These weeks the evening four-day event will be held again in various places in the province. Adults and especially children run five or ten kilometers four evenings in a row, and earn a nice medal at the end.
What is immediately clear: the tradition is decades old and has spread step by step through the country. According to tradition expert Ineke Strouken, the evening four-day event itself originated in a period when walking was promoted as a healthy exercise.
According to her, the orange, or sometimes a lemon, with peppermint in a handkerchief fits in with the practical tradition of ‘pick-me-ups on the go’, but there is no conclusive story about its origins. “Someone came up with it at some point, others adopted it and that’s how it continued to exist,” Strouken explains. This makes it a typical habit that cannot be traced back to one moment or person, but has mainly grown because everyone started doing it.
Why orange and peppermint? To do this, we have to go back to a time when eating and drinking on the road was not a given. In the 50s and 60s, lemonade was still relatively expensive and not something you just took with a large group of children. Not to mention sweets.
An orange or lemon offered a simple source of moisture and energy, while peppermint has long been known as a quick pick-me-up.
