Did the French, Germans, and Americans celebrate Christmas differently?

Week after week, I do my best to shed light on cultural differences between the US and Germany, or less frequently France. No wonder that my last post covered the myth of the German Christmas pickle. Today, I found an unusual one.

Happy holidays! Frohe Festtage! Joyeuses fêtes !

While I wrote this title, I had to decide which punctuation to follow. Am I wrong to think that Hannah, my proofreader, will attempt to edit the space I purposefully left between the last word (Joyeuses fêtes) and the following exclamation mark?

This is an edit that I have ignored in the past, as in French, an explanation or other two-part punctuation marking requires a space both before and after. This isn’t so in German. In fact, most of the time, German and English punctuations are very close.

This difference only goes so far. Germans would develop the topic into a five-page essay. Obviously, I’m not German enough to go that in depth! (To know more about me, just read about how much of me is French and how much is German.)

Did the French, Germans, and Americans celebrate Christmas differently?

To be honest, not really.

Cities and villages in each nation were lit up with Christmas lights and ornaments. They had Santa, Christmas trees, and Christmas carols. They ate too much, and sometimes the amount of presents for the children was simply ridiculous. Churches were fuller than usual, and last-minute Christmas shopping was the same across the pond. I don’t see any cultural differences here.

I hear you, my friends: of course, specific traditions do vary. Germans also celebrated St. Nicholas Day on December 6 (which I talked about in Cheaters? Why Germans Celebrate Christmas Twice), and Americans gave also more to charity than Germans.

However, what I’m feeling after all these years living as an immigrant (first in Germany, then in the US), is that Christmas and the holidays are a period of reflection everywhere. Once holiday stress is over and the presents unwrapped, we may have time for a hot chocolate or a winter spice tea. In my new home, I’m enjoying a fireplace. Definitely, this is the right place to reflect on the past year.

2018 was as eventful for me as 2017 was. Changes are sometimes necessary, and I’m the one who initiated them a couple of weeks ago. Now that I’ve made peace with myself, I look forward to 2019. Personally and professionally, I have to master a lot of changes, but believe me when I say that I’m more than happy to embrace them.

My last words of 2017 were a quote from Oprah: “Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.” I’ll stick to it in 2018.

Happy holidays!

Photo credit: Kevin Dooley by Flickr Creative Common