Yuletide, worldwide: Holiday traditions around the world
Baltimore has a monument lighting, New York has the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree, and Washington has a national menorah lighting. Around the world, though, holiday traditions range from religious ceremonies (like nine consecutive masses in Manila) to contemporary takes on pagan traditions.
What’s your favorite holiday tradition? Tell us in the comments.
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- A musician in a brass band wearing a traditional miner’s costume takes part in a Christmas miners’ parade in Annaberg-Buchholz, eastern Germany, on December 23, 2012. The miners’ parade is traditionally held in places in Germany where ore was smelted. (Hendrik Schimdt/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A brass band wearing traditional miner’s costumes takes part in a Christmas miners’ parade in Annaberg-Buchholz, eastern Germany, on December 23, 2012. The miners’ parade is traditionally held in places in Germany where ore was smelted. (Hendrik Schimdt/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Workers prepare tamales during the holiday rush at Delicious Tamales in San Antonio, Texas. A Mexican-American tradition, tamale sales spike during the Christmas holiday season. (Erich Schlegel/Reuters)
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- Tamales prepared for the holidays are seen during the holiday rush at Delicious Tamales in San Antonio, Texas. A Mexican-American tradition, tamale sales spike during the Christmas holiday season. (Erich Schlegel/Reuters)
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- Visitors walk past a stall selling illuminated Christmas stars at the annual Christmas market at Alexanderplatz two days on November 28, 2012 in Berlin, Germany. Christmas markets, with their stalls selling mulled wine (Gluehwein), Christmas tree decorations and other delights, are an integral part of German Christmas tradition. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
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- A man dressed as Santa Claus works on his make-up as he attends the annual meeting of volunteer Santa Clauses and Angels on December 1, 2012 in Berlin. The event was organized by Studentenwerk Berlin, a student organization at the German capital’s technical university (Technische Universitaet Berlin), that sends out its students dressed as Santas and angels every year to visit company parties in December and families on Christmas Eve. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Women dressed as angels and men dressed as Santa Claus attend the annual meeting of volunteer Santa Clauses and Angels on December 1, 2012 in Berlin. The event was organized by Studentenwerk Berlin, a student organization at the German capital’s technical university (Technische Universitaet Berlin), that sends out its students dressed as Santas and angels every year to visit company parties in December and families on Christmas Eve. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A man dressed as Santa Claus rings a bell as he attends the annual meeting of volunteer Santa Clauses and Angels on December 1, 2012 in Berlin. The event was organized by Studentenwerk Berlin, a student organization at the German capital’s technical university (Technische Universitaet Berlin), that sends out its students dressed as Santas and angels every year to visit company parties in December and families on Christmas Eve. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A woman dressed as an angel stands between men dressed as Santa Claus as she attends the annual meeting of volunteer Santa Clauses and Angels on December 1, 2012 in Berlin. The event was organized by Studentenwerk Berlin, a student organization at the German capital’s technical university (Technische Universitaet Berlin), that sends out its students dressed as Santas and angels every year to visit company parties in December and families on Christmas Eve. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Romanian children wearing real bear skins coming from the Bacau region (some 340 km northeast from Bucharest) perform the bears’ dance, an ancient tradition before Christmas, in Bucharest, December 23, 2012. Such ceremonies are still popular in the Balkans and Romania, especially during the days between Christmas Eve to Epiphany. Originally, they were ceremonies related to the periodic return of the dead, with people wearing all sorts of masks and behaving like animals such as horses, goats or bears. It is believed that bears banish demons from houses and farmyards and wish inhabitants a happy year. (Daniel Mihailescu/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Romanian children wearing real bear skins coming from the Bacau region (some 340 km northeast from Bucharest) perform the bears’ dance, an ancient tradition before Christmas, in Bucharest, December 23, 2012. Such ceremonies are still popular in the Balkans and Romania, especially during the days between Christmas Eve to Epiphany. Originally, they were ceremonies related to the periodic return of the dead, with people wearing all sorts of masks and behaving like animals such as horses, goats or bears. It is believed that bears banish demons from houses and farmyards and wish inhabitants a happy year. (Daniel Mihailescu/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A Romanian child wearing a real bear skin coming from the Bacau region (some 340 km northeast from Bucharest) performs the bears’ dance, an ancient tradition before Christmas, in Bucharest, December 23, 2012. Such ceremonies are still popular in the Balkans and Romania, especially during the days between Christmas Eve to Epiphany. Originally, they were ceremonies related to the periodic return of the dead, with people wearing all sorts of masks and behaving like animals such as horses, goats or bears. It is believed that bears banish demons from houses and farmyards and wish inhabitants a happy year. (Daniel Mihailescu/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Nigerian Christian pilgrims pray inside the Grotto at the Church of the Nativity in the biblical West Bank city of Bethlehem, believed to be the birthplace of Jesus Christ, on December 24, 2012. Thousands of Palestinians and tourists were flocking to Bethlehem to mark Christmas at the site where many believe Jesus Christ was born. (Musa Al-Shaer/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People gather to receive a piece of traditional Christmas bread, marking the Orthodox Christmas Day festivities, at Terazije Square in Belgrade on January 7, 2011. Serbian Orthodox believers celebrate Christmas on January 7, which is December 25th on the Julian calendar. (Marko Djurica/Reuters)
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- Pope Benedict XVI receives the Roman Curia for the annual Christmas greetings at the Clementina Hall on December 21, 2012 in Vatican City, Vatican. (Eric Vandeville/Vatican Pool via Getty Images)
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- People dressed up as Santa Claus enjoy a traditional Christmas bath on December 23, 2012 in Monaco. (Valery Hache/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Winter swimmers dressed in Santa Claus costumes enjoy the cold water during a traditional ice swimming session on December 23, 2012 in Lanke, some 50 kilometers north of Berlin. (Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images)
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- With the outdoor temperature teaching -10 Celsius (or 14 degrees Farenheit), people take part in an annual Christmas bath in the Warta river, in Uniejow near Lodz, Poland. (Tomasz Stanczak/Agencja Gazeta/Reuters)
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- Children are seen next to candles lit to celebrate Dia de las Velitas, or Candle Day, in the neighborhood of Belen in Bogota on December 7, 2012. The candlelight event takes place every year to honor the Virgin Mary and mark the start of Christmas festivities.(Fredy Builes/Reuters)
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- Ethiopian orthodox priests in their satin robes stand under sequined velvet umbrellas during the annual Epiphany celebrations, called “Timket”, of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church in Addis Ababa on January 20, 2004. “Timket”, the greatest Ethiopian festival of the year, commemorates the baptisom of Jesus in the Jordan River by John the Baptist. (Wolfgang Rattay/Reuters)
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- Supporters of the German second-division football club FC Union Berlin attend the 10th Christmas singing at the team’s stadium (Stadium Alte Foersterei) in Berlin, on December 23, 2012. For two hours, over 20,000 people sang Christmas songs. (Jörg Carstensen/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People wearing Father Frost outfits dance during a traditional pre-New Year parade in central Minsk, Belarus on December 23, 2012. (Viktor Drachev/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Father Frost (second from left), with his snow maiden, meets with Santa Claus (right) at the Nuijamaa border station between Finland and Russia in Lappeenranta, Finland, on December 23, 2012. (Heikki Saukkomaa/AFP/Getty Images)
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- The shoes of a snow maiden are pictured during a symbolic meeting of Father Frost and Santa Claus at the Nuijamaa border station between Finland and Russia in Lappeenranta, Finland, on December 23, 2012. (Heikki Saukkomaa/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Bear Miska, left, plays xylophone on the occasion of a symbolic meeting of Snow Maiden, Father Frost and Santa Claus at the Nuijamaa border station between Finland and Russia in Lappeenranta, Finland, on December 23, 2012. (Heikki Saukkomaa/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A baker of Dresden’s ‘Association for the Protection of Stollen’ (Schutzgemeinschaft Dresdner Stollen) puts icy sugar on a giant fruit loaf in Dresden, eastern Germany, on December 2, 2012. The giant cake was sold at a charity event on December 8. (Matthias Hiekel/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Bakers of Dresden’s ‘Association for the Protection of Stollen’ (Schutzgemeinschaft Dresdner Stollen) work on a giant fruit loaf in Dresden, eastern Germany, on December 2, 2012. The giant cake was sold at a charity event on December 8. (Matthias Hiekel/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People queue outside the famous lottery’s office, Dona Manolita, to buy the “Fat One” (el Gordo) lottery tickets in Madrid on December 18, 2012. On December 22, thousands of lucky ticketholders in Spain could find some relief from the country’s economic crisis, as the world’s richest lottery will pay out more 2.52 billion euros in prize money. Spain’s Christmas lottery named “El Gordo” (Fat One) is a Christmas tradition. (Pierre-Philippe Marcou/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People celebrate after winning the first prize of Spain’s Christmas lottery, named “El Gordo” (Fat One), in Grañén, in Alaquas, near Valencia, on December 22, 2012. The world’s richest lottery showered prizes of up to 2.5 billion euros ($3.3 billion) on crisis-hit Spaniards in an annual draw of the “El Gordo” or “The Fat One”. The jackpot went to number 76058, which is split into a total of 1,800 “decimo” tickets each paying out 400,000 euros. (Jose Jordan/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Miners from the Ore Mountains, wearing traditional costumes, take part in the Christmas Miners Parade on December 22, 2012 in Leipzig, eastern Germany. (Peter Endig/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People take part in a traditional pre-Christmas celebration with a painted tree trunk in Vilnius, Lithuania on December 12, 2012 at 12:12. (Petras Malukas/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A man participates in winter solstice celebrations to complete the Christmas ‘Blukis’ (stump) burning ceremony at Lukiskes Square in Vilnius, Lithuania on December 21, 2012. In pagan traditions in Lithuania exists a popular myth of stealing and conquering the sun. To free the Sun, the Blukis is dragged around a town, beat and later burned. (Petras Malukas/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A boy participates in winter solstice celebrations to complete the Christmas ‘Blukis’ (stump) burning ceremony at Lukiskes Square in Vilnius, Lithuania on December 21, 2012. In pagan traditions in Lithuania exists a popular myth of stealing and conquering the sun. To free the Sun, the Blukis is dragged around a town, beat and later burned. (Petras Malukas/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A boy participates in winter solstice celebrations to complete the Christmas ‘Blukis’ (stump) burning ceremony at Lukiskes Square in Vilnius, Lithuania on December 21, 2012. In pagan traditions in Lithuania exists a popular myth of stealing and conquering the sun. To free the Sun, the Blukis is dragged around a town, beat and later burned. (Petras Malukas/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People attend the first of nine dawn masses at a Roman Catholic Church in Las Pinas City on the outskirts of Manila on December 16, 2012 to signal the official start of the Christmas season. The tradition of dawn masses, which culminates on Christmas Eve, dates back to the Spanish era. It is a popular belief that anyone who attends all nine masses will have his wishes granted. (Jay Directo/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People attend the first of nine dawn masses at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in Manila on December 16, 2012 to signal the official start of the Christmas season. The tradition of dawn masses, which culminates on Christmas Eve, dates back to the Spanish era. It is a popular belief that anyone who attends all nine masses will have his wishes granted. (Jay Directo/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People dressed as animals with masks with horns for the so-called “Klausentreiben” make their way through the southern German city of Sonthofen on December 5, 2012 during a traditional pre-Christmas parade. (Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/AFP/Getty Images)
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- People dressed as animals with masks with horns for the so-called “Klausentreiben” make their way through the southern German city of Sonthofen on December 5, 2012 during a traditional pre-Christmas parade. (Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A trumpeter plays from the Old Town tower in front of the traditional Christmas tree placed at the traditional Christmas market on December 17, 2012 at the Old Town Square in Prague. (Michal Cizek/AFP/Getty Images)
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