Christmas in Turkey!

Two posts in one day, OoooOOoo

Christmas almost sort of exists in Turkey through the magic of globalization and Santa Claus' witchcraft. Turkey actually has a surprising number of Christmas things which have sprung up around Ankara labeled as "Mutlu yıllar" (New Years).

In the past twenty years a New Years tree has become somewhat of a tradition in Turkey. Gotta love globalization and consumerism. Fake trees no taller than four feet can be bought everywhere. Tree decorating consists of putting little tinsel garland on the tree with maybe some little ordainments. Its all mixed with New Years so in stores you can usually buy party hats and funny glasses at the same time.

So I was walking around Kızılay when I realized I needed to spruce up my apartment. Tugba also seemed excited to celebrate Christmas since she's never had a reason to before now. So I bought some red and green garland and we decorated the house. The next day I bought a tiny cheap strand of Christmas lights and Tugba brought me home some mistletoe. Sweetest of all was Monday when Tugba came back from the mall she had bought a box of ornaments, some garland and a TREE! Yay! We put the ornaments and the lights on the tree. So wonderful.

This was all very inspiring so I've decided to host a Christmas party with Jake. We're the only ones who actually celebrate Christmas who aren't going home for Christmas. The Germans are are going home and Dan, the token Brit, will be home as well. So Jake and I are going to have a party and introduce our friends, most of whom have never celebrated Christmas, to a food and wine filled night for baby Jesus's bday.

In honor of this post I thought I'd share some extremely interesting things I've learned through my friends about how Christmas is celebrated by people outside of the US.

--Europeans don't think Santa lives in the North Pole, in Europe its and actually place called Lapland in the northernmost part of Finland.

--Dan told me that in London Christmas decorations go up around late October because Halloween isn't such a big deal in England and Thanksgiving doesn't exist.

--In Armenia, Christmas is celebrated on January 6th and there's no presents because small gifts are given for New Years.

--Germans have the Christmas tradition of gluhwein, basically a mulled hot wine that is sold everywhere, at street stands, at soccer matches, and grocery stores.

--In Germany, Santa doesn't leave you presents, but Christkind (that's right baby Jesus) comes through your window and leaves you little presents on the 24th. Wikipedia just told me the most interesting thing about Christkind which is that Martin Luther made it up during the Reformation to get people from worshiping saints like St. Nick. Today I'd say its still pretty common for both Catholics and Protestants to tell their kids that Christkind is leaving presents.

--Germans also celebrate Christmas exclusively on the 24th. They put up their tree on the 24th and throughout the month of December they have an advent wreath where they light four candles, one for every Sunday leading up to Christmas.

--Another thing Germans do is instead of watching Christmas movies they watch fairy tales! The tales are not necessarily about Christmas and I've never heard of the stories before so there not like Little Red Ridding Hood or Mother Goose. My friend Caro told me her favorites are Väterchen Frost about a nice old man (who looks sussipously like Santa) who controls the forest and Das Kalte Herz, about a poor coal boy from the Back Forest who falls in love with an engaged beautiful rich girl. Apparently most of them are of Russian origin and I'm thinking this is some leftover DDR thing which is great because it sounds like a lot of fun. They're played all December long and of course, on Christmas day. Here's the preview for Das Kalte Herz.


Apparently all the fairy tales were filmed in 1973.

And last but not least, a fun fact about Christmas: The real Saint Nicholas was Turkish! Whoo! Saint Nicholas of Myra was a 4th century Greek Christian living in Lycia which would you know it, is now in Turkey! So all Christmas is actually Turkish Christmas.

So Merry (early) Christmas everyone!