Fun Christmas Facts
Christmas is celebrated all over the world with varying traditions. Here are some weird, but true, facts surrounding it. What’s in a Name? What could be more Christmassy than the nice old man who brings us presents? In Britain we call him Santa Claus or Father Christmas as do Australians and New Zealanders, Americans also call him Kris Kringle. Here are some of his names from around the world, the first few are translations of Father Christmas: He is Papai Noel in Brazil and Portugal, Papa Noel in Spain and France; Noel Baba in Turkey; Babbo Natale in Italy; Santa Kollosu in South Korea; Weihnachtsmann in Germany; Ded Moroz in Russia (pictured left); Mikulás in Hungry and Julienisse in Norway. As well as a name change, what children leave out for him differs from country to country. In Britain we tend to leave out mince pies; Americans leave cookies and milk; in France it’s biscuits; Sweden coffee; Chile sponge cake and Denmark rice pudding. It’s nice he has different things to enjoy, but he must be careful not to eat too much to get too big to fit in chimneys! It seems he sometimes slips away from his sleigh. In France Saint Nicholas rides a donkey bearing gifts for children. In Australia he sometimes arrives by helicopter or boat. In Hawaii he arrives on an outrigger canoe. Christmas Trees Christmas trees are a well known feature of Christmas. There are more than 600 species of Christmas trees in the world and the pine needles on some of them are edible (but don’t try them!)
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At some zoos elephants munch on discarded Christmas trees after the holidays. Old Christmas trees can also be used to rebuild sand dunes after a hurricane. 28 November 2021 - 7 February 2022
98% of Christmas trees are grown on farms and it takes up to ten years to grow one. The earliest Christmas trees dating back to 1510 were decorated with apples and paper roses. In medieval Germany apples, wafers and biscuits were used. Before the invention of electric lights, people put lit candles on their tree. This was very dangerous and led to many home fires. The first strand of electric Christmas lights were assembled by American Thomas Edison in 1880 and strung round the outside of his laboratory. In 1882 his friend and partner, Edward H. Johnson, hand-wired 80 red, white and blue light bulbs and wound them around his Christmas tree. It wasn’t until 1903 when General Electric in America began to offer preassembled kits of Christmas lights they became affordable. There are various other ways to decorate trees. In Brazil families decorate pine trees with little pieces of cotton wool to represent falling snow. In Ukraine trees are decorated with fake spiders and webs. It is a tradition in Germany to look for an ornament shaped like a pickle hidden in the tree on Christmas morning. The tree doesn’t have to be a fir, in India people decorate banana trees for Christmas. People in Europe once hung their Christmas trees from the ceiling to keep them out of reach of children. Some people take their tree decorating to extremes. A hotel in Dubai displayed a Christmas tree covered in 181 pieces of jewelery valued at more than $11 million. The star on top of the
Christmas tree in Rockerfeller Centre in New York City has 25,000 crystals and weighs 550 pounds (249 kg). One of the world’s tallest Christmas trees, a 162 foot (49m) fir, is in Idaho in America. It is decorated with more than two miles (3.2km) of lights each year. People can go to great lengths to stop others stealing their trees. A college in Minnesota in America sprays its evergreens on campus with skunk scent. Other parks have sprayed trees with fox urine and a chemical that smells like rotten eggs. I think I would rather lose the tree! Reindeer What would Santa do without his reindeer? The famous Rudolph was almost called Reginald, doesn’t have the same ring does it? Donner and Blitzen were originally called Dunder and Blixem. Santa’s deer are always pictured with lovely antlers and despite the male sounding names, only female adult reindeer keep their antlers through December. So Santa’s reindeer are probably all girls. Some interesting facts about reindeer: their hooves expand in the summer and shrink in winter. Their hairs are hollow and their antlers weigh more than a car tyre. Some reindeer herds have as many as 500,000 reindeer and migrate more than 600 miles (966km) every year.
If you would like to find out more, ‘Weird but True! Christmas’, published by National Geographic Kids, has 300 festive facts to light up the holidays.
