Many religions prescribe ritual purification prior to worship. A slosh of mouthwash after a surfeit of garlic suffices in the Church of England, although this is voluntary and often observed in the breach.
In the last century similar rituals had to be performed before driving on the Continent, as it was called in olden days. A green card issued by the insurance company, a GB sticker, an international driving licence for some countries and a special licence for Italy, snow chains, a licence (vignette) to drive on motorways in Switzerland, a reflective warning triangle and a document authorising my company car to leave GB – it was like a treasure hunt ticking off all the requirements. Some are still mandatory but I digress.
I have omitted one curious ritual, that of the yellow headlights (phare jaunes) in France. Today phare jaunes are illegal, unless the vehicle was manufactured prior to 1994, and gilets jaune more likely to be seen on French roads. To convert a white GB headlight to yellow I fixed on sticky yellow cellophane – it was a lot easier than putting on snow chains, a skill I never mastered.
For more than half a century all French headlamps had to be yellow. It began in 1937 and nobody really knows why. Perhaps to identify French vehicles in case of a German invasion, or perhaps because yellow was deemed less glaring and better at penetrating rain and fog; nobody knows, tiddely-pom. The French and the British are alike in at least one respect: neither embrace change willing. Workers in some jobs are still wearing yellow gigs.
Hmmm. ‘GB’plates are now illegal I believe which seems rather brutal and we now have to use ‘UK’ Both terms seem to be rather quaint given todays realities of perhaps less than previously Great and not particularly United.
Finding myself recently at the site of the Purgatory of St Patrick (who was more English even than Joe Biden) on Station Island, Lough Derg, I was struck by the 4 large Belfast (I cannot think of a better word) sinks outside the basilica. They are for the pilgrims’ purification before Mass. I can find no mention of the ritual in the modern guides to Mass on line. Perhaps it was another victim of Vat II. I was unaware that it had ever been required of the congregation by the CofE. It did however remind me of the Idkah mosque in Kashgar which had similar facilities in full use.