New Year Traditions

Every year for the last 40 or so I exchange special New Year’s Eve greetings with our friend who lives in Spain.  Whether by email or telephone we remind each other to eat twelve grapes as the clock chimes the last seconds of the old year.  Each grape represents one month of the coming year and eating them guarantees a year of good luck.

In the last few years my Bert and I have not made it to midnight.  We will not be under the same roof this year but the tradition continues.

As I closed the usual message I asked my friend if the luck for the twelve months would still be forthcoming if I ate the grapes too early.

In her reply she said she has failed sometimes to eat at the correct hour and also being Scottish she has been her own ‘first footer’ for many years.  She then told me of the Irish tradition of holding the front door open to welcome the New Year while simultaneously holding the back door open to bid farewell to the old year.  She ended with: “What about those who live in flats without back doors?”

I replied that I had no trouble with doors as my balcony door is actually my back door.  My worry would be that the old year may come to a precipitous end because as at stepping out he would fall nine floors down.

I did not want to imagine the splat.

That got me looking at other traditions my Bert and I have enjoyed.

The Netherlands:  My Bert was so happy to introduce me to his New Year’s Eve tradition, the most important of which involves food.  You are not Dutch if you do not greet the New Year with Oliebollen or oil balls.  These are round balls of dough deep fried and dusted with sugar.  They taste like doughnuts.  If you ever wondered where the hole in doughnuts went before there were Timbits they were oliebollen.

Friends still call to wish us a Happy New Year and proudly announce that they are eating oliebollen.

Of course there are fireworks.  So many and so ubiquitous that the news reports on New Year’s Day always include how many have been injured during the night of revelry.  It is usually in the hundreds.  The injuries run from a slight burn to: “You are lucky you’re not dead!”

Did I tell you that there is a lot of drinking too?  That might attest to the fact that each New Year’s Day there is also a Dutch version of Canada’s Polar Bear swims.  Only that being Dutch it is everywhere, done by everyone it seems, and having seen bikini clad women and children diving into the North Sea on January 1^st  I am in shivering awe even today at the recollection.

Denmark:  For four consecutive years my Bert and I spent New Year’s Eve in Denmark.   We were most surprised how paltry the meal seems – boiled cod – but that is only the traditional dish.  There were enough other surrounding dishes to feed an army in addition to the company of fourteen that gathered in our friends’ home.  I asked the whereabouts of the son and was told he was out smashing dishes around the neighbourhood.  I heard a smash at the door and was about to open it but was told: “Don’t, the smashing is not over as yet and there might be more being thrown at our door.”  Huh!?

Yes, Danes save their broken crockery to throw at the doors of the people they love on New Year’s Eve.  The more crockery found on your doorstep, the more love and abundant luck you will have in the coming year.

I love the Danes.

Incidentally, they too have a mad rush of fireworks that start at dark and may continue to the dawn of New Year’s Day.  They too may have many a hospital visit after the revelry.

Another reason for a hospital visit is the custom of jumping off the highest point you find at the stroke of midnight.  If you are celebrating in a home, that would be the sofa or a chair.  If you are at a really fancy party in a posh hotel you will see people jostling to get on a chair or a table, if inebriated, to ‘leap into the New Year’ at the stroke of midnight.  One year we grabbed the kids and moved slowly but surely to the huge windows to get an optimal view of the fireworks, as grown men and women leapt from anything elevated.  An older couple with a heavy German accent, who were on a similar mission as us said: “Ach! Those are the Danes.” I thought of sprained ankles and more.

Sweden: We gathered with family and friends for an amazing seafood smorgasbord.  There is herring prepared in every way imaginable plus lobster, shrimps, oysters.  The best china and glassware are unearthed and the table is beautifully decorated.

This is family.  This is a communal feast.  Everyone has contributed.  The home is warm and cozy and then comes the main tradition:  You must light the fireworks or go to the neighbourhood park, Town Hall or wherever you go to watch the fireworks as long as it is outdoors!

Note that Swedes are outdoorsy types and that for most of the year they live, if not in the dark then in a sort of twilight.  Being outdoors in the cold is normal. We Canadians can relate. 

At midnight you hug every single person in the room.  I like that!

Then we bundle up, children and all.  I am so swaddled I look like the Goodyear blimp.  I stand in snow up to my knees trying to stamp my feet which I cannot feel; my teeth are chattering; I shiver under the layers of clothing.

The fireworks are wonderful.  For a moment I cheer, and stamp.  I ooh and aah, I think, as I am too cold to know for sure.

We trudge back inside.  I pour myself a large cognac and curl up in a corner with an afghan.  What a wonderful night.

The following year we invite our niece and husband to accompany us to the New Year’s Eve party at the posh hotel in Copenhagen.  The headline band was Boney M.  Yes!

Jamaica: Yeah mon!  What excitement the holiday season brings.  The ‘clean-up’ for Christmas begins December 1^st then right after comes a New Year tradition – the laundry.  You must not have any dirty clothes in your home to greet the New Year.

The New Year’s Eve ball is a must.  If you can afford it you go to a Ball dressed to the nines. You must choose your venue early as all hotels, inns, large and small entertainment venues are fully booked weeks in advance.  If you cannot afford the gala events then the parties happen in every place imaginable including great house parties.  You party no matter your circumstances.

Watch Night Service is another must do.  Jamaica has the greatest number of churches per capita in the world.  We are a religious people.  Greeting the New Year in church is not optional for the vast majority.

Fireworks displays run the gamut from playing with fire crackers and ‘star lights’ to the big display in Kingston Harbour.  This harbour is the seventh largest natural deep sea harbour of the world and on New Year’s Eve it becomes a pyrotechnic wonder on land, sea and air.

Not to be left out, we also do a swim.  Polar Bear it is not! Families and friends go to the beach on New Year’s Day and wash away the old year.  Ah, to be at the beach and splashing in the azure waters of the warm Caribbean Sea on New Year’s Day.

The Meander: I must confess that for a few years I went to a party, left and rushed to put on my choir robe for the Watch Night Service, quickly disrobe at its conclusion and went right back to the party.  I know a few friends reading this did exactly the same. Cheers!