Christmas and New Year in America, and Mexico

Holidays are among the most popular and best known, and no wonder! Associated with gifts, family, fun and great feasts, Christmas and New Year around the world from a multitude of cultures and people. Viewed as a time of thanksgiving and celebration, these two parties are also a time to reflect on a year and welcomed a new cycle of 12 months.

UNITED STATES

Celebrated as religious holidays and secularMost Americans, Christmas is the biggest holiday in the United States. One of the great American contribution to the tradition Christmas is the Turkey - a chicken in North America - is considered a staple meal. Christmas time and other Christmas products including pumpkin pie, eggnog and candy canes.

In New York, Rockefeller Center Christmas tree has become one of the most visited attractions. Put in 1931, was symbolic of Christmas in the Big Apple. L 'Spruce - 30 can be raised - is a show, with lights and crowned with an elaborate decorated stars.

If ringing in the new year arrives, Americans usually celebrate with a party the night before. A common theme is a masquerade ball, where guests can play dress up and show after midnight. In Times Square, New York, thousands of people gather for an annual countdown, the costume since 1906. In one minute to midnight, stands a large ballfrom the top of a pile as high as the countdown the new year people. A big hit with tourists and locals.

MEXICO

With its roots in Portugal, bonds and American customs - Mexico celebrates Christmas a hybrid version of the Christian celebration of the country's rich heritage and cultural norms. Nursery schools or kindergartens are often in churches, homes and shops, as well as a popular game Los Pastores (The Shepherd). Are, in the southern Mexican state of OaxacaAn unusual pre-Christmas festival called Noche de Rabanos, or Night of the Radishes, when experts Veggie Carver turn the amazing color root vegetables, but humble in a wonderfully decorated with sculptures of saints and nativity scenes. corn husks and dried flowers are also used to create an incredible variety of artfully designed pieces of art.

Nine days before Christmas, a procession called Posadas - essentially a repeat of the journey of Mary and Joseph assought refuge in Bethlehem - is where "pilgrims 'journey from door to door in search of shelter, however. And' organized so that only the third house, the" pilgrims "of welcome. After a prayer meeting is held a party for children, complete with a grab-bag, a cardboard box with candy, fruit filled and processed.

At midnight on Christmas Eve, the birth of Baby Jesus, the whistles blew and bells and fireworks. Unlike many other parts of the world, children inMexico has only received gifts on January 6, Dia de Reyes Magos in progress (Three Kings Day of Me). But still, many have adopted Christmas as a day to exchange gifts.

New Year in Mexico is a complex issue in the same way with street parties with great music, dance, food, and the cries of the fireworks on the eve. Some New Year's traditions include eating 12 grapes for luck as midnight strikes!