, and I never managed. So although I should've stayed home and rested, I couldn't disappoint them yet again! 

So without further ado, my impressions of my first Frautag:

Since Frautag has a religious background, the day did of course start with a special church service, that locals typically attend in 'Tracht' (Lederhosen & Dirndl). We were a bit late getting up though and only managed to get a space at the very back of the packed church. As I was struggling to breathe through my nose as it was, my cousin and I fled after quarter of an hour and hung out in the surrounding cemetery instead. 

The building in the background is part of the quaint Jetzendorfer castle and will apparently be refurbished soon. I would quite like to live in that tower, the perfect home for a Bavarian Duchess no?! 

Busted. Sick Duchess... :(

I think Bavarian cemeteries are very pretty and always have a calming effect on me. 

This person was obviously very loved judging by the mountain of flowers!

I definitely took a moment to appreciate my surroundings, and acknowledge how lucky I am to have some family on this side of the world. 

Even my ratbag cousins (this is the little one).

After the church service was finally over we got a family photo. Unfortunately my older cousin had to work so the picture isn't quite complete! :(

It also reminded me of this photo, and once again I wished M & P were here as well. Maybe one day we can manage to get one of all of us. I shall make that a goal of mine!

We headed down the little hill that the church sits atop back towards home, and already we got caught in a flood of people.

Since my family's house is essentially in the middle of the town (the pale yellow one), we meandered down the main road in one direction before lunch. Most of the stalls are clutter that you don't need, is fun to look at, but not very pretty to photograph. So I didn't. Besides, I was too busy soaking up the atmosphere. Until we reached this guy...

Look at that loaf of cheese! I think I want his job.

One of the popular "meals" at such markets/folkfestivals is slices of this Emmentaler cheese consumed simply with a giant pretzel. You gotta love a place where that counts as a meal don't you?! So that's exactly what we did.

We also mixed in a bit of Mediterranean with the Bavarian...In the form of some Greek specialities from another stall, including 'dolmades', dips and octopus salad.

After a digestive nap, we headed back out into the hustle and bustle to explore the other side of the main street. There, I found my sweet treat!

This is called a 'Splitter bombe', you can't really translate the name, but the 'bomb' part definitely rings true, since it is a calorie bomb; chunks of biscuit mixed into soft, sugar-laden meringue coated in chocolate. I'm the first to admit I have a sweet tooth, but after three bites I was done. Tick, tick, boom!

After more chatting with friends and chilling in the Biergarten, the sun set over a still stirring Jetzendorf...

When night eventually fell, I moved from the Biergarten to one of the tents, in an attempt to preserve of whatever was left of my health and escape the cold, and to meet up with my friend Franka. 

Franka loooves Frautag! Can you tell?! :)

At 9:30pm a local band was somewhat unofficially announced to play, The Sideburns. I didn't really know what to expect, except that Franka had warned me that they would be arriving by tractor. Sure enough, a tractor and trailer rolled around the corner and parked in our neighbour's driveway, ready to rock!

Only in the country...

I gotta admit, despite being pretty open to all types of music, this wasn't my fave as it swayed into the heavymetal genre. But they did manage to hold a crowd and I was a fan of their tractor!

In charge of the tractor was the neighbour himself/the unofficial fifth member of the band/photographer aka Robert.

Robert let me jump aboard before the band cruised off again. And that ladies and gents, was Frautag 2013. I look forward to 2014!

Yours truly,

Fräulein SoulFood x