Unique global Christmas traditions: From witches to KFC

While attending Christmas church services is the norm in most countries, Venezuelans take it up a notch: On December 24, they roller-skate to midnight Mass to commemorate the birth of Christ. While the belief is that it's the sunny south's answer to sledding in the snowy north, the practice that began in the 1960s still remains popular. Traffic is blocked for the skaters' safety.

The story of Christmas is never complete without mention of the star of Bethlehem that led the three wise men to the manger of baby Jesus. In the Philippines, stars are depicted on vividly colored parols (from the Spanish "farol," which means lantern) that are hung outside homes during the Christmas season. Made of bamboo and Japanese paper, these festive lanterns symbolize hope and light.

The kind-hearted Befana was intended to visit the newborn Jesus with the Magi, but she wanted to finish her work on the loom first. Later, the witch could not find her way alone, so on the night of January 5-6, she flies around the world looking for the child. She rewards good children with sweets; those who were bad get a piece of coal in the form of sweet sugar.

With less than 1% of its population identifying as Christian, Christmas is a secular holiday in Japan. Yet one tradition has evolved, featuring a jolly, bespectacled man with a white goatee who's not Santa Claus. Ever since Kentucky Fried Chicken launched its "Kentucky for Christmas" marketing campaign in 1974, Colonel Sanders' famous fried chicken is now a Christmas tradition here.

Radishes have long been part of life in Oaxaca City, Mexico. Back in 1897, the city's mayor hit upon a whimsical pre-Christmas activity: the Night of the Radishes. Held every December 23, skilled local artists carve scenes of everyday life into locally grown radishes and display them at the local Christmas market. Given the season, Christian themes are also featured, like this Nativity scene here.

Most Nativity scenes boast a "heavenly" look-and-feel, but in Catalonia, Spain, they include a distinctly human character: "El Caganer," or "the pooper." Often placed in a corner, it is a figurine of a peasant, wearing a traditional Catalan red cap, with his trousers down, defecating. Theories abound, but it's seen as a symbol of fertility among farmers, as fecal matter makes good manure.

While St. Nick brings gifts to those who've been "nice," in Austria, his assistant the Krampus deals with those who've been "naughty." The Krampusnacht Festival, held on December 5 — the eve of St. Nicholas Day — celebrates this being who has "flaming coals for eyes, matted fur and twisting stag horns, who slaps people with birch twigs and kidnaps children ... so he can later drown or eat them."

Christmas isn't a typical cultural celebration in China, yet one distinctly local practice has recently evolved here. "Christmas Eve" in Mandarin translates to ping'anye, or "the evening of peace." That sounds like "pingguo," which means "apple." Thus, an innovative linguistic fusion has resulted in the popular gift of apples during Christmas known as "ping'anguo," or "peace apples."

Every December 24 at 3 p.m., families sit down to watch a 1958 Walt Disney Christmas special, "Donald Duck and His Friends Wish You a Merry Christmas." According to news publisher 'The Local' in Sweden, more than 4.5 million people — almost half of the country's entire population, watched this hour-long special in 2020, making it Sweden's most watched TV show in modern history.

And while December 25 is widely celebrated as the birth date of Christ in many Christian countries, Christmas — called Ganna or Genna — in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is observed on January 7. Many also participate in a special Advent fast of up to 43 days preceding Christmas, which is also known as the "Fast of the Prophets" (or Tsome Nebiyat).

German Christmas traditions are popular in the US. One of them is to hang a "Christmas pickle made in Germany" in the tree: Only nobody in Germany is familiar with that, and many in the US either. Either way, a fourth-generation glassblower from Thuringia, where the glass-pickle was invented in 1880, has been producing it ever since.