Christmas Celebrations in Finland, Hungary, Spain

and SloveniaYES for Future - Erasmus+ Christmas 2014

Christmas in Finland

As you may know Santa Claus lives in Finland. Normally Santa Claus comes to our homes on Christmas eve, gives some presents and maybe sings a song with the children.

www.flickr.com/photos/visitfinland

Christmas dinner in FinlandIn Finland, the Christmas dinner is eaten on Christmas Eve, December 24th. The good old

traditional dishes appear on the Christmas dining table year after year. Casseroles containing different vegetables including, rutabaga, carrot and potato are common. The main dish is usually a large oven-baked ham. Traditional food is also Rosolli. It is salad from boiled beetroots, carrots, potatoes, apples and pickled cucumber. It's sometimes served with herring. Dessert is usually either alcoholic or non-alcoholic Christmas

beverage glögg (mulled wine) and mince pie.

Hyvää joulua! (Merry Christmas!) wish

Kaisa & Roosa & Dora & Aava

Christmas presents in FinlandAt Christmas we give presents to our friends and relatives. Little children are excited waiting for Christmas eve. On Christmas eve comes Santa Claus who gives the presents to everyone. Sometimes Santa Claus won’t come and then the presents just appear somehow outside the door.Kaisa & Eve

Finnish Christmas traditionsIn the old town of Turku, the former capital of Finland, a special ceremony is held to declare the beginning of "Christmas peace" period, starting at 12 o'clock noon on Christmas Eve and lasting for twenty days. Traditional Finnish Christmas songs are hymns that are sung in the church.

Christmas Day is usually spent quietly at home, relaxing and resting, with some people perhaps attending the early morning church service.

Sauna is one of the most important traditions. Many Finnish families go to sauna on Christmas Eve. It's so relaxing and makes you feel good.

Christmas in Slovenia

We decorate Christmas tree on Christmas Eve, have an amazing dinner and go to Midnight Mass. In the morning, Santa puts presents underneath the Christmas tree and we open them with our family. - Vesel božič(Merry Christmas), Eva B. :)

Christmas in Ljubljana, our capital city.http://www.ljubljana.si

Christmas in HungaryIn Hungary we decorate the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve, December 24th. We have a great traditional christmas dinner, and after that we open the gifts, which the Baby Jesus brought us. We go to Midnight Mass, visit our family, eat and drink a lot, and have fun.In the winter holiday the whole family is together. We bake a lot of delicious christmas cookies, play winter sports like ice skating and skiing, and visit the advent Fair.

Boldog karácsonyt! - Merry Christmas! Advent Fair in Budapest

Haszon Luca

Christmas dinner in Hungary

In Hungary the families usually have a big Christmas dinner. The whole family sits around the table. Firstly we eat fish soup, secondly stuffed cabbage, finally the dessert is beigli.

Fábián Csenge

Christmas in Hungarian schoolsIn the Hungarian schools we always celebrate Christmas with our class, also we have a joint meeting too. We give a present to one of our classmates based on a previous random choice. We bring cookies and drink to the classroom and eat there together . During the joint meeting the headmaster or headmistress talks about the holiday and some students give performances too. At the end we sing a christmas song together.

Fábián Csenge

New Year’s Eve in HungaryThe goals of the New Years Eve traditions are that in the following year you have good health,luck,happiness and abundance.

In Hungary, the people are very superstitious.For example, we eat pork because it is grub our luck but we never eat poultry because it is scrape away our luck. On this day you should not go to the doctor or you will have illness in the whole next year. If the first day of the new year, the first visitor is girl, it is means your bad luck but if a man ring on the first day of the week, you will be lucky.

In the New Year’s Eve the fireworks are very popular. According to some people the loud noise can chase the evil and bad spirits of the last year but a very simple explanation is that it’s just fun and it’s the sign of frolic.

Terényi Kitti

Christmas in SpainIn Spain, we decorate the Christmas tree and Nativity scene two weeks before Christmas Eve. This is our way to welcome this beautiful time of the year. At Christmas Eve, families get reunited to have dinner, all together. Grandmothers usually are hours cooking for a lot of people, that is always delicious. Our dinner is divided in three parts: starters, like ham, prawns, cheese, shellfish… ; the second part is when we eat heavier food, is usually turkey or chicken but we can eat fish too; and desserts like turron or “polvorones”.

Also ,we sing carols and we tell every good experience we have had this year, and thank to God to gave us the chance to live them.

At Christmas, we open some presents Santa put neat to our shoes we put near the tree to what presents are ours. Although, this is not a tradition, because some families don’t have presents at Christmas, because we have another tradition here in Spain that is related with presents this dates.

After opening presents, we go to the church and we have lunch again with our family.

Cristina Parra Álvarez

Polvorones

New Year’s Eve in Spain-New Year’s Eve is a really special day in Spain because we have dinner with all our family reunited and it’s really nice to be altogether even if it’s once a year.-The most typical thing is ‘’The grapes’’.I think we only do that in Spain, when the clock strikes 12, we eat 12 grapes with every clock strike and is really hard because we don’t have enough time to swallow them, so you kind of turn a little bit red.-Talking about red, another typical thing is that we have to wear some red underwear if we want to start the new year with good luck!

By Pilar Fernández-Cortés

Epiphany Day in SpainThis is the favourite day of the year for children. On the afternoon of 5th of January there is a parade in all cities around Spain. Every year it is inspired in a different theme (children’s stories, toys…). The Three Kings, as we call them, or the Three Wise Men go on special “floats’’ and they throw candies to the children. Also they are accompanied by their pages. There are other floats decorated with the chosen theme. The next day children,and also adults receive their presents. It is a very amusing and emotional day and I think that this is the best day of the year to be with your family.¡Feliz Navidad! - Merry Christmas Olga Hierro

PREPARING FOR CHRISTMAS IN SLOVENIA

Christmas is the oldest and the biggest Christian holiday celebrated within our families.We start preparing for Christmas very soon in advent time which starts 4 weeks before Christmas. In this time we make beautiful decorated wreaths with 4 candles and every Sunday we light one.Our traditional cake is potica (nut roll). It is made from flour & yeast,sugar,milk,salt,butter,eggs and walnut filling.

Hana Pačnik