Festivals

When we first moved into the neighborhood, there were three Orthodox church festivals each year within walking distance: at Sts. Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church, then at St. John the Baptist Russian Orthodox Cathedral, then at St. George Antiochian Orthodox Church. The first had hands down the best food, the second had an excellent used book table, the third was just the place if you needed a bilingual Arabic-English New Testament (I have bought two, for friends). 

 But Sts. Constantine and Helen followed its parishioners to the suburbs a few years ago. Neighbors who went to the festival in Olney said that the food had fallen off sadly. Whether or not this is so, we never went to find out for ourselves. 

St. John the Baptist held its fall festival yesterday, from 8 am to 2 pm, a mile and half west on the grounds of a school on Connecticut Avenue. The decision to move the festival makes perfect sense: the cathedral has no parking lot, and only limited space for people to gather. The terraces around the church are always jammed at festival time, just what one doesn't need now. I suppose that the shorter hours were set by the school. And they would not have been able to have much of an outdoor festival this afternoon, with cool raw weather, drizzly through early afternoon. 

I could have taken in the festival on my run yesterday, but did not. Though I have stopped for book sales while running, and carried a book or two home with me, the notion did not appeal yesterday. I hope that next year the festival will be back on the cathedral grounds.

 It is not clear whether St. George's will attempt a festival this year: no signs were up yesterday or today on 16th St. NW. St. George's does have a parking lot, ergo room to spread out a bit, and a somewhat larger parish hall than St. John's.