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What’s different
As in the United States, December in Sweden is the month of cooking food for Christmas, buying Christmas presents, attending Christmas concerts and holiday fairs. But then comes the Lucia celebration in the early morning of December 13, when Lucia in her long white gown with a red sash and a crown of lighted candles, attended by maidens, star boys and tomtar, enter your bedroom with coffee, gingerbread and saffron buns. The Lucia celebration always coincides with the week of Nobel Prize festivities in Stockholm: The prize winners who stay at the Grand Hotel are awakened by Lucia and her entourage on December 13, singing traditional songs and serving coffee and saffron buns. Originally this was done as a surprise, but the unexpected sight of white-clad people with candles on their heads came as a shock to some half-awake winners, so nowadays laureates are asked in advance if they would like to be woken up. So what about the Christmas tree? I was born in the countryside in a village in northern Småland. A few days before Christmas Eve my dad grabbed an axe, went into the woods and cut a nice spruce. It had to dry a little and then we took it inside to be decorated. This is what many Swedes do (well, most folks don’t have the opportunity to cut their own tree so they buy one)—but they generally wait and won’t decorate the tree until a week before Christmas Eve. In some parts of Sweden, especially in the south, an important part of Christmas is lillejulafton (little Christmas Eve). That’s when you taste some of the Christmas food, take a sip of the glögg and add the last of the decorations. Then comes what is most important to Swedes: julafton (Christmas Eve). It generally starts in the afternoon with a big julbord, the Swedish Christmas smörgåsbord. In the afternoon you may watch the special Donald Duck program on TV, a Christmas tradition on Swedish television since 1960. Then jultomten (Santa Claus) will come and if you are not too tired you can dance traditional Swedish folk dances around the tree.
In the morning on Christmas Day, most people sleep in unless they want to go to julotta, the early morning Christmas service. Santa is not coming this morning because he had to leave late last night—for America to give the kids their Christmas presents.
Christmas isn’t over
In some ways Christmas just got started. The day after Christmas Day is a holiday in Sweden, called Annandag Jul (the second day of Christmas, also known as Boxing Day). This is the day for meeting with family and friends for dinner parties and more Christmas food. Then comes New Year’s Eve with more parties, and on Trettondag (January 6) Swedes celebrate Epiphany. In the U.S., Christians recognize Epiphany as well, but in Sweden everyone celebrates, and on Trettondagsafton, January 5, there are great Christmas concerts all over Sweden. The song says, “Nu är det jul igen we sing julen
varar än till påska” (Christmas will last through Easter), which is not quite true even if there are folks who keep the tree well into February. Usually the tree is thrown out on January 13, on the day called Tjugondag Knut (the Twentieth Day, when Knut has a name day in the Swedish calendar). Kids are invited to a julgransplundring, a party at which the Christmas tree is stripped of its decorations, especially its candy. After this somewhat violent event the tree stands there pretty naked and is thrown out. Only the needles on the floor are what’s left of Christmas. That’s the Swedish tradition and many of us Swedes in the United States are still keeping up with it. So if you see a house with Christmas decorations still shining bright in January you will know that a Swede lives there. Merry Christmas! Göran Rygert, GA
God Jul God Jul &
Gott Nytt År!
VASA ORDER OF AMERICA Local Lodge Stenland #727 District Lodge New York #4
Promoting Swedish/Nordic heritage and culture St. Thomas Lutheran Church Route 59 East, Central Nyack, NY Meetings 2nd Friday of the month 7:00 pm Contact RasmussenTRE@gmail.com
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Elsa Rix #1
God Jul och Gott Nytt År
516-565-2091
God Jul och Gott Nytt År
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Illustration: Jenny Nyström
Sunday). It happened on the Sunday two weeks prior to Christmas Eve. That was a big thing. If you lived in a small town you had to take your afternoon stroll and pass the stores, check out the most interesting displays, sometimes with moving figures and even sound. But a smaller start of the holiday had already occurred on the first Sunday of Advent, which is often the first Sunday of December. That was— and still is—the day when you put out the special Advent candle holder, four candles on a bed of moss, with a few decorative red mushrooms. On this day, the first of the four candles is lit, followed by the three others, one by one, on Advent 2, 3 and 4, respectively. The First of Advent is also the day you may take a sip of glögg, the typical Swedish mulled wine Christmas drink.
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