Posted on 12/23/2007 11:27:55 AM PST by AmericanInTokyo
Three years ago a friend of ours brought over the Japanese exchange student that she was hosting to our Christmas Tree trimming party.
It was a delight to watch her ooo and aaah over over all the decorations.
The best part was letting her try her hand at placing ornaments on the eighteen foot Douglas Fir I had cut from my backyard as I was thinking about how she would go home and tell her friends that Americans have 18 foot Christmas Trees that they decorate using 12 foot long polls!
Can it be that they just have a “copy cat” mindset and if we said “Merry Flying Pink Elephants” they would have signs saying that also?
That reminds me of how SPAM is a hot, high end gift in Korea.
A friend of mine at work is from Taiwan and says it is the same there, too.
Wearing surgical masks is very common and polite in east Asia if you have a cold. You see them all the time in cold and flu season.
I often have wondered if maybe the anti-Christmas people believe that Christians in this country don’t take their faith seriously. We all know they would never have the courage to attack Islam like they do the Christian faith.
1%?? Geez even the UAE has a higher population of Christians! They’ve got 35%
Merry Chritmas, AIT
My daughter spent 2 years living in a rural mountain village in Japan. The people could not possibly have been more courteous, kind, thoughtful. She observed that they were very ‘into’ all things American, which I assume Christmas is considered over there (as opposed to a specifically Christian event). Nonetheless, they are so respectul. We could do with a little of that here.
Merry Christmas to all of you.
I lived in Tokyo for years. Christmas was a fun time, for sure. Lots of gift-giving. Back in the 80’s, the Waco store down on the Ginza had put up the first ‘Santa on the Cross’ in its display window. Quite a fuss was made over it.
the oddest thing, though, was the emptiness of the famous places on New Year’s Day. All were closed and the place was like a ghost town for one day of the year.
Beautiful photos, American in Tokyo. I’m happy to see that other countries in the world are not as “P.C.” as we are here in the U.S.A.
I wiah you only the best during this Christmas holiday. Warm regards to you!
Silvie
Kurisumasu Omedetu Gozai’mas, AIT. Spent several Christmases around the Camp Zama area in the mid 60s. One enduring memory was of a Japanese Santa Claus outside Shinjuku Station. He was skinny as a rail, with a fake beard and was ringing a bell, much like The Salvation Army here.
In Spain, they now say "Feliz Fiestas" (Happy Holidays) rather than "Feliz Navidad", as was common even 15 years ago.
Thank you m.a. I am new to Flickr so I can go back in and somehow unfreeze the pics so you can see them. There were many more. Thanks for checking. I finished the post at 4 a.m. this morning, then got some shut eye, and just got up! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!
It should be easy to see the photos. A number of people worldwide had already seen them on Flickr.
One may need to sign up in Flickr, I am not sure. Try again at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/22094945@N07/
And let us know if they are visible.
Thanks to ALL who have commented!
Where’s Santa on the cross?
A very Merry Christmas to you!
Feliz Navidad, mon ami
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