Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic How do you celebrate Christmas?

Please! I need your help. I've decided that I'm going to let two different classes work with the question of how Christmas is celebrated in other countries. But it's not so easy to find very much information on the Internet, and often that information is kind of stilted and formal.

So, please, can you tell me how you celebrate Christmas in your country? Just to make you see that your Christmas celebration is special and not like it is in other countries, I'm going to tell you a little about Christmas in Sweden.

Yesterday (or for many of you, today) Christmas sort of started here in Sweden with the Window Display Sunday. Actually, that is an event that has become less important and festive over the years, but it used to be something that made families crowd into downtown centers to gape at the splendidly decorated display windows.

Things really start on December 1. All Swedish kids need to have an advent calendar:



These advent calendars have twenty-four little "doors", one for each day up until Christmas Eve. You open one for each day. Nowadays, some kids expect advent calendars that come with a present every day!

There is also a daily kiddie TV program, the Christmas Calendar, that many adults also watch.

On December 1, almost everybody puts one of these on their window sills. Many families have one such "multiple electric candlestick" in each of their windows.





When you pass a house in December, you may see one of these electric candlesticks in every window. (Okay, it's a bad picture and those lights may actually be something else enteirely, but really, it's true what I said about the candlesticks in the windows!)

The candles we put in our windows are electric, but there is also this kind of candlestick where the candles are really supposed to burn down. You light a new candle every Sunday, starting on the Sunday four weeks before Christmas Day.



The next big thing is Lucia on December 13. Lucia is actually a Catholic saint, who is celebrated in Sweden by secularized Swedes who have no idea who she was! Actually, the reason why we celebrate her has to do with the fact that December 13 was considered to be the darkest night of the year in the old peasant society of Sweden. Various more or less heathen celebrations took place that night. The Catholic church, which was banished from Sweden in the 16th century, had made each day of the year a day to remember a particular saint, and the saint whose day was December 13 was Lucia. When all other saints were forgotten in Sweden, Lucia was remembered, because she was the one who brought light on the darkest of all nights.

Early in the morning on December 13, girls dress up as Lucia and her "attendants". All schools and workplaces have their own Lucia celebration, where Lucia and her attendants walk slowly into a darkened room, bringing light and candles and singing traditional Lucia songs. If you are one of the lucky ones (or unlucky ones, depending on how you look at it) who have a Lucia visiting your own home very early in the morning, then Lucia is supposed to bring you coffee and cakes, too.



(Oh, and by the way... some of these girls may be severely hung over after a night of wild Lucia partying...)

For Christmas, we eat a lot of pork. In the old peasant society, Christmas was the time when people slaughtered their fattest pig.



The main course, the Christmas ham.



Other Christmas food.

We eat Christmas ginger bread...



...and deliciously yellow saffron bread.



Of ocurse we have Christmas trees, too, but I'm not posting a picture of a tree. Doesn't everybody have them?

Christmas Eve is the biggest day of celebration in Sweden. No other day of the year comes close to it. At three o'clock, most families watch a Disney Christmas show, which is the same each year.

And by the way, Christmas Eve is the big, big family day in Sweden. If I've understood it correctly, Thanksgiving is the day that Americans are supposed to spend with their families. Well, for Swedes that day is Christmas Eve.

Later in the afternoon or in the early evening, every child expects Santa Claus to come to his or her house, bringing presents. (Actually, the presents will already be in the house, maybe under the Christmas tree - except there will not be room for all of them - and maybe in big sacks. You simply ask the visiting Santa to hand out the presents, not exactly to bring them. By the way, all Christmas gifts are handed out on Christmas Eve, and nothing is left for Christmas Day.)



This Santa may be on his way to some kids! (But he should really put a mask on first!)

The next day is Christmas Day, and some people go to a very early Christmas service, called "julotta", at seven in the morning. Most people sleep late that day, though.

In the past, people used to go the "julotta" in horse-drawn sleds with jingle bells.

Christmas Day is also a day for visiting family and celebrating together. But some people also go to town to check out the big sales that often start on Christmas Day in Sweden these days! Well, Christmas Eve is over, so why not start the leftover Christmas sales right away?

Well, that is something about Christmas in Sweden. Please don't think I'm asking any of you to write a lot about your Christmas! Anything you can tell me will be most appreciated!

Ann

Don't you guys do the whole "St. Nicolas Day" thing? The Swedish side of my family does? *shrug*

Probably one of the most notable things about the US is "Black friday", the day after Thanksgiving. A lot of people either already have that day off of work, or they take it off anyway, and EVERYONE goes Christmas shopping. Most major stores will have good sales that day and open very "very" early (Anywhere from midnight, 3am, 4am, etc). This year my cousins started shopping at 3am and didn't stop until 4pm!

That's my little tidbit. I'll let someone tell you something about Christmastime in the US.

When I was little we definitely did the advent calendars. I pretty much stopped having that as part of my Christmas about 10 years ago, but I still see all kinds of things that countdown to Christmas on store shelves.

For my family, Christmas is the one time of year we all get together. I see probably 60+ relatives on Christmas Eve when the big parties are thrown. My hometown is in Texas, so we make the horrendously non-traditional chile, tamales, salsa dip that will make you cry from the heat, and bunuelos dinner.

God we're so unnatural. Um, I'm pretty sure the rest of the US opens their Christmas presents on Christmas morning. Or at least, when I was little, 'Santa' came on Christmas Eve night, so gifts were under the tree the next day. We switched to doing it Christmas Eve with the relatives and then my folks and I exchange gifts on the 26th.

My dad is locally famous for decorating his house in Christmas garb on Black Friday (the day after Thanksgiving). I've discovered over the years that he's not such a loon, and some other people in town do that, too.

What else about Christmas. At some point during December, we usually run around town looking at everyone's Christmas lights. That could be our one normal Christmas tradition. :p

I'm Catholic, so we go to church on Christmas morning. If we go the day before, we can watch all the little kids act out the story of Jesus' birth in Bethlehem. It's super cute.

And I think that's all I know about Christmas. I think my observation is that the real days in the US are the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day. Other than that, I don't see a lot of real Christmas activity (besides shopping panic).

JD

Our Christmas is quite different from other countries since we celebrate Christmas over two days. The 25th is the first day of Christmas, celebrated like all over the world. The 26th is the second day for us, what in English is like Boxing Day. Only we celebrate it rather like the first day.

For the rest, it's like most of the Western world. Advent calenders for kids, church for the religious people on Christmas Eve and presents on Christmas Day (traditionally, we only open them during the evening, as it feels more 'special' - called 'gezellig' in Dutch).

Dinner used to be a fancy business. A big home cooked meal with turkey or chicken and everything else you'd traditionally cook for Christmas. But these days, people see it as a day off, and so they don't like to spend it all day in the kitchen. Gourmets are very popular for Christmas, as are dinners in restaurants.

We actually have another 'holiday' in December: Saint Nikolas (or Sinterklaas, as we call him). To us, he's our equivalent of Santa Clause. So kids are lucky, two days with presents in one month!



That's our saint, with his helpers, 'zwarte pieten' (black petes ) His day is on December 5th, but he arrives in our country three weeks earlier by boat. All the way from Spain! Tradition has it that children who behaved badly, will be taken back to spain in the bags of the black petes. Children also get to set their shoes by the chimney at night, since the saint and his helpers put candy in it at night if they sing a song for him. If you leave him something nice like a picture or some carrots for his horse, you may get extra nice gifts.

Traditional candy looks like this:



Other specialties from him are chocolate letters and speculaas.

Adults also celebrate this day with gifts, but then wrapped up as surprises. So that takes a kind of creativity to make, but it makes for a very fun evening!

I no longer celebrate Sinterklaas, but I do celebrate Christmas. It just has something extra, more special to me. It's probably just the nice looks of all the lights and the tree.

Saskia

I won't say EVERYONE goes shopping on Black Friday, but it sure feels like it. I, for one, avoid it as much as I can, even though I live right near a mall. Traffic headache!

Let's see. Christmas celebrations can vary wildly from area to area, as the US really is a melting pot. But the public ones... Most cities around here start putting up decorations a week or so before Thanksgiving, putting lighted decorations and banners on the street lights in town. The really big light displays, where there's a whole fairground or town with lights, go up between mid-November and the first of December. McAdenville, NC is an example of a really big one around here. Thanksgiving weekend also starts the marathon of Christmas shows and movies, ranging from the popular movies and shows (Charlie Brown, Garfield, Shrek the Halls, The Santa Clause, It's A Wonderful Life, White Christmas) to the smaller made-for-tv movies shown on Lifetime and Hallmark. On Christmas morning, there's a parade at DisneyWorld and DisneyLand that airs on tv.

Personal celebrations can differ from family to family. Some people go to church either on Christmas Eve, some don't. Some open all of their presents on Christmas Day, some open one or more on Christmas Eve. It's *always* a day spent with family, when possible, though some people prefer the immediate family than the extended family.

My own celebrations vary from year to year. Growing up, at first we were to far away from any family to visit, so it was just my parents, my brother, and me. Later on, as we began to move around and closer to family, we'd spend part of the day with various relations, depending on where we were. The last few years, Christmas Eve would be spent at my aunt's Open House with my dad's parents, Christmas morning at home opening presents, and Christmas dinner back at my aunt's house. Once I moved out on my own, I'd spend every other Christmas with my dad (a tradition I'd like to get back to, but our jobs won't allow it right now), and the other Christmases at home with the husband's family. My mother-in-law usually has her own Open House, and we open presents from her and the hubby's family then. In the morning (or whenever we can, as hubby's had to work most Christmases in recent years), we open the rest of the presents.

Stockings! I almost forgot about those. Traditionally, the family hangs stockings by the fireplace (if they have one, or if they get a fake one, or just on the wall). It used to be actual socks, but now decorative sock-shaped bags are used. The night of Christmas Eve, Santa will come down the chimney (if you have one, or just the front door) and leave presents under the tree, and fill the stockings with little gifts and candy. The tradition continues even after the kids have stopped believing in Santa Claus. In my family, the stocking usually holds inexpensive gifts like pens and batteries, sometimes a stuffed animal, silly putty. One year we all got cars! Sure, they were toy matchbox cars, but it was fun to joke about it.

Really, if you see any American Christmas movies, you can get a good feel of what our Christmases are like.

As a kid, we had an Advent calendar to count off the days, or we did something else along those lines. I remember one year I had a picture of Santa and we put a cotton ball on his face each day so that he had a full beard by Christmas.

Back in the old days, before Tivo or even VCRs, it was an *event* to watch the Christmas specials - Charlie Brown, Rudolph, Frosty the Snowman, etc. I miss that it's not such a big deal anymore. I used to count the days as a kid.

We opened only one present on Christmas Eve, it was always a new pair of pajamas. The rest we opened on Christmas morning.

The coolest tradition in my family (I think), is one that my stepmother brought to us. She had married young and, by the time she was 20, was divorced with two young children. Strapped for cash one Christmas, she took toys that my brother and sister already had and rewrapped them. They were too young to know the difference and Christmas was saved. Every year after that she always took something from their rooms (and then ours as well after she married my dad) wrapped it up, and put it under the tree. As we've grown older (and moved away) she's had to get more creative with it. One year she gave me the candy bar that had been in my purse when I got to the house.

It's a nice reminder that Christmas isn't about what you're getting, but what you already have.

As the grand ol' melting pot, there are so many traditions. Here's our from the midwest US:

My family is a bit odd (or cheap depending how you look at it!), and we buy Christmas gifts all year long. Black Friday (for me) is typically the day to finalize the Christmas gift lists. (That way you go into December a little less stressed because all the gifts are bought.)

We start decorating the weekend after Thanksgiving (never sooner). We've always used fake trees as Mom and I have allergies. Although lately Dad's been buying fresh, so the tree goes up in mid-December. Everyone helps with the decorations (both inside and outside) and we've always decorated with ornaments that meant something throughout the years (this one signifies what happened in 2001, etc...)

We used to celebrate St. Nick day, and I will still sometimes (but I always seem to confuse the dates for St. Nick and Pearl Harbor day--go figure). There are always tons of stuff to do in December around the community. We like to go on more rides in the evenings and "rate" Christmas light decorations.

Companies typically have some sort of Christmas party (formal or informal).

If I have an advent calendar on hand, I'll use it; but I'm quite the forgetful person and typically open 5 windows at a time!

We go to Christmas Eve services every year. These are usually informal, candle-lite services. If we can get a group together we'll go carolling the week before Christmas as well. We do typically do our traditional Lite drive with hot chocolate and cookies driving around looking at all the cool lights.

We've always made candy and cookies together as a family and pass these out as Christmas gifts to everyone (co-workers, friends, mailman, etc.)

We don't typically open gifts on Christmas Eve--only Christmas morning. We've always been allowed to open our stockings on our own; but have to wait for the whole family to awake/arrive before we open the gifts under the tree. (My sister and I always wake up early to make monkey bread for the whole family). We'll then go around and open gifts one at a time (this can go quite long depending upon how many family members make it: one year it took us over 6 hrs!)

Then it's back to work again the 26th or 27th depending on the weekday or job.

Hope that helps!
Jo

Actually I celebrate Chanukkah. However I do enjoy looking at all the festive lights and decorations, watching cheesy but tried and true movies such as Miracle on 34th Street, and of course a reason to bake cookies!

Mona

Thanks a lot, you guys! My students will find so many interesting tidbits in your posts!

Actually, no, Trinity, we don't do Saint Nicholas Day in Sweden. Maybe the Swedish side of your family has some Dutch roots too? Because I think that Saint Nicholas Day is a Dutch tradition.

Ann

Hi all!

We celebrate Christmas two days also, 24th (Christmas eve) and 25th(Christmas day).

On the 24th its almost as an average day, because everyone who has a job works (well maybe not school teachers because kids are on vacation- our school time goes from march to the first week of december) until 7pm when people head to their houses and all the family gathers at one house.

Because its the only opportunity almost the whole family is together, Christmas eve dinner it's very important so mothers and grandmother do spend quite some time in the kitchen to cook a great feast . The typical food on Christmas and New Year's eve is turkey with Paneton (a sweet bread with reasins and little fruits - it's suppose to be an italian bread) .
In fact around 5-6pm you can smell turkey everywhere because some families instead of cooking the turkey on their own oven they take it to the nearest bakery to be cooked, so you walked by a bakery and there's the smell of turkey.

As I said family gathers together around 7 or 8pm until twelve pm when everyone wishes the other Happy Christmas and hugs and you can hear/see the fireworks ignited (sp?) by some families (my family still does, my grandmother -we gather at her house- has a garden at her front door where my uncles, cousings, me and my brother ignite the fireworks). It's like a known competition among the other houses, who makes more noise to celebrate Christams , although in the past years less people are doing it. (This firework tradition is more of a city thing, in the other parts of Peru, the fireworks are ignited by the authorities so if someone wants can go to a dtermined palce to watch them).

After fireworks, kids receive their gifts brought by PapaNoel=Santa Clause. I learnt a couple of years ago that we not always 'believed' in Santa, my mom told me something of 30 years ago Santa was brought here by Coca Cola :rolleyes: .

Then we have dinner and kids (myself included when I still received toys- wow it's been like 7 years ago, feels like yesterday ) eat as fast as one can so they can go play with they're new toys until 2am when they get sleepy and adult stay until around 4am.

On the 25th, we have breakfast together with some more turkey and the rest of the day is spend visiting other relatives.

Carolyn