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becoming madame, Fete du Travail, France, french culture, French Labor Day, Holidays, Labour Day, life, lifestyle, Paris, paris life, politics, premier mai, Travel
May 1st is to France what Labour (Labor) Day is to North America: a national holiday, a day of rest and relaxation, a nod to the workers of our society who keep the whole system running. In Paris today, and in most of the other large cities and even many of the small towns, parades and festivals mark the occasion. This year in particular, given that the Fête falls smack-dab in the middle of a Presidential election campaign, the day has a certain potent political flavor to it.
In France, le premier mai is a pretty big deal. One of the two French national holidays at the beginning of May, le Fête du Travail is always the 1st of May regardless of what day the date happens to fall on.
My view of the Pyrénées as I write on le premier mai.
If you’ve ever heard a French person talking about taking their “pont,” meaning bridge, you can be confident that they are talking about their vacation planning. Taking your bridge, in French, is taking off the one day that stands between the national holiday day and a long weekend. This year, for instance, le premier mai falls on a Tuesday. Almost everyone in the country, therefore, took yesterday off as their “pont” making a long four-day weekend.
Historically, the premier mai and the Fête du Travail weren’t always the same thing. The Fête du Travail in France began in 1793 just after the French Revolution. It was originally slated for mid-January. However, in the late 1880s when the United States began its campaign for a Labor Day, the French modified their Fête du Travail to correspond with the growing labor movement worldwide.
By the late 1880s, la Fête du Travail in France and the premier mai are now combined as one holiday to celebrate the 8 hour work day.
Traditionally in France, on the premier mai, men give women a special flower called the Muguet de mai. This delicate white flower symbolizes happiness. In fact, in France it is the “porte-bonheur” meaning “happiness-bringer” of May 1. A wonderfully fragrant flower, the Muguet is also the flower of the 13th wedding anniversary in France.
This morning my father-in-law’s sister, Chantal, dropped by with a handful of Muguet de mai from her garden. Her husband handed the small bouquet of the delicate buds over to my mother-in-law, an arrangement which is now sitting on the kitchen table.
Muguet de Mai
All over the country today you will find vendors selling small bouquets of Muguet. Ladies walking around throughout France will be holding the flowers.
Maybe it’s just me, but I seem to be able to smell the delicious odor of Muguet everywhere I turn today on this beautifully sunny First of May.
Bonne Fête du Travail from France!!
Becoming Madame 
Lovely post! I love the smell of muguet de bois.
Enjoy your holiday.
And Lilies of the Valley – how I remember that, in their little white wrapped bunches, carried along by everyone – so sweet smelling, and the talk of politics in all the bars and restaurants, with the second round of voting around the corner. Well done!
Lilly of the valley is one of my favorite flowers. I had forgotten that it’s associated with the premier mai. What a great reason to go out and find a small bouquet. Am I allowed to buy them for myself?
My first perfume as a young girl was from the Five and Dime and it was called Muguet de Bois but the photo was the same as the flowers you show here. It smelled so good to me, but I’m sure not as nice as the real thing! It looks like the Muguet are in a milky mixture rather than plain water, is that so? Why? Thank you for sharing this with us.
The flowers are in a small vase of water and we left the paper towel around them which is how they came to us from my Aunt-in-law’s garden – the paper towel was just for travel; we took it off a little later on. 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!
I have a shaded flower bed full of those little flowers! What a lovely tradition (along with the pont, how clever.)
I hope you enjoyed it!In the US they don’t celebrate it May 1st but i know they do in my other places like Haiti and some countries of Africa.
I’d love to know what the muguet de mai smells like. We also celebrate Labor Day in Spain, but there are no flowers of special tokens given that I know of, though you can bet people also try to arrange a “puente” weekend. 😉
How is Spain right now? All we hear about over here are the manifestations and the general panic over the economy. What’s your take?
Spain’s doing horribly, and we’re expecting things to get much worse. Apparently, one politician responded to the youth’s desperation to find work by saying, “Well, you have two choices. Go abroad, work at a bar, and learn English. Or deal with it.” I’m not sure that’s the exact quote, but it was certainly his sentiment.
There are tons of strikes and manifestations. We’re not quite sure what to do either (my husband’s been out of work since the New Year, without ANY sort of dole, due to more health cuts – and he’d been a nurse for almost a decade!). He interviewed in London recently (his neuro experience in Portugal helped), but they’ve had such a high influx of nurses trying to work at hospitals there that the interview fell through. There’s a friend who’s working as a nurse in France, but it’s the same story there as more and more Spaniards leave to find work abroad.
Really, we’re on the fence as to what to do (stick it out? move to the States?), and hope to have something figured out by this Summer. (Fingers crossed).
I love those flowers! They’re called Maigloeckchen in German, which translates to May bells. A very fitting name
May Bells is a very appropriate name. They do look like tiny white bells, don’t they! Thanks for sharing!