Last week I had the absolute pleasure of helping my Czech friend prepare for her wedding- an exhausting but exhilarating experience which included me having to make and bake more than 300 miniature cakes which the bride, a trained pastry chef, was not allowed to help with on pain of a ‘crying baby’ and ‘unhappy marriage’.

One of the most bizarre traditions was to abduct the bride half way through the wedding day, take her 10km away to a bar and then run up a massive bar tab whilst the groom tracks her down. The groom then has to pay the tab and is also charged a hefty ransom for her release… the tradition was that the bride keeps the money, but since they are a modern couple (and the groom Welsh) the money came from their joint account!

No doubt anyone from outside our culture would find some of the things we do are entirely strange… a quick poll around the office revealed strange superstitions including; waving a wand for luck in the office, never stepping on sets of three gas covers (after being pushed in front on oncoming traffic on numerous occasions for doing it, that superstition has now caught on with me), locking the car three times, never eating more than one banana a day (Sarah was convinced she would die), saluting lone magpies and never passing on stairs  (common but odd superstitions when you think about it!).

I watched a documentary recently on BBC World Service about getting under the skin of the Japanese culture by exploring their feasts and festivals including a very competitive ‘baby crying’ contest where the first baby to cry wins and will have ‘good health’ (you could see mothers slyly nipping and pulling the hair of their one year olds to try and win!).

Traditions and superstitions are part of what make different cultures and each country, county and family has their own –and whilst we might laugh and marvel at them, they are what bind us, set us apart and they give us something to pass on and mess up the next generation with!