A mind-boggling cultural tradition in this country, so distant from the genuine Christmas celebrations, is Christmas Eve. You see, Christmas Eve here is celebrated more than Christmas day. We know it's tough to imagine, but it's true. And, here's just some of our evidence...
The first anomally we have is the "turkey" dinner. Christmas is a holiday for romance in this country. On Christmas Eve, couples commence a gathering at various restaurants (most commonly KFC, which sounds good to you, but American and Japanese KFC are not the same- trust us! and we're being serious, really, KFC, they go to KFC) across town and enjoy a nice Christmas Eve dinner of what they claim to be turkey. After walking around town to decide where we would eat tomorrow- the real Christmas- we noticed all of the advertisements for Christmas dinner ended on December 24th- Christmas Eve! What about Christmas day? What happened? We even asked one nice-looking restaurant hoping their special would continue to the following day, but no, the special ended today, Christmas Eve. Needless to say, we walked away quite downcast. So, we headed to the store and bought some of this so-called turkey (as we didn't want to botch Christmas by celebrating on Christmas Eve), which we true turkey-eaters all know to be chicken. Yes, chicken. But they are adament it's turkey, but no, it's really actually chicken. Sorry!
The second anomally is the tradition of Christmas-Cake eating. When this tradition started is still a mystery to us, but it is still going strong today, as you can see from the above picture. We thought a nice cup of Baskin Robbins ice cream would be nice on Christmas Eve. Well, we were in for quite a surprise, walking into the store, and seeing boxes upon boxes of ice cream Christmas-Cake sealed in dry ice! Yes, all these boxes are Christmas Cakes!!! How unusually splendid! This is definitely one tradition we could get used to- you know how we like our sweets! But, still we are flabbergasted by the massive quantities of Christmas Cake during this season! No, we did not walk away with a cake, seeing how they are about $40 a piece, but we did get some delicious cups of Cranberry & Chocolate Ice Cream!
Yes, this all occurred on Christmas Eve- the peak of Christmas in this country. If you don't believe us, we don't blame you. We had to ask several of our classes before we succumbed to the reality of this truth. Of course, our Christmas will be on the real day, tomorrow. This could be a bonus for us, as the restaurants raise their prices on Christmas Eve and are packed to the brim- ha!
Well, we hope you have a happily, happy, Christmas Eve!
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