Dec 10

Dec 10 Happy Christmas from China

Well we have been to India and now we are now in China to see how they celebrate this magical time of the year.

In China very few people are Christians and most people know nothing or very little about Christmas. It is generally celebrated in the big cities, where there are lights, trees and decorations in the streets and in some of the stores. The big stores some of them have grottos, same as over here and Santa is called 'Shen Dan Lao Ren'. Sometimes even the postmen will dress up as Santa to deliver letters.

The younger generation tend to celebrate Christmas with parties and young couples will buy gifts for each other, a bit like on Valentine's Day

Few people have a Christmas tree, and those that do it is usually plastic and decorated with paper chains, flowers and lanterns. The nice trees are usually in the big shopping malls.

One of the traditions that is popular on Christmas Eve is the giving of apples, and of course, the shops have taken advantage of this and sell them in coloured paper.. The Chinese Christmas eve is called 'Ping'an Ye' meaning peaceful or quiet and has come from the carol Silent Night. The word for apple is 'pingguo' which sounds like the word for peace.

Some people go carol singing and the most popular carol is Jingle Bells, as few understand the carols or even know the Christmas story.

Those that are Christians go to a special service and Midnight Mass is very popular.

On Christmas Day, they do prepare a feast. Not as we know it with turkey and stuffing and all the trimmings but very similar to a Spring Festival with roast pork, jiaozi (Chinese dumplings) spring rolls, huoshao (a baked roll with or without stuffing) and rice. Western food has caught on and you will find green tea flavoured cake, and chocolate and vanilla cakes topped with cherry tomatoes.