2020 has been a year to remember for our house. I totaled my car on our 3rd wedding anniversary, my wife received some news that changed our family dynamic, I lost an aunt to cancer and my dad’s mom within a month of each other, one of our pets passed away, and we are hosting an exchange student from Spain. Plus there is that whole pandemic thing. But out with the old and in with the new! 2021 has to be better right? According to our exchange student Pau, there is a Spanish good luck trick, that we are going to try this year, eating twelve grapes in roughly 12 seconds when the clock strikes midnight. Ever heard of that as a New Year’s tradition?
Pau calls it “Les dotze raïms de la sort”, roughly translated to ‘the twelve lucky grapes’ in Catalan, his native tongue. (I had no idea that Spain had different national languages until we started talking with Pau in August).
When we asked him about the tradition, being 15, he wasn’t really sure about how it all began and referred to his dad, David. David told us it was a tradition that’s been happening for over a hundred years and is said to bring about good luck. I gave it the ‘ol Google and this is what I got.
“The twelve grapes date back from at least 1895 but became established in 1909. In December of that year, some alicantese vine growers popularized this custom to better sell huge numbers of grapes from an excellent harvest. According to the tradition, eating the twelve grapes leads to a year of good luck and prosperity. In some areas, it is believed that it wards away witches and general evil, although this “magic” is treated like an old heritage, and in modern days it’s viewed as a cultural tradition to welcome the new year.”
So my question is who didn’t eat their grapes last year?
Happy New Year from all of us at Townsquare Media to all of you!
