A Christmas Special From Mailbutler
Original holiday traditions from around the world, best and worst music picks…
We have a really international team at Mailbutler (…from over 10 countries!), so we thought it’d be fun to ask around the office how everyone celebrate Christmas and if there’s any weird or unique tradition you can’t find elsewhere in the world. 🌎
Oh, and we also decided to ask for everyone’s best/worst Christmas music picks. (…and can I just say there’s only a fine line between the two)
This is the result…
🇩🇪 Christmas Pickle
“It’s common practice to decorate the Christmas tree in Germany but there’s also a funny thing you can do. Somewhere on the tree there will be a pickle hidden amongst all the other decorations (doesn’t have to be a real one). The first person to find it gets an extra gift. You can also hide the pickle somewhere in the room. 🤚” — Rene from Germany
(His music picks are Weihnachten in Familie and Wir haben einen Weihnachtsbaum by Frank Schöbel 🎄)
🇵🇱 12 Dishes
“In Poland it’s important to have 12 dishes at the Christmas table, most families I know follow this. Also if you have 12 dishes you have to try them all — it is said that it will bring you luck in the following year.” 🍽️— Szymon from Poland
🇺🇸 Christmas Lights
“Americans love their Christmas, so it’s all about the spectacle. We would drive down areas in Los Angeles where entire neighbourhoods dedicate themselves and their electric bill to putting on the best Christmas light. Also, my family was too impatient to wait for Christmas Day to open presents, so growing up, my parents allowed my brother and I to open one present Christmas Eve.” — Jasmine from US
(Her worst Christmas music pick is Santa Baby 🎅🏻. I’m with you on this one, Jasmine)
🇭🇰 Fake Snow & Christmas Cracker
“Christmas is 100% a consumer holiday in Hong Kong. You’ll find most shops and malls opened filled with fake snow (of course) and over the top decorations. People basically celebrate like it’s new year’s eve.
I spent my last few Christmas days abroad and my favourite tradition has to be the Christmas cracker in UK. They’re paper tubes that you pop open and usually there will be a piece of paper with jokes on it. They’re usually quite terrible and cheesy (think of turkey-themed knock knock jokes).
I love them because I get to bond over the cringe with whoever is across the table.” — Simone from Hong Kong
(Her Christmas music pick is The Little Drummer Boy 🥁 )
🇩🇪 Wichteln (Dwarfing)
“In Germany we have something called Wichteln — it’s like Secret Santa where you anonymously exchange small gifts. The literal translation is ‘dwarf’ or ‘dwarfing’. On the 24th you would gather together and open gifts — the person who rolls the highest number on the dice gets to open their gift first, and they have to guess who it’s from.” 🎲 — Tobias from Germany
🇷🇺 2 Weeks of Christmas in January
“Christmas in Russia is a non-consumer holiday celebrated on the 7th of January, so we put all of our energy into celebrating the New Year instead. Common attributes to it are presents, fireworks, champaign, mandarines, and salads with an enormous amount of mayonnaise, which disappears from the supermarkets as the day X is coming closer. 😱 The celebration goes for almost 2 weeks, in which we have official state holidays!”— Polina from Russia
(Her Christmas music picks are All I Want for Christmas is You and ‘all of ABBA’s songs’ — it’s her dad’s all-holiday favorite!)
🇹🇷 Family Time Around TV ?
“We don’t really have any widely accepted celebrations for Christmas in Turkey. Most families come together at some point, exchange gifts and watch television.” 📺 — Gökay from Turkey
🇬🇭 Christmas Goose
“My mom always wants to make a huge Christmas goose every year — she fails miserably as it just tastes like grilled chicken with traditional Ghanaian spices. We always tell her that chicken would be just fine but she insists on keeping that stuff up… 😅 (it just makes no sense to me 😂)” — Willimag from Ghana
(Her best Christmas song pick is What’s This — and her worst pick — because someone had just had to — is Last Christmas !)
🇬🇧 Queen’s Speech
“A weird Christmas tradition in the UK is that people sit down and watch the Queen’s speech on television on Christmas Day every year —
It’s always meant to be a positive message to the people but usually most people are asleep when it’s on due to eating and drinking too much Christmas lunch!” ♕ — Ian from UK
(His best Christmas music picks are Happy Xmas (War Is Over), Merry Xmas Everybody, and Fairytale of New York (feat. Kirsty Maccoll). Apparently “every other Christmas song is just awful.”)
🇫🇷 So French
“In France, people usually make a traditional cake called “Buche de Noël”, which means “Christmas Log”. The cake is served during the feast, which is called “Le Réveillon”. It’s a very late supper (traditionally held after midnight mass on Christmas Eve). The menu for the meal varies according to regional culinary tradition. In Alsace, goose is the main course, in Burgundy it is turkey with chestnuts, and the Parisians feast upon delicious oysters and foie gras —
One thing is sure: you´ll enjoy the dinner 😉” — Erwan from France
(His best Christmas music pick is O Come all ye faithful. He, of course, joins Willimag on the worst pick — because someone just had to — with Last Christmas.”)
🇻🇳 Just Another Night Out
“The majority of Vietnamese people are non-Christians — people just meet up with friends and go out. Sometimes they visit the church to admire the decorations. Also people usually don’t give any presents, they send cards to their beloved ones ”✉️ — Nhan from Vietnam
(His Christmas music pick is Hai Mùa Noel. Sounds pretty sad… not surprising knowing that Vietnamese people don’t receive any gifts… 😉)
I guess we’re all hungry now… but we also have a lot of interesting stories to tell our relatives about, so we can all make fun of the weird foreign holiday traditions and enjoy our little yearly routine 😃
What about you? Do you have an even weirder tradition you would like to share with us? Or maybe the Ultimate Worst Christmas Song Ever? Leave us a comment, we´d love to read about it!
PS: You now can also add a little bit more stress to the whole holiday preparation by running a few of our worst Christmas Music Picks through the speakers and turn up the volume, sounds like fun! 🎶
by Simone and Erwan from Mailbutler
