29/30 November in Poland is the day of mysterious parties with the candles and future telling games, called Andrzejki (St Andrew Day)– the same as in the very past, but nowadays treated as a fun.

There are hundreds of ideas of how to find out about the future, namely the marriage, lucky or unlucky love and prosperous or poor perspectives. The most popular practices are wax pouring and shoes competition. The most spectacular is pouring liquid wax into water. The shape which formed as the wax solidified is then illuminated to throw it’s shadow on the wall. The shape of the shadow gives the opportunity for unlimited interpretation, which is fun for all participants.

The shoes competition is reserved for the girls only. All of them took off their left shoes and put them in a line one after the other. Then this line of shoes “walk” to the door, the last moving to the front on by one, thus walking forward. The girl who’s shoe reach the door first, would be the first to get married.

One of the way of discovering the future husband was to interpret the girl’s dream from the night preceding the St Andrew’s Day. After the intensive praying to St Andrew they expected to be shown their future husband during the night dream. The man they could see during the dream was the one they would soon merry.

Although the tradition is not as strong as in the past, and many practices are completely forgotten, it has to preserve something of it’s spiritual character if at least a few of those practices are still celebrated (such as pouring wax, shoes competition). Nowadays young people celebrate the traditional meeting together on St Andrew’s Eve. The remains of the believe of a magical power of that night lend a special mysterious character for the parties, with the candles and future telling practices. Today the traditions provide an excellent reason for entertaining social gatherings.