Families celebrate unique holiday traditions
As the cold approaches, a sense of happiness and warmth wraps around Sara.Winter break is fast approaching. As December 25 comes up, Sara Mehmood prepares to celebrate her cousin’s birthday. How weird can it be that Christmas is not what she expects from the cold winter. A Christmas-less winter has always been the norm for Sara Mehmood.
We live in a diverse place and therefore many people around us celebrate different things. Mehmood came to the United States from Pakistan when she was 12 years old and recalls celebrating holidays very differently.
“Before coming to America, I didn’t even know such holidays existed until I started living [here],” Mehmood said.
Mehmood and her family now celebrates American holidays in their own unique way. Throughout the year, Sara celebrates other Muslim holidays like Eid-Ul-Adha, Eid-Ul-Fitr, and Ramadan.
“For some time, holidays meant relaxation and quality time with family or a way to regroup and remember old times in Pakistan. Mostly we called our relatives back in Pakistan during the time off. Recently, we have developed a tradition of meeting on Thanksgiving day at my uncle’s house for a family gathering. For the last three years, we meet on Christmas day as an entire family over at my uncle’s house for my cousin’s birthday,” Mehmood said.
The different traditions that families do is what helps them create new memories. In Mehmood’s case, her family has accommodated their religion and American holidays.
“We don’t give each other gifts or say ‘Merry Christmas’. It is a sin to say Merry Christmas in my religion and since we don’t believe in Christmas, we don’t celebrate it,” Mehmood said.
Senior Jose Miguel Evangelista talked about the traditions his family does for the holidays.
“We attend night masses the nine days before Christmas and go to a party on Christmas Eve,” Evangelista said.
Evangelista claimed that his family has been doing these traditions for as long as he remembers.
“I would love to continue these traditions because I really enjoy participating in the activities and spending time with family and friends,” Evangelista said.
Evangelista recalls these traditions to be very fun and full of crazy activities that he enjoys.
“The only thing that I’d like to change would be having a wider variety of food after each mass,” Evangelista said.
Other people have a tradition of vacationing for the holidays and celebrate holidays in another unique way.
“During Christmastime, my family and I visit my parent’s hometown in Mexico and we stay there for about two-three weeks,” said Lorenzo Herrera.
For a long time, his family has always celebrated Christmas a little differently, and it will always remain a tradition.
“We don’t celebrate Christmas the same even though we are Catholic. For example, I’ve never received presents on Christmas. On Christmas Eve, we spend it with all of my extended family and there’s a lot of food, music and a lot of dancing. At night we go to the local church for the posadas which is just a typical mass for Christmas and when it’s over we receive a goody bag with candy, cookies and fruit. We also drink hot chocolate and ponche which is a hot and sweet mexican beverage,” Herrera said.
This tradition is something Herrera always looks forward to and it is one of his favorite times of the year.
“I would like to continue these traditions because I’ve always loved having the opportunity to visit Mexico and even though we don’t celebrate the holidays the same as others, it’s always a lot of fun and we get to create memories and spend time with our family,” Herrera said.
