Epiphany (holiday) Epiphany holy water. Sometimes people desire to have this blessing for themselves as well. Winning the Epiphany race is a great honor for both horse and rider, while the post-race celebrations, win or not, are highly festive. As in other Orthodox heritage countries, water rites play a special role on this day. A unique piece of Romanian folk wisdom holds that if a girl slips on ice – or better yet falls into water- on Epiphany, she will surely marry before the year is out. In Transylvania (Erdély/Siebenbürgen), Lutheran and Reformed Christians of Hungarian and Saxon descent celebrate Epiphany with
Epiphany (holiday) cold water to retrieve the cross, and whoever retrieves it is believed to be blessed during the whole year. These are very festive gatherings with lots of spectacles attending the sites. Special food jelly from pork and beef meat and bones called "pacha" (пача) or "pivtii" (пивтии) is prepared the day before, but served on the day after Epiphany, together with warm local brandy, rakija (ракија). Epiphany is a non-working day for the Orthodox believers in Macedonia. In Malta, Epiphany is commonly known as "It-Tre Re" (The Three Kings). Until the 1980s, January 6 was a public holiday, but today