Ever wondered what it’s like to live in another city/country/continent around the world? What the way of life might be like, from the foods to the clothes, to traditions and beyond? While travel exposes you to some aspects of another country’s culture, there’s a lot that you only find out after you have lived there. One such thing is in relation to a girl’s coming-of-age – her period. Yes, everyone knows about bat mitzvahs and quinceañeras, but we don’t know much about how people the world over deal with a girl’s first period. Here are a few first period traditions from around the world that might horrify or pleasantly surprise you.
In certain cultures, a girl is given a raw egg mixed with sesame oil to help ease her through the pain.
In South Africa and Sri Lanka, a huge party is thrown in honour of a girl’s first period. In South Africa, she is gifted lots of presents, but must stay in the house for three days, and away from men and children. While in Sri Lanka, in the Tamil community, the girl is bathed by her close family and friends, and is fed with rich foods, in isolation. After that, she takes another bath, and dresses up in a sari and with make-up and loads of jeweller to signify her womanhood. A similar practice takes place in Morocco, as well.
According to Jewish and Afghani tradition, a girl is slapped upon getting her first period. It’s seen a kind of awakening of the girl into her womanhood and to ‘slap sense’ into her. And in Afghanistan, it is a sign to the girl not to reveal the fact to the men in her family, or she will be married off immediately.
In France too, a girl is slapped when she gets her first period – a red mark on her cheek symbolises the colour, her last slap since she is now a woman, and also seemingly wards off bad luck.
When a girl in Japan gets her first period, her mother will make sekihan, which is sticky rice and red beans, and the whole family must eat it and guess that she has gotten her first period.
In Aboriginal tradition, the girl is taught the ways of womanhood by the other women in her tribe, and her mother builds her a hut in which she is to live till the end of her cycle. The hut is then burned, she is bathed in the river, and is paired with a man to be her husband once she returns to the village.
In Brazil and Italy, a girl’s first period is big news. In Brazillian families, all close friends and family are told, and it becomes a celebration. And in Italy, the girl is referred to as ‘signorina’ or young lady, and everyone who knows her is told that she has got her period.
