Christmas Wishlist this Year

  Taking part in a local haka contest – and winning it – on Christmas Day on a New Zealand beach was the last thing I expected to do during my backpacking trip around the world. While sunbathing on Piha beach near Lion Rock, just outside Auckland, I was invited to learn the ceremonial dance so decided to go for it along with several other tourists. My terrific trainer, Ari (whose name apparently means Lion of God), should take all the credit for my prize – a large live sheep and a Māori tattoo on my shoulder. Strictly Come Dancing it certainly wasn’t, but a Christmas with a difference it sure was. In New Zealand, like its neighbor  Australia , Christmas comes in the middle of the summer holidays. Lots of people like to spend time of the beach, camping or at their Baches (holiday homes) for Christmas. Many towns have a  Santa  parade with decorated floats (made by local businesses and churches, etc.), bands and marching teams. This can be any time from mid November onwards and is really

  With no plans on Christmas morning we searched for an impromptu mini-break and chose three nights in  Vienna , departing Stansted at 8pm. No traffic, no queues, last train into the city, and a taxi around the Ringstrasse – illuminated golden bright on a silent night – for chocolate in bed as the clock struck midnight. Cafe Hawelka, Wiener wurst, Christmas markets, ice skating, Belvedere Museum Klimts, the ferris wheel at Prater, feeling giggly after gluhwein, looking for the Third Man aboard a clanking tram … Vienna simply dazzles at Christmas. Sometimes the unexpected presents are the best. Traditionally the Christmas tree is brought in and decorated on Christmas Eve. Decorations include candles (now often electric) and sparklers. For children other important decorations are sweets, such as small liqueur-filled chocolate bottles, chocolates of various kinds, jelly rings and 'Windbäckerei' (meringue, usually in the form of rings, stars, etc.). Some children believe that the &

  Arriving late by bus, still wearing ski gear, we trundled our cabin bags over the cobbles in search of our rented apartment in the heart of medieval  Granada . It was Christmas Eve. Everyone was out: drinking cava, sharing tapas or queuing to see the  belénes , the nativity scenes set up in all the plazas. We went to midnight mass in the Cathedral, and on Christmas morning, climbed up to the viewpoint at the Albaicín, the old Moorish quarter. From there, the Alhambra looked sublime against its backdrop of snow-capped peaks, the same mountains we had skied down just the day before.  Christmas crib, or nativity scene.  Belén  actually means Bethlehem, and while some show just the manger scene, others form elaborate tableaux of the town and its environs. Many families have a ‘ belén box’ that goes back decades, full of lovingly-collected half-broken figurines, lumps of papier-mâché, bits of twig and silver paper, mirrors, corks, seeds and dried grasses; all ingeniously employed to recre

  One Christmas, I went to a zen meditation retreat in Oita, on the southernmost  Kyushu  island, because I was feeling very burned out. The meditation retreat, as you would imagine, was pretty relaxed and the resident monk and I got along very well. Oita is famous for its fugu – the poisonous puffer fish – and for Christmas dinner, I took the only other person at the retreat and the monk into the city for a fugu feast. After a visit to a karaoke bar where we sang I Will Survive, the three of us rounded our Christmas off at a whisky bar before riding the train back to the temple to meditate before bed. Best Christmas ever! If you're used to Christmas Day being the main event or at least for festivities to continue on the 25th, a Japanese Christmas may take you by surprise.  I clearly remember our first Christmas in Japan and going out to try to buy one of the aforementioned chicken packs on Christmas Day. They were perplexed why we would be asking when Christmas was “over” and we w