cracker christmas.
American Traditions
--------In the states there is a big lead up to Christmas. Since the late 90s, Christmas music and decorations begin taking over stores long before Halloween. With the holiday season officially beginning the day after Thanksgiving when many American's leave the warmth of their homes to camp out in line for Black Friday bargains. Each family has their own particular traditions, but in my family on Christmas Eve we were allowed to open one gift, which was always pajamas and occasionally an ornament. In the lead up to this time mum would lock herself in the bedroom to complete the annual wrapping of the gifts. Right before bed we would place homemade sugar cookies and milk out for Santa.
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| Sister decorating the tree on Christmas Eve 2013 |
In recent years we would decorate the tree on Christmas Eve as well, but I seem to recall doing it earlier when I was in primary school. Our tree has always featured a mix of glass bulbs and more whimsical ornaments, with a popular favourite being a corn husk doll. Dad would always place the angel on the tree last. Me and my sister also had our own tiny trees that were put up in the bedroom, decorated with ornaments given to us. Each ornament has a small tag or writing on the bottom listing who it was from and in what year.
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| A favourite ornament on my grandma's angel tree |
Christmas Day as a child always began with the ever controversial waking of the parents, complete with bed jumping. Eventually dad would get out of bed and go downstairs ahead of us to turn the Christmas lights on while us children would wait (not-so) patiently on the stairs. Then it was time for unwrapping gifts. Gifts from Santa came in a special wrapping paper, often with Santa on it. There would also be one or two "family" gifts, a game or a movie for the family to enjoy.
It's not Christmas til this commercial airs.
After gifts were unwrapped came the big, stressful rush to get everything ready and all the food prepared in time for visitors. Usually in the evening a few family members or friends would stop by for dinner and a second round gift-giving. Popular Christmas foods are turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, peas, cranberry sauce, and rolls. Dessert can be pumpkin pie, chocolate pudding pie, and pistachio pudding.
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| Inspecting potential White Elephant gifts |
Since becoming an adult a bright spot of the holiday season has been the annual PF/PCA Christmas party at my old workplace. One year the celebration was held at the Pittsburgh Glass Center where we were able to blow our own glass ornaments, but usually it takes place at one of the two buildings. There is a potluck, alcohol, and my favourite, the White Elephant. A White Elephant gift grab is when Gary, the theatre manager, passes out playing cards to each participating individual. There are multiple rounds, but the first round allows you to pick a gift from the table when your card number is called. Subsequent rounds involve being able to steal from other participants or choosing to keep your gift. Just because you choose to keep your gift, doesn't mean it is actually yours, it can still be stolen by someone else. In the end, everyone gets to unwrap their gift, but the catch is, gifts are supposed to be something you already own that you no longer want. Memorable gifts in the past have been the back seat of a van, a metal detector, and a coconut.
Christmas in the States does happen during wintertime, but there are very few white Christmases as it is still quite early in the season. The weather usually doesn't turn to reliable snowfall til late January early February.
Kiwi Traditions
--------Kiwi Christmas is quite a bit different, mainly because it takes place in summer. Halloween is barely a holiday here and Thanksgiving doesn't exist since it is an American construct. Some stores begin selling Christmas supplies in late October, and a handful have even attempted Black Friday sales. Despite all this, largely the holiday season doesn't kick off til the first weekend in December when the city begins putting up the Christmas decorations. It is a week or two later that live Christmas trees begin to go on sale, but they are significantly smaller and less bushy than their American counterparts. A few houses will put up Christmas lights, but it doesn't get dark til nine pm so it is rare to see extravagantly decorated houses.
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| Really the only house in the neighbourhood to have more than one strand of lights. |
In Wellington there are a few free, public events to help get you in the holiday spirit. The first is the Wellington Santa Parade, perhaps the best parade I have ever attended. While waiting for the parade to begin children will happily run up and down the street playing. The parade features fancy floats and lots of pageantry from many different cultures. From what I understand they used to handout sweets, vouchers, and even bread to parade goers, but in recent years the practice has stopped due to the threat of litigation. After the parade is Santa's After Party along the waterfront where the fun continues with live Christmas music. Another, more recent, tradition is NZ Secret Santa. A Twitter based Secret Santa game now organized by the NZ Post. You are given a random stranger as a secret Santa and must do some Twitter sleuthing to figure out a gift that they might like. I participated this year and received a small handmade pin.
There are Christmas parties as well, but they seem to lack much of the warmth of the parties we are used to back home even though they are usually much more extravagant and held off-site. Secret Santas are incredibly common, but I don't think anyone has ever heard of a White Elephant before. Maybe it's because we don't know a lot of people well yet, but somehow the parties as a whole seemed rather impersonal.
Like most countries, churches and religious institutions play a large role in Christmas celebrations. There are Christmas concerts, holiday crafting extravaganzas, and Christmas pageants. Happy Holidays is an uncommon saying here, with most people offering a cheerful greeting of Merry Christmas.
New Traditions
--------Since there is a lack of Thanksgiving, we chose to start our own tradition to get into the holiday spirit. The newly dubbed Decorating Day takes place in early December and consists of a simple meal reminiscent of holidays past. Once dinner is over we put on Christmas music and deck the halls. The following week Weta employees were invited to bring their families to work for free Christmas photos. We jumped at the opportunity and even brought Ms. Wednesday along to participate in the fun.
Christmas abroad makes it difficult to partake in the tradition of gift and card giving. Packages must be mailed out immediately after Thanksgiving to ensure that they will arrive in time and many arrive at their destination looking rather down-trodden despite paying an exorbitant amount to the postal service to ensure safe passage. The other option is to have items directly shipped to the recipient from the store, but this can result in the postman telling you what your gift is, accidentally opening your gift ahead of time, looking at the packing label and noticing the store it was sent from, and not actually knowing who sent which gift. We were still receiving packages as late as New Years Eve and have yet to figure out who sent two different gifts. Seth, the saint that he is, spent much of December intercepting parcels to wrap and place gift tags on so I could still be surprised.
This year on Christmas Eve we attended a candle-lit midnight mass, with mulled wine and holiday cakes at the end. The next morning we awoke, emptied out our Christmas stockings as a family. Even Wednesday got into the holiday spirit, waking us up and then staring at me intently until we actually got out of bed. Stockings emptied and porridge in our bellies we headed to morning mass for a cheerful service.
For lunch we prepared a home cooked meal of roast chicken, mushroom wellington, mashed potatoes, cheesy rice stuffing, mushroom gravy, biscuits, and banana bread pudding. Afterwards we opened gifts before heading out to an Orphan's Christmas.
Did you know? A traditional Christmas dish, English puddings are steamed by wrapping the baking tin in a damp towel, then placing it in another pan that is filled half-way with water.
Orphan's Christmas is put on by a family that attends our church. For many years they traveled abroad for work and learned to make the most of Christmas away from family. Even though they now have children and grandchildren here in New Zealand they still continue the tradition for those who do not. This particular celebration was very English in nature, with crackers, a treasure hunt, and classic English desserts such as tarts, trifle, and Christmas cake. One dessert was very Kiwi in nature, pavlova. Pavlova is a meringue cake topped with whipped cream and fresh fruit. Seth says it's like eating a cloud, I say it's like eating candy floss with fruit. Either way, it was so sweet that I ended up with a sudden tummy ache. It's worth trying, but be sure to eat it slowly. After dinner Father Christmas stopped by to deliver some gifts he found in the back of his sleigh. The house is high up a rocky mountain, so the only way it can be accessed without magical reindeer is by cable car. What a sight, jolly old Saint Nick riding up the hill in a motorised carriage!
Though our Christmas was very English, other Kiwis have their own unique traditions that celebrate the summery nature of a Kiwi Christmas. These people have barbecues with shrimp and salads, spending much of their holiday on the beach. Mother nature plays her part as well with the pÅhutukawa, a usually green tree that displays gorgeous red blooms right before Christmas.
Orphan's Christmas was wonderful and we stayed well into the night. Once home we watched the Queen's annual address before heading off to bed.
The days following Christmas were a long blur of Skype calls with family back in the States, BBC Christmas specials, and hiding inside trying to avoid the bright summer sun.
Visit Wednesday on Any Day to read Ms. Wednesday's holiday thoughts.
