Christmas questions mostly for those outside the US, but for we Americans, too

[Seshat]

Australia Post has a tradition of having 'Santa' reply to letters addressed to Santa.

There's a special address they prefer folks to use, that their sorting system directs straight to the 'Santa office'.

[MoonCat]

I've got a little ceramic figurine of La Befana, as well as a couple of nice Santas (and the Polish Star Man). I'd put pics up but I don't have the cable I need to get the pics to my laptop

[Moirae]

I'm from Canada but live in New Orleans.

In Canada, we celebrate it the same way. Its Santa Clause. I was always taught that Saint Nick, Topo Gigio, and all the rest are just other names for Santa Clause.

I love this time of year.

Growing up, my mom, my sister and I would inevitably hand make decorations. I still have some of them. Bread dough formed into teddy bears, decorated, baked, and shellacked so we can keep them forever. Ceramic ornaments painted by all of us (some of them have broken over the years but I still have them). Little mice in warm sluggly beds to hang on the tree that are really walnut shells with almonds for the heads, yarn for the tails, and pieces of fabric for the covers along with markers used to make the faces.

That sort of thing.

We also used to start baking about a whole month before Christmas and we used to not be able to eat at the kitchen table after a couple days because it was filled with hand made from scratch, cakes, cookies, pies, and candies.

The last weekend of November was christmas decorating day, so we'd put up the tree and decorate the stair banisters, and the windows with fake snow designs.

On Christmas Eve we would go to my mum's mum's place. I had lots of cousins, and aunts and uncles, so the girls would go play dolls in the basement (it was set up like a second living room), and the boys would run outside to play hockey in the streets or go into one of the bedrooms and do whatever boys do. The adults would sit in the dining room until dinner was ready. Turkey and ham, mashed potatoes, and yams, corn, peas, and carrots, home made bread, lots of soft drinks, and lots of sweet pastries made by hand by my gramma (though most of the rest of us brought something too), and so much food it couldn't possibly all be eaten. The whole house was decorated and carols were playing on the boombox. There were so many presents under the tree that they would spill into the living room and everyone would have to scramble and push things aside to find a place to sit. Then one adult would be picked to hand out the presents. All the adults would get at least one each and the kids would usually get two or three. Normally each family would also bring one present from under the tree for the kids to open that night as well.

I remember my uncle chasing us girls around the house making kissy faces at us saying "give me a kiss girls" and we'd run around screaming at the top of our lungs.

I remember one of my older cousins holding the youngest boy up by one of his heals and walking around the house with him like that while the little one screamed laughing like crazy.

Many times my uncles would drink too much and there would be an argument or fight that would break out at some point. Or maybe one of my aunts would go storming out of the room because they got angry with someone lol. Sometimes it was even my family that had that problem.

One year, I remember my gramma's best friend bringing her grandson over and all us older girls were drooling over him (we were about 12 or so) because he was very cute.

We're all older now and things have changed, but those christmas memories will always stay with me. No matter where the family was in the world, we always came home for christmas to spend it together. A few years ago, one of my cousins said to me "It's really too bad that the kids of our generation couldn't experience the wonderful christmases we had when we were little". And she's right... things have changed alot. But we will always share gramma's christmases as some of the best times of our lives.

We'd go home about midnight or maybe 2 am.

One year my dad had me absolutely convinced (I was about 6 or 7) that I heard the sound of the bells on santa's sleigh, and I had to go home asap so santa could come visit.

Of course, my sister and I being so excited would inevitably wake up anywhere between 5 am and 7 am and make our parents get out of bed (when they'd probably only been asleep about an hour) to see the toys.

My mom was one of those people that prepared for this time of year all year round, and she'd buy toys and toys and toys. Our living room was always COVERED in toys. Not just the wrapped ones but the unwrapped "santa presents" too. ALL over every surface of the rooms. Christmas day was always a playground. We'd pull everything apart and put it together and leave it in the living room sometimes for days.

But one year... one year was the best and to this day I remember it as clear as it was then.

My parents made us close our eyes (we were 3 and 6 I think) and they picked us up and brought us down to the basement to get the greatest toys ever. My parents had made a Barbie house for us from scratch. Big enough to sit in. Mom made furniture out of Popsicle sticks and fabric. The windows even had lace curtains. She made DOZENS of sets of clothing for our Barbies. We played with it for so many years it was literally falling apart when it was finally thrown out. And I'm not kidding, the walls were falling off, the sides were cracking, the things in it broken and ripped, because as we got bigger, the dollhouse couldn't really fit us anymore but we didn't care.

After the toys came my other gramma's house. Now, I have to admit she wasn't as much fun. She didn't like girls much so gave us crappy toys every year, and when I was 12 I was told "Why are you in the kitchen with the women. Get out" which made my mom really angry. I was older than all of the kids on the other side of the family and their inane prattle and childishness got on my nerves.

But that was our christmas. And I will always remember how it was the best time of year growing up.

The house I'm living in now is just my husband and I and his aunt. The shape and form of the house isn't conducive to even decorating for Christmas so I haven't bothered, though I'm considering starting up my sims 4 game so I can decorate. We are in the process of buying a house. I intend on doing it right when I have my own house. I really would love to go to my in laws for Christmas though, but they are in another state so its not easy.

So that's how we always did christmas. I wouldn't give up those memories for anything in the world.

[Ted_The_IT_Guy]

NORAD (The people that used to be in Cheyeanne Mountain in Colorado, think of the movie "War Games") will track Santa Claus around the world.

Tradition dates back to the 60s when a couple kids someone got ahold of a phone line RIGHT INTO the command center and were asking about Santa. Some guy on duty decided to have some fun, and told them Santa was last sighted over "X" and moving towards "Y".

For non Americans and Canadians, NORAD is the radar detection groups that would have spotted Russian ICBMs coming to nuke the United States during the Cold War, and has since evolved into more US Airspace security since the USSR went down. Cheyeanne Mountain is outside of Colorado Springs, CO, about 60 miles south of Denver, where I live.

[depechemodefan]

I thought Santa Clause and Saint Nick were the same person until I looked it up in Wikipedia. Granted, that was some time ago.

I grew up in Texas, but my mom was from Colombia. Their tradition was that baby Jesus would come into the house on Christmas morning and leave presents for the children. No, no one played the baby Jesus, just when the kids wake up they find the presents.

[csquared]

Santa's birthday is Dec. 6. Therefore, St. Nick's Eve on Dec 5.

[MoonCat]

I know someone that served at NORAD years and years ago. He used to say he "practiced blowing up the world every day". After leaving the service he wasn't even allowed to fly over some countries for a long time after (security reasons I guess).


Moirae, I loved reading your Christmas memories. Reminds me of some of the Christmases when I was a kid.

[XCashier]

I was raised in Phoenix, AZ. When I was a little kid, I longed so much for a snowy Christmas and was always disappointed when it never happened. We were a Protestant household, but didn't have much in the way of religious traditions aside from a small Nativity display.

On Christmas Eve, we went to our paternal grandmother's house. Grandma would have a simple spread of sandwich fixings and cookies, my brother and I would get presents from Grandma and our great-aunts, we spent the evening visiting.

Christmas morning, we had to wait until Mom and Dad woke up to get the gifts under the tree, but we were allowed to get the gifts from our stockings (pinned to the sofa, as we had no chimney. Again, as a little kid I worried that Santa couldn't get in, but Mom assured me he had a skeleton key to get in through the door. ) Once Mom and Dad woke up, we kids would pass around the gifts, and we'd all take turns opening them, youngest going first. That was me, followed by my brother, then Mom, then Dad.

That afternoon, we'd go to our maternal grandmother's house and have a celebration very similar to what Moirae described. Lots of great food, more gifts for everyone, cousins playing together, aunts and uncles and parents visiting and all having a wonderful time.

Sadly, a good chunk of my family has passed away, plus we're in a different state (though with somewhat better chances for a snowy Christmas!), so my son doesn't have the experiences I did. Hopefully some year soon we can afford to go back to Arizona to spend Christmas with the family again.

[wolfie]

Tradition dates back to the 60s when a couple kids someone got ahold of a phone line RIGHT INTO the command center and were asking about Santa. Some guy on duty decided to have some fun, and told them Santa was last sighted over "X" and moving towards "Y".

I've heard that some department store set up and advertised a "call to Santa" line, but they switched a couple digits in the number in their ad - and the wrong number was the actual line into NORAD.

I can imagine what would have happened if the person having a little fun had a twisted sense of humour: "We spotted something coming in low over the Pole, trying to fly under the radar. A squadron of fighters was sent to investigate, the Bandit tried to take evasive action, so we splashed it."

[Chromatix]

Finland has its own set of Christmas mythology, mostly inherited from the Scandinavian traditions. The local variations are mainly:

Santa - whose name in Finnish is Joulupukki - lives in a mountain called Korvatunturi. It happens to be on the Russian border. He has an official grotto in Rovaniemi, which is right on the Arctic Circle (seriously, look at a map). The overnight sleeper trains between Helsinki and Rovaniemi (some of which continue a little further east-north-east to Kemijärvi, approximately towards Korvatunturi) are called the "Santa Claus Express".

St. Lucia's Day is also celebrated:

The traditional Lucia Parade on 13 December is a festival of light during wintertime. Each year a young maiden is selected to represent Saint Lucia, receiving her crown of candles at Helsinki Cathedral before descending the steps to Senate Square.

On the slightly more disturbing end of things, the film Rare Exports was set and produced in Finland - you'll even need subtitles to understand it. This is based on the older Scandinavian myths, in which the Joulupukki and his little helpers are not nearly as jolly and friendly as we now expect - indeed, the native Sámi people buried him in the mountain long ago for everyone's safety.