World of Warcraft celebrates the summer equinox with blazing cyan fires, tossing torches, and fireworks! Much like the United States – well, except for the cyan fires and the torch tossing.
“This festival takes akin to a multitude of European-based midsummer festivals that celebrate the summer solstice, or the passing of the sun from its highest point in the sky. In many agrarian cultures, the primary sprouting and and sowing season of spring has ended and now the summer growth is preparing the crops for the next few months and harvest. As a result, a great deal of work has been done and there’s more to come.
“So many of these celebrations involve celebrating the work done for the community and enjoy the warm weather.
“In Warcraft, this holiday reflects this by providing fires, carnival events involving fire, and even some PvP encouraging achievements.”
Link, via MMO Anthropology.
The real reason for the festival is to get your undead zombie roaringly drunk and fling him off the top of a zeppelin tower. Works with gnomes, too, but really you can just throw them off towers any time.
I have a Gnominator 5800-XL-ii (version 3, because the version 4 still explodes on Tuesdays.)