The land of the long weekend
I was trying to look busy while waiting for a work thing to start last week, and found myself pouring over those pages in my diary that list international public holidays. As you do.
I wonder if that nasty rumour that Australia has more long weekends than any other country is true I asked myself?
No, is the short answer.
Here is the public holiday tally for some random countries:
Australia – 9
Brazil – 14
Canada – 11
Czech Republic – 13
Italy – 12
France – 12
Japan – 15
South Africa – 13
South Korea – 13
UK – 9
US – 10
So I think that we can all agree that, quite frankly, both the UK and Australia are hard done by when it comes to bank holidays* and could do with some more. Perhaps an annual ‘Snow Day’ or ‘Get Drunk in the Park Day’ would be appropriate. Any other ideas?
In the short term, we could all just get jobs at the Australian High Commission in London and Edinburgh. Here the staff enjoy public holidays from both countries (including Canberra Day for heavens sakes – why not take Melbourne Cup Day as well while you’re at it folks!).
Pfttt…
*To be fair though, I have to point out that at least Australia and Britain have vaguely generous annual leave allowances – unlike say, stingey old Japan and the US.
Tags: cultural difference, mindless minutiae, Monday moaning
May 11th, 2009 at 11:30 am
without getting too picky it also depends on whether you have to work on saturday monrings as happends in some places.
As to extra holidays I’m not sure why mindsummer’s day isn’t a holiday it’s often a nicer day than august bank holiday monday and why no jamboree in July?
I’d make bonfire night a holiday too oh and my birthday!
Hang on why don’t we have one local holiday locally chosen so councils etc can celebrate something local and highly devisive and boring people from the chamber of commerce can complain about lost man hours.
May 11th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I like the idea of the local holiday BLTP (like Canberra Day or Glasgow Fair), but the best thing would be everyone having their birthday’s off – a sort of personal bank holiday. I could definitely handle that.
Not sure about making Bonfire Night (an anti-Catholic celebration if there ever was one) a holiday. Although I do like the anti-government nature of it… so, mmm, could be a goer.
May 11th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
May has too many bank holidays. I’d much rather have one in October. Perhaps Hallowe’en would be a good one.
Japan with 15! What can they all be for?
May 11th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
I’ve never yet worked on my Birthday or over Christmas – but it seems odd going from May to August without any other public holidays when the weathers at it’s best ..I wonder if we’ll get a day off when the queen pops her clogs..
When I was a civil servant we used to get Queen’s Birthday (which you could take any time within a set period) and Maundy Thursday off too, as well as an unofficial half day Christmas shopping
May 11th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
They do appear to fare better in France, but if a holiday falls over a weekend, you don’t get the Monday off instead, you lose it. Even with that taken into account, though,they usually do better than us.
Japan has a couple of equinox-related ones, plus ‘Golden Week’ in May, which is as close as the place ever gets to grinding to a halt.
Isn’t there a rumour that our increasingly desperate government are going to introduce an October one, just so people will like them and vote for them?
May 11th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Agreed, May has too many holidays and an additional one is required in June or July. I am also liking Mondo’s suggestion of ‘Christmas Shopping Day.’
Or perhaps we could borrow one from Japan:
1 Jan New Year’s Day.
12 Jan Coming of Age Day.
11 Feb National Foundation Day.
20 Mar Vernal Equinox.
29 Apr Showa Day.
3 May Constitution Memorial Day.
4 May Greenery Day.
5 May Children’s Day.
20 July Marine Day.
21 Sept Respect for the Aged Day.
23 Sept Autumnal Equinox.
12 Oct Sports Day.
3 Nov Culture Day.
23 Nov Labor Thanksgiving Day.
23 Dec Birthday of the Emperor.
I vote for Greenery Day.
ISBW, the government will never bribe me with additional public holidays!! Not unless it is something like ‘National Dodgy Expenses Claims Day’ anyway.
May 11th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
May the 4th is already Jedi day as any fuel kno! :)
I put forward bonfire night as an offcial day when people can be offended as every other festival seems to hack people off why not have day that offends people officially they can all get in all in a hoo ha and the rest of us can let off fireworks , eat sausages and have bonfires.
May 30th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
the thing with american holidays is that they don’t always fall on mondays or fridays, and some of them are quite capable of occurring on a saturday or sunday, so in the end we actually get very few “Long weekends”
June 1st, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Hello there Dokholocaust. Thanks for this – makes me feel better about the powers that be over here. If a national holiday fell on a weekend and you didn’t get the Monday off they’d be a national outcry!