It's a standard trope in portrayals of assimilated Jews to open with a scene built around a Christmas tree. That's how Tom Stoppard's " Leopoldstadt" and Alfred Uhry's " Last Night of Ballyhoo" begin, and also Ian Buruma's memoir about his grandparents, " Their Promised Land." The idea is, as soon as you show that, you've got the audience's full attention, especially if it's a Jewish audience, because it's so peculiar.
Also much as it is today, it was a period of carousing and merriment. The weeks around Christmas were celebrated with feasting, drinking, singing, and games. Mummers would blacken their faces and dress up in costumes, often in the clothes of the opposite sex, to perform plays in the streets or in homes. Carolers, too, would sing door to door as well as in the home. Wealthy lords threw open their manors, inviting local peasants and villagers inside to gorge on food and drink. Groups of young men called wassailers would march in and demand to be feasted or given gifts of money in exchange for their good wishes and songs.
Growing up in Australia, December 25 meant swimming in the backyard pool, playing cricket on the beach, and eating cold prawns for lunch. Whenever I watched American holiday movies, I felt like I was witnessing a completely different, surreal celebration unfold, complete with snow, fireplaces, and people bundled up in heavy coats. Those movies might as well have been depicting the holiday on another planet - I didn't even see snow in real life until I visited Europe as an adult.
The story of the birth of Jesus appears only in two of the four Gospels of the New Testament: Matthew and Luke. They provide different details, though both say Jesus was born in Bethlehem. The exact day, month and even year of Jesus's birth are unknown, said Christine Shepardson, a professor at the University of Tennessee who studies early Christianity. The tradition of celebrating Jesus' birth on Dec. 25, she said, only emerged in the fourth century.
and the two sang the song for the first time at the Christmas mass. Written just after the Napoleonic wars, the text of Stille Nacht uses imagery of peace and calm, and has played an important role in times of war throughout its 200-year history: it was sung and performed in public during the First World War and also during the Second World War.
She'd recently turned 11, and in my heart, I knew she no longer believed in Santa. "Mom! Don't forget, I want Monopoly," she casually called back. I scrunched my eyelids together, holding back hot tears. Santa, the only arbiter of Christmas gifts in our household, was also the magic link to my Italian Catholic childhood for me and for my Jewish children, whom I'm raising in my husband's faith.
Whether you're driving home for the holidays, travelling to far-flung places or staying cosy at home, one of the great joys of Christmas is making memories and indulging in nostalgic traditions. All over the globe, different countries and cultures celebrate the season in different ways, marking the holiday with long-established rites and rituals or merging heritage to create beautiful new traditions. Below, we run through some of our favourite Christmas traditions around the world, and ask the Traveller editors about their own personal festive rituals. From seafood feasts on Christmas day in Australia to surfing Santa's taking to the waves in SoCal, these are the most wholesome traditions for some festive joy this season.