#304 Five Christmas Traditions from Around the World
36:16 Share

Hello everybody and welcome back. Before we get started today, I just want to take one minute to let you know about an app that can allow you to talk with foreign friends from all around the world to practice your English. So if you're looking for some more speaking opportunities, then this might be a good option for you. It's a one-to-one audio chat and within the audio chat, there are lots of different types of content available.

You can talk about topics, play word games, play guessing games together, or games like we have done on the podcast before, like would you rather questions, making it fun and engaging to practice English.

The name of the service is Take 5, which is another way of saying to take a short break in English, symbolising the ease and comfort of learning. If that sounds interesting for you, you can check it out at take5.net.

now, that's N-O-W, or click the link down below in your podcast description, wherever you're listening. So you can go there and meet other people and practice what you have learned in this podcast while talking over there.

This is something I feel quite passionate about, getting speaking practice, and it doesn't have to be with a professional teacher. Any speaking practice you get can be great. I've also found that practicing with other learners is a great opportunity too. I do that with my learning and I think it can benefit you. So once again, if you're interested, take five dot now. Now let's get back to the show. ♪

Hello everybody and welcome back to the Level Up English podcast. The best place to come to practice the English language, learn about the British accent and culture with me, your host, Michael Lavers.

We have made it to the end of the year. Congratulations and also Merry Christmas. That's right. If you're listening to this episode the day it's being released, that means it is the 25th of December, Christmas Day.

You may know I upload every Wednesday so it's just a total chance that this episode has landed on the 25th. 'Landed on' means it happened, you know, some event happens on a certain date, usually by accident. So this episode has landed on the 25th of December so of course it just seems kind of natural that we should talk a bit about Christmas.

But before you delete this episode or click away, I should say this is not going to be your kind of general standard Christmas episode talking about mince pies and presents. I have done that kind of thing before a few years ago, but today I'm going to make it a little bit more interesting because I will be comparing five different Christmas celebrations from around the world and

And with each one, I'm going to share five different expressions that you can use in your English speaking.

And I wanted to make this useful whenever you're listening. So even if you're listening to this in June, you can still use these expressions all around the year, anytime, because they're not specific to Christmas time. That's one thing that can be a bit annoying about Christmas stuff is that it's only really relevant at Christmas. So I want to avoid that in today's episode.

And yes, this is, I think this is the last episode of 2024 as well. So that's pretty crazy. Next one, I think next episode will be the 1st of January, which falls on, which lands on New Year's Day, of course. So in next week's episode, it's always my favourite episode of the year. I'm going to be talking all about New Year goals, resolutions and reviewing things.

the year and also talking about how the next year may turn out. My plans anyway, but we'll get to that all next week. That's going to be super exciting. And yeah, I guess we can get into this Christmas episode today. So whether you celebrate it in your country or not, I think you'll find this one interesting.

I thought I would start today, though, by briefly sharing a quick comparison between how Christmas is celebrated in the UK, where I'm from, and Thailand, where I am right now. Because this will be my second Christmas in my whole life where I haven't been in the UK. The first one was Thursday.

about five years ago now. It's gone quickly. Five years ago. I was also in Thailand then. And yeah, another one this year where I will be in Thailand. So I'm already kind of familiar how Christmas works here. Last year I was living in Thailand, but I did go back home for Christmas. And I think this is quite common in many countries around Asia and other countries that don't have a Christmas tradition.

that goes back a long way, like in the UK and Europe. And that is, it's much more commercialised here.

From my perspective, it seems like very commercial. It's all about buying things, buying stuff, going shopping. If you go to any shopping mall at the moment, they're covered in decorations. In fact, it's much more, what could we say, much more extreme than in the UK. In the UK, you'll have quite a...

What's the word? A humble? Humble is the right word? Modest. That's what I was looking for. Quite a modest display in the UK. So when I say modest here, I mean it's quite small and it's not showing off. It's not boasting. So the UK will often have quite a modest display of Christmas decorations. If you go to any town in the UK and go to the centre of the town or city, you might just have one Christmas tree covered in lights.

But here in Thailand it's much more extreme where every single shopping mall there's like five Christmas trees, lights everywhere. Some of these Christmas trees are like four stories high, they're huge and yeah it's really crazy the amount of work they put into the decorations here. And there are many places where they will have snowmen and Santa Claus or Father Christmas as we'd say in the UK.

lots of snowflakes and presents and all this kind of winter themed stuff.

And to me, it just feels really weird. I don't get the Christmas feeling living in Thailand, despite all of the decorations. It just doesn't feel right because to me, Christmas is cold. It's winter. A big part of Christmas is dressing up warm in thick winter coats and hats and scarves and gloves. Maybe there's snow, maybe there's not, but there probably will be frost, which is ice on the ground.

And another big part is dark days. So in the UK, the sun might not get bright until like 9am and it might start to get dark before 4pm. And obviously in the north, up in Scotland, it's going to be even shorter than that. But to me, that's what Christmas is. And a big part of, I think, the tradition of Christmas is using these colourful lights to make the darkest time of year feel brighter and happier.

Where I am in Thailand is basically the same all year. The sun always sets around 6pm. It doesn't change that much. So yeah, for these reasons, I don't get that Christmassy feeling. But honestly, that's fine for me because I'm not a big Christmas person. You know, I don't have any decorations now, unless you count these lights behind me as decorations, but they're not really Christmas related.

So yeah, I suppose that's it. It doesn't seem too big here. You know, no one has a day off work or anything as far as I know, but it is definitely obvious that Christmas is coming. It just doesn't feel right. That's my main point, I would say. And if you're wondering, the reason I am not going back to the UK for Christmas this year, one reason anyway, is

is because it's not necessarily the best time to travel to the UK. I'll speak specifically about the UK now, rather than European countries. And I would say there's a few reasons for this. One, because everything is closed.

When it comes closer to Christmas, apart from a few restaurants, especially in smaller towns outside of London, everything's closed. There's nothing to do. I suppose the idea is you want to spend time with family, but that can be a bit much. A few weeks with just family. I don't know. That's my opinion. You need stuff to do as well. And I do love going for Christmas or winter walks. That can be quite nice too.

Coming back early and having some food when it's dark already. But yeah, another reason is I love to go back and see my friends as well as my family. And, you know, we did do that last year. But as we said, Christmas is primarily, mostly a time for family. I was speaking to a Japanese friend the other day who said Christmas is more about couples, which is interesting to me, like relationships, family.

But in the UK, it's definitely more about your family and you might not see your friends so much. So there were some times where I was free, I had nothing to do and I wanted to see my friends, but of course they were with their family. So there were quite a few days last year at Christmas where I was just sitting on my own, I had nothing to do and I was wondering, why did I come back? I could be in Thailand right now.

So that's basically the reason why. So I would suggest if you're thinking about travelling to the UK around Christmas time or New Year time, just be aware that it may be challenging. There may be many things closed.

and there may not be many people on the streets. Maybe that's what you want, actually, but you can have a walk around London on Christmas Day and it will be relatively quiet, but maybe not so much to do. So just think about that before you travel and whether that suits you.

Anyway, let's get into the main part of the show now, where I'm going to talk about five different countries. None of them are the UK. I've already mentioned that a little bit, but we're going to go around the world now and talk about different Christmas traditions. I should say, though, before we get started, this is just based on my research. I haven't been to many of these countries, so I can't

say for sure but I hopefully I haven't been lied to by the internet so if you are from one of these countries maybe you could give me a comment and let me know what it's like if this is true or maybe it's slightly different but either way we'll be learning an expression with each one like I said

So let's go first of all, all the way over to Japan. And this is something that I'm pretty sure is true because I've heard about it many, many times. And this is eating KFC for Christmas dinner.

You may know in the UK, Christmas dinner is usually a big roast dinner where you might have roast potatoes, vegetables, Brussels sprouts. What else? Some kind of meat, maybe turkey or something like that, or maybe some vegetarian alternative like I would have.

and lots of gravy, stuffing, all this kind of stuff. I have spoke about this in a previous episode. Maybe I'll link that one if you want to know more. But yeah, it's quite a big meal. It takes several hours, usually the whole day to prepare. And it's quite a special thing in the UK. But in Japan, apparently it's just a simple KFC dinner. This is Kentucky Fried Chicken, the fast food chain, the fast food restaurant. And

And I think this, again, shows the consumerist kind of culture that a lot of Asian countries have at Christmas time, where they don't have that history of Christianity there. So they'll kind of make their own tradition. So this is quite funny. It was quite interesting to learn about from someone who celebrated it growing up.

Apparently, this all started from a successful advertisement campaign in the 1970s. It's a really, really good advert if it was able to change the culture of this holiday for 50 years now. That is insane.

So, yeah, from what I understand, families in Japan make the most of Christmas by enjoying a bucket of KFC. And this is from what I've heard. Usually you would have to order this in advance because there's such a high demand that you'd have to order to make sure you get it.

But I suppose it's a fun tradition and it's nice to have something regular each year. And the expression that we can learn with this one is to make the most of something. You may have heard of this before, but to make the most of a situation is to take full advantage of something or to take full enjoyment out of something.

If you want to make the most of this podcast for your learning, you might consider becoming a member and using the transcripts to help your reading and your listening skills as well. So there's another example. You could make the most of your learning by doing that extra stuff there. And perhaps if you're in the UK, you might want to make the most of Christmas by making sure you have bought everyone good presents.

presents because that is a really big part of Christmas in the UK, buying presents and gifts for each other. And the better that yours are, the happier people can be. So make the most of Christmas by making sure you have a good gift for your friends and family. That's a good one there.

So going slightly down southwards now, we can head to the Philippines, a country I have not yet been to. But in the Philippines, there's something called the Giant Lantern Festival. So this is where they would celebrate Christmas with a giant lantern festival. And according to my search here, this happens between December 14th and January 1st.

But maybe there's one specific date where it happens more. I don't know. But yeah, apparently, especially in the city of San Fernando, it's a big thing there. And that city has been nicknamed the Christmas capital of the Philippines.

So I think for the YouTube watchers, I'll put some pictures on the screen. But these lanterns are really, really beautiful. Again, it's kind of similar to that Christmas tradition of creating some light in the darkest time of the year, which may not be a factor in the Philippines. But if you look at these pictures, they are quite amazing. And I imagine they will have fireworks and stuff like that as well. So that's a nice way to celebrate. One that I actually haven't heard of before, before Christmas.

making this podcast planned. And each year during this celebration, the participants go the extra mile by creating increasingly elaborate, increasingly more detailed, that means elaborate, increasingly more detailed lanterns for the festival. So every year they have to kind of go one step further to make it more impressive and bigger and

And the expression I used here was to go the extra mile. This must be a British or American phrase, right? Because we're using the word mile, not kilometre. To go the extra mile means to do more than what is expected of you, to do extra. We might have mentioned this before on a business English episode, maybe. But it's really common with work when you're doing more than what you were expected to do.

My goal with the podcast is to always go the extra mile. Hopefully I'm successful in that. I don't want to just give you a lazy, no plan kind of style podcast. I want to go the extra mile, make it fun and useful at the same time. And if you think of any other ways or ideas to

that can help me go the extra mile, you're always welcome to let me know. But yeah, I think that's a really important part of businesses in general, right? And it doesn't take much

It could be you hire a cleaner to come clean your house and they go the extra mile and clean under the bed, behind the bookcase and all of these places that you can't usually see. But if you notice they've cleaned there, you're going to get such a better impression of their cleaning services, right? That's just one example of how someone could go the extra mile and do a bit more work or a bit higher quality of work.

And I think that last 10% of work can affect 90% of someone's impression. So I'm always thinking about what I can do with the podcast to go the extra mile and give you a good listening experience. I don't know. Hopefully I can do that.

Anyway, let's go to a new country. We've had Japan, Philippines. This next one I'm a little bit nervous to talk about because of the pronunciation. But now we're going to a country that is high on my list to visit in the future. And this is Iceland. Iceland. So they have something. I'm going to try to pronounce it. Obviously don't speak Icelandic, but it looks like Jollabokaflur. Maybe. Yeah.

And I think this is translated to Christmas Book Flood. And this is a custom in Iceland where they give and receive books on Christmas Eve. That's the day before Christmas. Spending that night right before Christmas reading these books and enjoying some hot chocolate, perhaps, in those probably very, very short winter days. In fact, I'm kind of curious. Iceland...

December sunset time. I want to see when the sun sets in Iceland. Okay, it's not as crazy as I expected, but it's still very short. According to this search, the sun sets between 3 and 4 p.m., so around mid-afternoon, but the sunrise is often around 11 a.m. So yeah, I guess that is very short. It's maybe just four or five hours of daylight in

In the winter, having these hot drinks and reading, maybe around a fireplace. Doesn't that sound so nice and cosy? I can totally see why they would do that. And in fact, I think we can take a leaf out of Iceland's book by making reading and maybe reading together a part of our winter and holiday celebrations. I think it sounds really nice. So did you catch the expression I used here? I said we could take a leaf out of their book.

So this is, yeah, take a leaf out of someone's book. I suppose, I always feel like leaf basically is another word for page. Maybe in the old days they would use leaves to make paper. I'm not quite sure on the origin of this idiom, but basically it means to copy or to learn from someone else's example. So if I see someone doing something that I like, I can take a leaf out of their book.

One thing I will talk about more next week is a Chinese speaking language group that I have started in Bangkok. And I got the idea to do this from someone else, except I didn't like that one because it was happening in a bar and I don't drink. So I don't want to go to a bar.

So I took a leaf out of his book and I started my own group to practice Chinese, right? So I copied that person's idea. So maybe think about for yourself a time when you have taken a leaf out of someone else's book. Or maybe think about someone you admire, someone you respect, and maybe there's something they do in their life that you think is really good, really healthy or useful, but you don't do it yourself.

And maybe you want to, maybe in the new year, it's something you can consider starting. So you can take a leaf out of their book and start that habit or whatever it is. So let me know what that is for you. You're always welcome to leave your examples to practice these expressions in the comments on the website.

Okay, so we've had Japan, Philippines, Iceland. Two more now. We're going to stick around in Europe because I think that's where most of the Christmas traditions are and go to a very Christmassy country, Germany. Germany. And you may know what I'm going to say, which is Christmas markets. Christmas markets in Germany are apparently really amazing. I've never seen them myself at that time.

But Germany is quite famous around the world for its Christmas markets where you can shop for handmade items, handmade gifts, enjoy some mulled wine, which is like hot wine. I've tried it. I don't know if I've tried alcoholic one, but you can also get like non-alcoholic hot wine. Basically, it's like hot apple juice, but it's really nice. It's really good.

in the winter and it's got spices and stuff in it as well. And, you know, it's a good chance there to, yeah, just go for a walk in the evening and

get some hot food, hot drinks and embrace or enjoy the holiday spirit there. So German Christmas markets bring so much to the table with their cozy atmosphere, local things to buy, delicious treats and I think sausages maybe are a big thing. Again, I've never been to Germany at Christmas, but

I can say for sure in the UK, it's a big part of Christmas markets where mulled wine, you'll have a lot of that, and German sausages. I don't know if this is also a thing in Germany, but it's a huge thing in the UK. So you'll have this smell of cooked sausages and wine everywhere. It's very interesting, but I have to say that my personal experience in the UK is quite...

underwhelming, which means disappointing when it comes to Christmas markets there. Most places I've been, like, you know, I'm from, or I was born in a city called Plymouth in the southwest, and the Christmas market there is really not that nice. Okay, I don't want to speak too badly of Plymouth, but it's not super interesting. It seems to be mostly kind of stuff that you wouldn't really be interested in,

There's not really enough food options, I find. And the annoying thing is it closes on like the 21st of December. So it always feels like Christmas stops before it even begins. I feel like a good Christmas market should last up until 25th. But that's just my opinion. But actually, the best Christmas market experience I've had in the UK was in London. And it's the South Bank Christmas market.

Maybe it's not quite traditional, but it's a really good option if you want to try some food while sitting on the bank of the River Thames. Last time I went there, when I lived in London, I tried some Nepalese food from Nepal for the first time. And that was really cool, just sitting there eating my food.

Not a very Christmassy food, I will admit, but great location, not super busy and yeah, good food options. So I recommend that one if you are in London during Christmas. But yeah, maybe you might have caught the expression I used when I spoke about Germany a while ago, and that was they bring a lot to the table or they bring something to the table.

So, you know, at Christmas, you might be bringing food to the table. Literally, you're bringing it to the table. But this expression kind of more broadly means to contribute something or to offer something to a situation or a discussion. If I'm in a workplace, maybe I'm the manager and I can say, OK, you want to apply for a position in my company.

What skills can you bring to the table? What skills can you bring to the table? So in other words, what skills can you provide? Can you give us? I mentioned that the Christmas markets bring a lot to the table. What did I say?

They bring so much to the table with their cozy atmosphere and food. So they're providing, they're giving all of these things to you, right? So if you want to use provide or give or offer, you might be able to switch it out with to bring to the table. Really great expression you can use in many different contexts and situations.

Okay, let's just head a little bit north over the sea and go to our final country, Sweden. So Sweden has an interesting custom, which is called something like the gavel goat. I don't know. I don't know any Swedish, just like the other languages, but it's a little bit like G-A-V-L-E. The A is a bit different.

And this is basically a custom where they have a giant straw goat. So it's a goat made out of straw, which is another word for dried grass. And if you search for this on Google, like I am doing now, this is a huge and nicely decorated goat, as we said, made out of straw goat.

Very impressive if you have a look at it, actually. It looks very cool. Again, I'll put a picture on screen for YouTube. And what's really kind of funny and interesting about this tradition is it has also become a tradition for people to try to burn it down.

From what I understand, this was not the original intention. The original intention was just to have a goat as like a decoration. But then people started burning it down every year. So, yeah, despite these challenges, the gavel goat, gavel is the name of the town, by the way, the gavel goat embodies the spirit of Christmas and brings the community together each year.

And I don't know, maybe if you're from Sweden, you can let me know what you think of the burning. Is it actually kind of fun or funny that it gets burnt down? Or is it annoying? Is it better if it just stays up and isn't burnt down? I wonder if this tradition will begin to change over time. Yes, some people might say that burning down this giant and decorational goat is not really in the spirit of Christmas.

So we can use that expression here. The final one today, in the spirit of, in the spirit of. If something is in the spirit of something, it's kind of like something is done with the mood or the attitude of a specific occasion, right? So it's a little bit hard to describe. I found it quite difficult to think of a definition, right?

But we can give you some more example sentences to show you. So it can be an atmosphere or a spirit of a festival. Like in the spirit of Halloween, all of the houses were decorated in spooky, scary things. In the spirit of Halloween. In the spirit of kindness, she cleaned up the rubbish from her neighbourhood.

So here we're saying in the spirit of kindness. It's kind of just like saying she did it out of kindness. She did it because she wanted to be kind. So with that feeling of kindness, she did this thing. Right. Maybe when you're traveling, you might be thinking, hmm, should I fly to this country or should I take a train over the mountains? Hmm. In the spirit of adventure, I think I'll take the train.

So, right, we're saying because it's more adventurous, let's take the train. I want to have that adventurous spirit, adventurous feeling. Right. So spirit is a bit like feeling in this context. So there we have it. Let's just do a quick review of all of these expressions. We have kind of a random order in the spirit of something to go the extra mile to bring to the table something.

to take a leaf out of someone's book, and finally, to make the most of something. So there we have five expressions. How many of them were new for you? Let me know.

Okay, so before we end, I've got a few things I want to talk about. One of them is a lovely message from one of you kind listeners. So let's take a second now to listen to this one. This was really nice from Abdullah. Hello, Michael, and hello, English listeners. I'm going to introduce myself in a couple of minutes, so spare me two minutes, guys.

I'm Abdullah from Palestine living in Gaza City. I'm not sure if you know what is going on here in Gaza, but I don't want to dive into details. You can search. And it's been about four months since I found and started listening to Michael's podcast. I'm going to share my experience with his podcast. First, I'm a good listener. I mean, my listening skills is perfect. I had listened to many podcasts before.

with a variety of topics, but I have never seen like Michael's podcast for a couple of reasons. The first one is Michael provides too many beneficial expressions, phrasal verbs and some idioms that all of them are in daily English usage with a great explanation and that's what sets him apart from other podcasters actually.

The second reason is he has a gift for teaching English, his ways and his voice and his accent as well. He has a clear accent, I mean. And in addition, recently I became a member in his website and what I wouldn't get for such Michael's courses. It's amazing. And I encourage all of you to become a member. You will never regret at all.

And thank you, Michael. And thank you, English listeners. There we have it. Thank you so much, Abdullah. That's so kind of you. Abdullah and I have already spoken a little bit by email, so we've exchanged a few messages. But of course, I really hope I really wish the best for you and your family. Abdullah, I hope you're safe. And yeah, that's so kind of you to leave me that nice audio message. So, yeah, thank you for the shout out. I'm glad that you're enjoying the content.

And yeah, Abdullah has already left some great writing practice paragraphs on the Level Up English website, which I've responded to. And yeah, obviously your English there and your pronunciation in your message was fantastic as well. So thank you so much. Keep it up. All the best. And as I always say, if you would like to leave your own audio message, you can do so at levelupenglish.school slash podcast.

And there is a spot further down the page where you could do that if you want to. Let's just end it here with a quote from Charles M. Scholes, who says, It's not what's under the Christmas tree that matters. It's who is around it. It's not the presents under the tree. It's the people who are around it, in other words.

So whether you celebrate Christmas or not, it's maybe a nice reminder to enjoy the time with the people around you there. So I hope you enjoyed this episode, last one of the year. I could just shout out right before we go that if you want to get more from Level Up English, you can join us as a member. Go to levelupenglish.school on the website. Click on the members button at the top of the page to get access to group classes, workshops,

Different courses about IELTS exam, pronunciation, writing, grammar, vocabulary, building a routine. There's so many, honestly, I can never remember all of them. And I'm updating them almost every week, all the time there are new lessons being added.

Oh, and the private podcast as well. If you do like these more casual, personal episodes, then the private podcast, we have over 113 episodes that you have not heard before. So you can have a look there if that's interesting.

If you're really not sure about it, we can offer you some free lessons too. So if you want to join our email community, there's a link down below to sign up in your podcast description. Click on the free lessons button, enter your email and you will get sent five free lessons to your email as well as an extra free lesson twice a month to your email as well if you want to stay as a member there.

Okay, let's end it here. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for your support in 2024. And let's have our fingers crossed for a good 2025. I will see you next year.

You have been listening to the Level Up English podcast. If you would like to leave a question to be answered on a future episode, then please go to levelupenglish.school forward slash podcast. That's levelupenglish.school slash podcast. And I'll answer your question on a future episode. Thanks for listening.