Christmas in Spain

On the 22nd of December we flew down to Valencia to celebrate the Christmas holidays. We had a pleasant flight via Münich with our friends Lisa and Dani.



On Christmas eve we had lunch and dinner with Paco's brother Carlos and his girlfriend Amparo.

There are some differences between the way of celebrating Christmas in Spain compared to Sweden.



1. On Christmas eve it is common to have dinner with your family and then go out with your friends. However we stayed home after dinner since all our friends here in Valencia have children by now and are not up to going out to party (and the matter of fact is that we were so tired and did not want to go out ;-)



2. They do not watch Kalle Anka (Donald Duck) or other stupid traditional tv programs



3. They do not eat julbord (smorgasbord) nor turkey. They don't have a traditional Christmas dinner



4. Santa Clause usually don't visit Spanish homes. He has hired the Three wise men to deliver the Christmas presents. Since they don't use magical reindeers they arrive late, the night between the 5th and 6th of January. However it seems that we have behaved very well this year because Santa had sent us some gifts. I got two pair of gloves (see below).



5. They do not go out on Christmas day as Swedish drunk youths do. They stay home with the family.



6. They have to work on the 26th of December



7. On New Years Eve they eat 12 grapes for every "ding dong" at 00:00. This tradition started one year when there was a huge harvest of grapes. It is also a tradition to wear read underwear and to toast with Cava (not Champagne). If you want even more luck for the next year you can drop something "of gold" in your glass of Cava and then toast.



8. Christmas ends on January the 6th. Therefore they didn't know about "Tjugonda knut" until this year when Ikea published this commercial.