What do people in your city/country actually do on Christmas Day? (apart from eating).

25 comments

1. The 25th? Either stay at home or visit friends/relatives, more religious go to church.

   Christmas Eve leftovers for breakfast and something fancy for dinner.

2. In my family we go to church, open presents, have lunch, go for a walk or have a nap (depending on how we feel), then watch Christmas films and read, build lego, or play card/board games.

3. Eating with the family :). When my grandparents were still alive we used to visit them with the “extended” family. Nowadays its just me, my mom and my dad. It is a chilled down day in which we try to relax and just be happy

4. Christmas day? Maybe celebrate Christmas again but with the other side of the family? Otherwise its not very special, we celebrate on Christmas Eve so.

5. Under normal circumstances have a fancy meal for lunch, have the relatives over for presents and coffee and cake and then go out with my friends in the evening.

6. We usually visit aunt and uncle to have a slightly extended family breakfast. Nothing special. I mean, the big celebration happened the evening before anyways

7. Go to church, watch TV (they show a lot of classic films at Christmas), go for walks, play games like board games, charades, card games, eat.

8. 25th? That’s after Christmas already. So go to grandparents/aunts/friends, watch TV, play with presents, go out. For children from divorced family it’s often Christmas with the second parent. Normal day for people not caring so much about Christmas or for families where everyone is adult. That’s us and it’s usually day as any other + using the new stuff we got.

9. In my family it is tradition to eat way too much and then complaining about having eaten way too much. Afterwards there is usually some cake or cookies that everybody needs to at least try, followed by some more complaining about having eaten too much.

   Not sure if this is what other people in Germany do as well.

10. On Christmas morning my young siblings and I watch Disney Christmas movies in our pjs like Scrooge, and any Christmas episodes of old Disney shows (recess, Mickey Mouse, ducktales, etc), then go to Christmas mass and go have lunch at my aunt’s and uncle’s house where the whole family will be there. We eat, and then after the kids will play board games or play outside, some of the men usually play poker (for fun, no money involved) and everyone else will chat, watch Christmas movies, some fall asleep watching said movies and it’s tradition to always paint a mustache on them

11. We usually go for a walk, open some presents, eat dinner and then play games or read a book or watch TV or film. We also call our grand parents or parents depending on where we are having Christmas day.

12. Apart from eating? Cooking, mostly.

    I wake up, take public transportation, go to my older brother’s house, where we celebrate it, help with the cooking and, well, start eating. We talk about everything and nothing. The dinner can last hours. Then, yeah, maybe the TV is turned on, but nobody really pays much attention. Maybe a board game is played. After not much time, is supper time, so we eat again, this time TV’s on, we watch the news and an occasional film. I stay there to sleep. On Saint Steve morning we wake up, have breakfast, usually at different moments. I take a long walk. We start cooking again. More family comes (my sister’s in law side of the family). As there is a kid, we have prepared the *Tió* (a wooden log) with the gifts and make it shit them. Yeah, I know it’s not the traditional day, but as it’s the day a kid is present, we do it on the 26, sorry. We have dinner, for hours. Talk again about everything and nothing. Somebody takes me to Barcelona by car and I take the metro home.

13. I celebrate Christmas day with my mom, and the second day of Christmas with my dad and grandparents. We mainly relax at their place, maybe watch a movie and play some board games.

14. I’ll probably be studying for my exams on the 25th

15. We hang around the house in our pajamas, playing with our presents and nursing our hangovers. The Christmas celebration is on Christmas eve

16. I live in a mixed background house. So we have a swedish Christmas celebration on the 24th as is traditional, and then British Christmas on the 25th. So on the 25th we open our stockings, maybe have a glass of champagne for breakfast. Walk the dog, and then watch TV or play games until dinner. Then eating and drinking, then a boardgame, then a family destroying argument, then sulking, then bed.

17. The entire holiday is a family thing. So it’s the “core family” on 24, then her side on the 25 and his side on the 26 or something like that. People meet at home. That’s what I remember it from my childhood at least and that’s what I hear from people who celebrate and have children or are partnered. I don’t remember ever going out to eat on Christmas eve, not even on the holidays that follow.

18. We open the gifts on Christmas morning, and we have our Christmas meal which is usually at lunch. Then it depends, it’s usually TV, board games, pigging out on chocolate, maybe going for a walk… Back when we used to have snow in December we’d also go sledding. Traditionally Christmas Day is spent with your immediate family, then you visit (or get visits from) extended family on the following days.

19. Like last year it’ll just be the two of us, although this time with a dog. So it’ll be cooking for three days, eating too much on Christmas Day, then walking the dog for miles and miles to get rid of the calories.

    Then at night a festive number of drinks, whisky, bailey’s, bubbles of some sort.

    Normally we travel to see family, but there is, apparently, a virus about.

20. We have this tradition in my area: young men, alone, go visit houses of friends and families on Christmas morning. No ritual, no special greetings, but the unwritten idea is that this brings good luck.

21. Christmas Day is the best day of the year in our house because we do nothing at all. We celebrate on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day is for enjoying gifts, playing with new toys, board games, leftovers, spending the day in our pajamas and watching movies. We never have any plans on Christmas Day. Everybody is welcome to come over, but we are not going to cook for them or dress up (or get dressed even).

22. It is a family day in Ireland. Everything is closed. So people going out are going to church and/or to family.

23. Like all these things, ‘tradition’ varies a lot by region, socio-economic class, religious observance, and individual family practices.

    We normally do presents on Christmas Day (not Christmas Eve, as in many other countries).

    Growing up, we didn’t go to church (my parents were not religious), but as an adult I normally – in non-Covid times – try go to church on Christmas morning as well as on Christmas Eve night. We try to reassert Christmas as a genuinely Christian festival, and not the secularised / pagan / consumerist extravaganza it has become.

    It is quite customary to go for a walk on Christmas day, especially if you live in rural areas.

    Many people watch the Queen’s Christmas Message to the Commonwealth on Christmas Day. It’s quite interesting because it’s one of the few times she is actually allowed to speak her mind, rather than just saying what the Prime Minister tells her to say. However, a lot of people in Scotland these days are republican and don’t give a flying fig what the Queen has to say about anything anymore.

    We also have ‘Boxing day’ – the day after Christmas day. In rural areas, and for certain classes, it’s a day of hunting and shooting. For most suburban middle class people, it’s a day of chilling out, digesting, napping etc, while the children play with new toys.

    Most of our Christmas traditions were borrowed from England in the 20th century. Because of the way the Reformation played out in Scotland, Christmas was for a long time a low-key event, with more of a general public party at Hogmanay (New Year).

24. Basically just relax. I’d argue that Christmas is probably the most important familial time for most people in the UK. Even if you aren’t Christian, many people use it as a time to gather with family and relax.

    In my family, we open gifts in the morning, mess about until the afternoon, and then spend the evening at the house of the head of the family late into the Boxing Day morning.

25. Christmas Eve: cooking at my parents’ house, Christmas dinner, opening presents, sittig around and talking. 25th: family visiting, going for a walk if the weather permits, sitting around and talk, listening to Christmas concerts on TV while talking. 26th visiting friends, talking, playing games.

    I usually watch potato quality streams of Russian and Japanese figure skating national championships because they’re always organized at Christmas time, lol.