{"id":38732,"date":"2024-01-03T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-03T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/?p=38732"},"modified":"2025-12-17T14:58:05","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T19:58:05","slug":"krampus-kfc-and-kutya-unique-christmas-traditions-around-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/tartan-news\/2024\/01\/03\/krampus-kfc-and-kutya-unique-christmas-traditions-around-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Krampus, KFC, and Kutya: Unique\u00a0 Christmas Traditions Around the World<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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Christmas is a famous holiday that became popular around the fifth century in which individuals celebrate the birth of Jesus. Principally, we spend this holiday with our family and receive gifts, but not everybody celebrates the same way.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Instead of a turkey Christmas dinner, it has become a tradition to have “Kentucky for Christmas” in Japan.<\/strong> PIXABAY<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Japan<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Japan, the population is mostly made up of Buddhists and Shinto followers, so Christmas is more commercial, fun, and romantic than holy. In fact, if we ask the Japanese what Christmas is about, some might say that it is for Santa Claus. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1974, KFC made a campaign<\/a> to associate fried chicken with the season. Nowadays, the Japanese KFC Christmas meal is so popular that they have to pre-order it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vietnam<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Vietnam, only a small percentage of the people are Christians, and Christmas is not a public (or official) holiday. But because of the French colonial influence, celebrations happen just the same. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


The Vietnamese get into the Christmas spirit by throwing confetti, having large group gatherings, and enjoying the light shows and festive decorations, which include life-size nativity scenes in the more Catholic neighborhoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ukraine<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

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Kutya served with almonds and honey. Photo from Canva.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Ukraine has a unique decoration tradition<\/a>. Their Christmas trees are often decorated with an ornament in the shape of a spider (usually made of paper and wire) and they also decorate their Christmas trees with artificial spider webs. Traditionally, this represents good luck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another tradition that entails luck is the practice of throwing \u201ckutya\u201d on the ceiling, if it sticks, it is a sign of a good harvest in the future. Kutya is a popular Christmas dish that is comparable to a sweet porridge.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Miniature version of the Yule Goat. Photo from Canva.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Sweden<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Sweden, the Yule Goat tradition is celebrated for Christmas. Each year since 1966 a giant goat made of straw and bound with red ribbon is located in a little Swedish city named G\u00e4vle. The legend says that the goat is an invisible spirit that would appear before Christmas to make sure that the holiday preparations were done correctly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For a long time, the goat was destroyed every year by people who intentionally burned it. That\u2019s why the goat has been rebuilt every year. The reason why people burned it is unknown, but it has become a sort of tradition. The last time the Goat was burned down was in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Festivalgoers take part in the Austrian Krampus Run. <\/strong>SHUTTERSTOCK<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Austria<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the Krampus Run<\/a> is an especially unique 500-year-old tradition where onlookers are attacked by these monstrous-looking, horned creatures called Krampuses. The purpose of the Krampus is to straighten up and punish unwieldy children. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oona Ngabonziza, reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Originally published on Jan. 3, 2024<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Christmas is a famous holiday that became popular around the fifth century in which individuals celebrate the birth of Jesus. Principally, we spend this holiday with our family and receive gifts, but not everybody celebrates the same way. Japan In Japan, the population is mostly made up of Buddhists and Shinto followers, so Christmas is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10416,"featured_media":43180,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3613,2108,5386,3],"tags":[368,441,717,5933,276,3792],"class_list":["post-38732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-food","category-holidays","category-tartan-news","tag-culture","tag-holidays","tag-international","tag-oona-ngabonziza","tag-sinclair-community-college","tag-traditions"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":"","source_text":"","source_url":""},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5s3vR-a4I","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/360_F_1018944073_TsM1m8d7RUDhjHgr5sgaCkqkflSzVHoy.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10416"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38732"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43181,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38732\/revisions\/43181"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}