Everyone likes a good public holiday, right? Well, not governments and corporations, of course. And especially not in the North, it seems.This point came home to me again over the last couple of weeks. All Saints' Day, on 1 November, is a Roman Catholic holiday, fair enough. So it is no surprise to see it observed as such in countries such as France, Italy, and Spain. (But not in Ireland, if someone can explain that to me without blaming the English.)
Then the UK ... ah, the UK ... not only ignores All Saints' Day completely, but also ignores Hallowe'en as an opportunity to make vacational amends, and even ignores wicked ol' Guy Fawkes as a reason to give people an extra feel-good winter day off.
And in Finland, we get Saturday off, so there!
What?
3 comments:
hold on.
speaking as a chronically overworking finn, are you seriously slamming finnish workers' rights? apart from the bureaucratic impossibility of getting fired in holland and a few more free days in say, central europe, who are we disadvantaged against?
the 6-day thing is a retarded complication, but everyone knows the standard number of weeks of holiday we're entitled to (because they are, amazingly, pretty much universal across the board).
compared to a lot of things deeply wrong in this country, in labor agreements (and strength of unions and stuff) we seem to be winning more than anything else. or am i being deluded? cos if we are being screwed over, point me to the right windmill and watch me go ..
Ah, the beauty of perspective!
Finnish workers are not disadvantaged against anyone in this respect, in my opinion. My (side) point was that the holidays are equal to everyone else's, but look better on paper. In Finland, everyone knows that thirty days equals five weeks. But someone coming from elsewhere (because we're all Europeans now) may look at their shiny new contract and think, whoa, that's five days more than I'm used to!
1st November in Ireland - well, Halloween is a day off, but in the UK style where it is the following Monday that is the holiday. Or is it the last Monday in October? I forget now.
Holy Days of Obligation are not completely ignored, however - IIRC you can take time off that day to go to Mass, and the Civil Service get a mandatory two hours off, where they all go to the pub :)
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