Gullivearth's blog

You might think that your way of celebrating Christmas is the way but every country and culture has its own little twist. Here at Gullivearth we would like to present to you an alternative way to celebrate that same merry Holiday on the 25^th of December. We’ve seen that international students can be readily accepting of new cultures and traditions, popular examples include: learning how to say, “Cheers!” in as many languages as possible, trying a new food (however disgusting it might seem at first), taking transportation on the back of an animal, dancing with the locals, attempting to use a strange and foreign toilet, etc. The culture shock might seem overwhelming at first but an experienced traveller will tell you that’s half of the fun. So let’s see how exotic you guys can make your Christmas this year and bring some of that international holly jolly into your life. You may never look at Christmas the same way again.

The US Christmas: Put up the lights, hang some stockings, find a Christmas tree, have your children write letters to Santa Claus, make a snow Angel (if snow is available), carol in the streets, find out who’s naughty or nice, drink eggnog (a thick mixture of milk, sugar, cream, eggs, and cinnamon often spiked with alcohol *rhum or southern comfort), give gifts, etc. Most of these acts are pretty comparable among most western countries. In beach towns in California you’ll find Santa Claus wearing swim trunks, riding the surf, and probably using vernacular such as any variation of dude and bro, awesome, or the ever enthusiastic but less expressive « hell yeah! »

Latvian Christmas: They wear some of the most bizarre costumes ever. They call it Mumming when they wear anything ranging from a walking talking haystack to a goat head to a living corpse.

Japanese Christmas: Because Christianity is a minority religion here, Christmas is more of a commercialized holiday than anything else. Although, it is the time for children to receive presents from « Hotei-osho », a benevolent Buddhist monk. This is also a holiday for lovers, much like Valentine ’s Day for the US. Men commonly buy flowers and teddy bears for their girlfriends during Christmas. That’s sweet. Although it seems the Santa Claus concept didn’t escape Japanese anime writers from protraying him like a glowy eyed dark skinned hulk of a saint.

Mexican Christmas: What may seem like the best option so far: They celebrate the holiday from the 12^th of December to the 6^th of January. Kids receive their gifts at the end on January 6^th, the epiphany, from the 3 wise men, similar to how the three men brought gifts to baby Jesus. Christmas Eve is celebrated with fireworks and everyone banging pots, shouting, whistling, ringing bells, etc. Mexican celebration food features Tamales, Atole, and Menudos.

Greek Christmas: They are starting to decorate small and large Christmas boats instead of trees. Some areas precede Christmas by fasting while everyone else celebrates it by feasting.

Belgian Christmas: They have two Santa Claus figures, St. Nicholas and Pere Noel. While St. Nicholas checks up on what all the kids are doing by monitoring their behaviour during the month of December. Pere Noel sits in the North Pole and sorts through the wish lists. They are essentially the good cop bad cop duo of Christmas.

Estonian Christmas: It sounds like a foreign Christmas over here. They celebrate the sacred holiday by bringing home “Christmas straw,” fortune telling, and predicting the next year’s harvest and weather. And of course there is the traditional Christmas day sauna, a great opportunity to mingle with your relatives, in the nude!

That’s it for your crazy Christmas traditions. Go out there and have a wild and new experimental time. Or invent some new traditions of your own. We hope you’ve been inspired. We sure have, and can’t wait to row in our shiny Christmas ships, stuff ourselves with hot tamales, and prance around the sauna wearing nothing but our haystack helmets. Merry Christmas everyone!

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