If the concept of a strange overweight man breaking in to your home in the dead of the night via the chimney seems normal to you, then TOAD wonders what you’ll make of these Christmas traditions around the world…
• Come Christmas, a Freddie Krueger-style character, Krampus, roams the mean streets of Austria, punishing naughty children and terrorising the good ones.
• On Christmas Day, congregations in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas, head to morning services on rollerskates. Traffic authorities clear the roads especially.
• On Christmas Day, Portuguese families set extra dinner places for dead loved ones.
• On Christmas Eve, Norwegians hide their brooms before they go to sleep.
• There are no sprouts in Greenland on December 25 – only raw whale skin with a bit of blubber attached. If you’re lucky, you’ll also sample the decomposed flesh of an auk, an arctic bird which has been wrapped in seal skin and buried for months.
•At some point during the festive period, single women in the Czech Republic stand with their back to their front door and hurl a shoe over their shoulder. If it lands pointing towards them, it’s said they’ll be married within a year.
