In Sweden we say “God jul och ett gott nytt år!”. It translates to “Good Christmas and a Good New Year”.

Swedish has grammatical gender agreement for adjectives so “god” and “gott” is the same adjective but inflected for different grammatical genders of “jul” and “nytt år”. “Jul” is derived from [Yule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yule).

After Christmas and/or after New Year we say “god fortsättning”, meaning “good continuation”.

The generic secular way to say holiday greetings is “god helg”, meaning “good holiday”, but it sounds kind of flat as “helg” also means weekend in Swedish.

Other seasonal greetings we use are “glad påsk” (happy Easter) and “glad midsommar” (happy Midsummer) and sometimes but very rarely “glad pingst” (happy Pentecost).

11 comments
  1. *Boas festas* (good holidays) is the common catch-all greeting. It’s shorter and handier than the full *Feliz Natal e Bom Ano Novo* (happy Christmas and a good New Year).

    You get more specific right before the actual date. So for example, you’ll leave work on Friday, and say “*Feliz Natal*” to you coworkers, because you will see them again before New Year’s. Then maybe you’re at the market getting your last items on the 24th, you might say to the cashier “*Boa Consoada*” (have a good Christmas Eve dinner). A week later, there you are again shopping last minute for New Year’s Eve dinner, and you say to the cashier “*Boas entradas*” (have a good entry). And when you come to work on Monday Jan 2nd, everyone will be wishing “*Bom ano*” (good year) to eachother (along with the typical “haven’t seen you since last year!” joke).

  2. Boldog karácsonyt

    meaning

    Merry Christmas. Karácsony is Christmas (t is the accusative suffix)

  3. *Wesołych Świąt i szczęśliwego Nowego Roku* which is often translated to “Merry Christmas and a happy New Year” but it means probably something more like “Happy Holidays/Merry Christmas and a lucky/fortunate New Year”. It’s hard to say exactly which version is closer. *Święto* is an universal word for all holidays but usually it means Christmas if not specified. And *szczęśliwy* means both happy and lucky.

    Edit: We also have traditional holiday greetings for Easter though in this case they are usually a part of bigger greetings. It’s *smacznego jajka* (“delicious egg”) and *mokrego dyngusa* (“wet dyngus”). Dyngus is a tradition of spraying other people with water.

  4. These are the most common used:

    – “Feliz Navidad” which means “Merry Christmas”

    – “Felices Fiestas” which means “Happy Holidays”

    – “Feliz Año (Nuevo)” which means “Happy (New) Year”

  5. I guess in Finnish the most common greeting for that is “hyvää joulua ja onnellista uutta vuotta” and it means “good Christmas and happy new year.”
    Other options are “rauhallista joulua” (Peaceful Christmas) or “hyvää uutta vuotta” (Good new year).

  6. Merry Christmas and happy new year is usually: *Hyvää joulua ja onnellista uutta vuotta*, which if translated literally would mean good Christmas and happy/fortunate new year.

    In Finnish we usually wish *hyvää* with other holidays too, like *hyvää pääsiäsistä* (good Easter) or *hyvää juhannusta* (good midsummer).

    You could also wish someone *iloista joulua* (joyful Christmas), but that is not as common as *hyvää*.

    There is a humorous saying for the first of May that comes from Swedish: *Klara vappen*, which is a twits of a colloquial Swedish [*glada vappen*](https://www.sprakinstitutet.fi/sv/aktuellt/spraket_lever/glada_vappen!.18011.news). So instead of wishing someone joyous holiday you wish them a clear (sober) holiday.

  7. Most common is probably “Häid jõule ja head uut aastat” which literally means “Have good christmas and a good new year”. Generally all the christmas cards have some version of this but it’s not used when meeting someone in person. During christmas time you’d say the first part “Häid jõule” (have a good christmas) and then later, you’d say “Head vana-aasta lõppu” (have a good end of the year) and “Head uut aastat” (have a good new year).

    “Häid, head” can be replaced by “rõõmsaid, rõõmsat” (merry) or “ilusaid, ilusat / kauneid, kaunist” (beautiful).

  8. God jul og godt nytt år.

    It’s generally the same as in Swedish, but for other holidays we still use “god” (not “glad”), e.g. “god påske” (“good Easter”). And we use “god helg” to say “have a good weekend”.

  9. * **Frohe Weihnachten!** quite literally means “merry Christmas”
    * **Frohes Fest!** = “merry festivities” (as in “happy holidays”) is also quite common

    as for the new year part, we have the funny greeting of **Guten Rutsch (ins neue Jahr)!**, which literally means “have a nice slide (into the new year)!”.

    The etymological origin isn’t quite clear, but it could come from from Yiddish via [Rotwelsch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotwelsch) as a humorous variation of Rosh Hashana (the Hebrew New Year).

  10. Generally for specifically Christmas you’d say “fijne kerstdagen”, good/nice Christmas days, or just “fijne kerst”. If you want to include New Year’s it’s “fijne feestdagen”, good holidays. On Christmas cards you might have the combo “fijne kerstdagen en een gelukkig Nieuwjaar”, so it includes “happy new year”. Which is also what you say after New Year’s when you see people again for the first time. Or you can switch your “gelukkig nieuwjaar” up with a “beste wensen”, “best wishes”.

    For very conservative religious Christians/protestants you can also go with “gezegende kerstdagen” which means blessed Christmas days. Usually combined with a “voorspoedig nieuwjaar” which means fortuitous new year.

  11. My favorite is the New Year’s greeting in Hungarian – we often just say “BUÉK”, which is an acronym that stands for “Boldog új évet kívánok”, meaning “I wish you a happy new year”. Got it pared down to all of four letters.

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