By Russell Wettle,
Staff Writer.
During the winter, there are a lot of widely-celebrated holidays. Since there are so many traditions during these events, there are sure to be a few quirky ones. In my own family, we enjoy lighting our Christmas pudding on fire. We soak it in brandy for days, then put a match to it and engulf it in flames. It doesn’t hurt the pudding; it only warms it up and makes sure that it’s no longer saturated with alcohol.
In Japan, a very successful marketing campaign by Kentucky Fried Chicken in 1974 introduced a new tradition: lots of people now eat KFC on Christmas Eve. People hoping to get their festive fried food often have to order it months in advance because of the backlog of orders that the restaurants get.
In Catalonia, Spain, families celebrate Christmas by having a “pooping log.” It’s a log with a fake grin attached to its face that sits under a blanket. It is given food to eat every day and is then beaten with sticks on Christmas with the hopes that it will defecate presents for the children, who then look under the blanket to find their presents. Parents are expected to sneak the presents under the blanket while the children pray in the evening.
In Kurdistan, an autonomous region of Northern Iraq, it’s customary for children to lock their doors a week before Hanukkah and their parents have to pay them in coins in order to enter. It’s seen as a unique way of fulfilling the tradition of gelt, or the gifting of money.
Some students here at SRHS also have interesting things they do during holidays. Sophomore Micah Myers has a pickle hidden in his family’s Christmas tree every year. Everyone in his family then looks for the pickle because the person who finds it gets to open their presents first. “All my cousins come over and we search the tree for the pickle,” said Myers, who thoroughly enjoys this fast-growing tradition. “My family’s been doing it for a long time.”
People from all over the world have traditions for the winter holidays. While these range from Christmas KFC to pickles in a tree, they are all a great way to make the holidays even more fun.
