With this Sunday being Palmsonntag - Palm Sunday, one of the questions in many German families this weekend will be: “wer wird der Palmesel sein?” (who is going to be the “Palmesel”?)

The Palmesel – literally the “palm donkey” – is a nickname given to the last person to get out of bed on Palm Sunday.

The tradition is not new, but it has mutated over time as it was originally used to refer to the last boy to enter the Church on that day.

Of course, the term refers to the donkey ridden by Christ into Jerusalem prior to his crucifixion, and since the middle ages German towns have held Palm Sunday processions – some with live donkeys, others with wooden ones.

It’s always nice to be returning from holiday or a weekend away on a Sunday, as there are very few lorries on the roads.  The reason for this is something called the “Wochenendfahrverbot”, a part of the German road-users law (StVO) which prohibits lorries from using the roads on Sunday before 10pm.

There are some exceptions, such as those delivering fresh produce, but in general it means that the roads, especially the motorways, are fairly empty and flow faster.

But what about on Good Friday?

When I was asked this yesterday, I thought I might be in for a lot of research, but in the end the answer was simple.  Just look in the relevant paragraph of the StVO.  That paragraph is known as §30 Abs. 4 – and contains a very straight forward answer.

Good Friday is listed by name as a day on which the Fahrverbot applies for all of Germany.

And before the same question comes up again next week – Easter Monday is too.

“Easter Pack 1″ is a collection of 4 transcripts, each in their own PDF file. The pack is a ZIP file containing the 4 PDFs and is available from the AllThingsGerman Download Store.

The transcripts in this pack are:

• Palmsonntag
• Karfreitag
• Ostern
• Die Auferstehung

To find out more, visit the AllThingsGerman Download Store.