Christmas in Denmark vs. Portugal

This post comes with some delay since I've been quite busy lately.
I will continue the story from day 4 as soon as possible.

So, this was the first time I spent the Christmas holidays away from my country and my family and even tho I thought things would be similar, I had the joy to experience a lot of interesting traditions of danish Christmas! So I'll try to tell you about the different habits and traditions between Christmas in Portugal and in Denmark.

Christmas in Portugal

These holidays in Portugal, particularly in my family, are spent uniting all the family together, in one big house, where I meet all my uncles, aunts, grandparents, cousins and family friends living far away, which I don't usually see every month. It is a very magical time. I'm the oldest of the cousins from my father's side, so I really enjoy to see all my little cousins play and run around. It was hard to not see them this year and I missed them a lot.

The houses are decorated with a Christmas Tree, usually a plastic one, with little lights, balls, angels, sprinkles, and Christmas ropes. We put a star on the top of the tree. A big tradition is also the Crib, or "Presépio", where there's little figures of Jesus' family, the shepherds, some animals and the 3 holy kings. We mount the tree and the crib at 1st December and we only take them off after 3 Kings Day. There is an advent wreath in a table and we light one candle every Sunday, read the bible and each candle means one word.

The Christmas Crib

We have dinner together and we have a lot of traditional Christmas dishes such as codfish and octopus! As deserts, we eat rabanadas, bolinhos de bolina and pêras bêbadas, between others! It was surely a challenge to not eat all this delicious food this year!

Rabanadas (bread with cinnamon, egg and sugar)

Bolinhos de Bolina 

Pêras Bêbadas (Drunk pears- baked pears with wine)

After dinner, our family has a tradition of doing a little show, where the kids show their talents, such as dance, sing and playing an instrument, and the adults do the same to entertain the children. We are a very united family.

We also have the tradition of the Santa Claus, and we do a small role-play every year where an adult of the family dresses up as Santa and delivers the presents everyone has bought at mid-night of the Christmas Eve night (24th December). It's really funny and I remember how magical it was when I was a kid. I'm sure my little cousins enjoy it as good as I used to. After opening the presents, we talk in family and play some games until we eventually go to bed.

In the morning we use to go to church and have lunch together as well. Portugal is a very religious country, and we celebrate the catholic Christmas, as the born of Jesus. It is a time of happiness and hope when the family gets together again and celebrates life. That's the meaning of Christmas.

Christmas in Denmark

I probably don't know all the traditions from this Christmas, but I will try to describe it from what I've seen and learned. Christmas is spent home with family and friends. The preparation for Christmas starts way before. There is an advent wreath hanging in the living room and we light one candle every Sunday, just like in Portugal. We went out some days before to find the perfect Christmas tree, a real one! Danes like to get the "fatter" trees, so they can dance around it at Christmas Eve. It was very funny to go to a field and try to choose the best one. We were always indecise and went back and forward until we were happy with it. Then, my host dad took a saw and cut the tree. We then went to pay for it and put it in the back of the car.

My sister, dad and me after cutting the tree

They don't give such importance to the crib, but it was in the living room several days before Christmas. The tree was only put up 1 day before Christmas Eve. It was decorated with real candles instead of lights, little danish flags, some balls and the star on the top. It seemed really massive in the middle of the living room, in comparison to the small thin tree in the corner of the house back in Portugal. The living room was also changed, the couch was moved as well as some armchairs, to form a circle to talk as a family. There were ornaments all around the house, such as candles and beautiful little decorations. You could feel the Christmas spirit in the air.

Dansk Juletræ

Adventskrans

Each Sunday there's the tradition of singing songs in family after dinner in the living room. Even tho I didn't know most of the songs, I enjoyed to be a part of it and it was very Hygge! Making cakes and biscuits is popular in the time before Christmas. In every Sunday morning the children use to get little presents, such as candy or little gifts. Some families also participate in a Christmas scratch card, where you scratch a number each day and you can win up to 1 million kroner! (135k euros)

On 24th December, everyone was very excited, and we went to the local church at 4pm, where we met a lot of friends and their families. It is a tradition to hear the priest's speech on this day, on a Lutheran church. When we got home the dinner was eaten at 6.30pm. It was served on a beautifully decorated table. My host siblings came home from Copenhagen to spend Christmas with us. Popular Christmas foods include roast duck, goose or pork. They are served with boiled and sweet potatoes, red cabbage, beetroot and cranberry jam/sauce. 

The desserts were surprisingly good and I'm going to miss this food for sure! We ate 'ris á la mande' (a special kind of rice pudding, made of milk, rice, vanilla, almonds and whipped cream) for dessert. All but one of the almonds are chopped into pieces. The person who finds the whole almond gets a present called a Mandelgave (almond present). The present this year was a little snowman made of chocolate! It was incredibly delicious!

Ris á la mande

After dinner, we went to the living room where we danced around the tree holding hands while singing Christmas songs. The older person in the family chose a song to sing and after it was finished, the second oldest person and so on. I was not used to this tradition so it was very interesting to be a part of it. The Christmas tree was lit with candles and it gave a really warm feeling to the room. One of the songs made us go in a train through the house while singing. 

After that, we sat together in a circle in the living room and opened our presents, that were below the tree. I had bought presents for my host parents and I also received some really nice presents, which I loved! Between them, there were a Denmark scarf, a little toy called Hoptimistic, from a Danish designer, and a game of Yahtzee!

Hoptimistic

Danmark scarf

Yahtzee board game

I also had time to Skype with my family back home, and to see all my big family in Portugal. They were very happy to see me but not as much as I was to see them! We could share experiences and they also got the chance to meet my Danish family.  It was very funny to see the reactions of my little cousins to see me for the first time in such a long time. They were very excited, screaming and jumping! After talking to each branch of my family for a little while, we hung up the call. It was incredible to think that even tho we were so far away, and with such different cultures, we were connected and could share that moment together! :)

Printscreen from the Skype call :)

After a while of talking and laughing, we went to bed. It was surely a very different Christmas from what I was used to, but definitely the most interesting, and I really enjoyed it! I hope it's not the last Danish Christmas that I will have!