Brainstorm descriptions of a (usual/ traditional) Japanese and British or American Xmas and New Year into the table on the next page, particularly the differences.
Use these categories to help with the brainstorming task above:
- Food and drink
- Decorations
- Religion and superstitions (good luck and bad luck)
- Sports and games
- Gifts and cards
- Arts and media
- Clothes
- Spending time together (parties etc)
Without looking below, put the cards that you are given into the two columns matching the two categories in the table. Some things might happen in both places, but all should clearly be more common or more traditional in one place or the other.
Hints:
- If it’s not very common and/ or traditional in Japan, it must be for the other column, and vice versa
- There should the same number (29) in each column
- You should be able to put at least some of them into pairs by topic
Check your answers with an un-cut-up version of the worksheet. Is anything surprising? Are any important things missing?
Imagine one of you is Japanese and the other person or people are from the UK or US, and that you are seeing each other (again) for the first time since the Xmas/ New Year holiday. Ask each other about the break, imagining you know very little about Xmas and New Year traditions in the other person’s country, and so asking for more info about things you don’t understand.
Do the same, but this time speaking for a couple of minutes then smoothly finishing the chat, for example to get down to business or move on and talk to someone else.
| (Traditional/ Typical) Japanese Xmas and New Year | (Traditional/ Typical) British or American Xmas and New Year |
|
|
Cards to cut up/ Suggested answers
| Japanese Xmas and New Year | British Xmas and New Year |
|
Send New Year postcards
|
Send Christmas cards |
| Watch television singing competition show on New Year’s Eve
|
Watch the Queen’s speech in the afternoon on Christmas Day |
| Traditional games and sports (e.g. a kind of badminton with wooden bats)
|
Often go for a walk as a family after Xmas dinner |
| A kind of long distance relay race is televised every year
|
Unlike most of Europe, many football matches held and televised |
| The most common Xmas meat is fried chicken (often from KFC)
|
Most common Xmas meat is roast turkey (with stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, etc) |
| The most filling New Year food is chewy rice cake
|
The most filling Christmas food is roast (and sometimes mashed) potatoes |
| New Year vegetables include black beans, seaweed and bamboo shoots
|
Christmas vegetables include Brussel sprouts, parsnips and roasted carrots |
| New Year foods tend to be for good luck or because little extra preparation is needed | Xmas foods ones that were still available in winter like root vegetables and dried fruit
|
| Hot sweet red beans with chewy rice cake eaten in January
|
Hot pudding with brandy sauce, custard, fresh cream, or ice cream eaten for Xmas |
| Drink something called “sweet rice wine”, actually a non-alcoholic drink, usually hot | Drink a drink called eggnog (egg liqueur) or mulled wine (hot wine with spices)
|
| Christmas cake is often a sponge with cream and strawberries | Christmas cake is usually a heavy dried fruit cake with marzipan and white icing
|
| Packaged snacks (sometimes shaped like Xmas stockings) bought and given to kids
|
Everyone eats snacks (tins of chocolates, sugared almonds, chocolate coins, etc) |
| Make your own chewy rice cake by pounding sticky rice with a wooden mallet
|
Take the shells off your own nuts with
a nutcracker |
| Eat mashed chestnuts and whole chestnuts around New Year
|
Eat nuts and dried fruit such as Brazil nuts, walnuts, dates and figs around Christmas |
|
Give cash in little envelopes, only to kids
|
Give presents, in stockings or under the Xmas tree, to both adults and children |
| Visit to a temple or shrine to pray for the first time of the year
|
Go to church for a carol service or (candlelit) midnight mass |
| Boyfriends and girlfriends spend Xmas together, e.g. having a romantic meal
|
Families spend Christmas together at home |
| Especially in shops, Xmas decorations replaced by New Year ones on Dec. 25th
|
Christmas decorations must be taken down by 6 January, or it is bad luck |
| End of the year “forget the year party” with colleagues, usually in a bar | End of the year Christmas party with colleagues, often actually in the office
|
| Sometimes dress in traditional clothes to visit a temple or shrine around New Year | Wear party hats (from inside Christmas crackers) on Christmas day
|
| Decorate the house with the “7 lucky gods” and the animal representing the (new) year | Decorate the house with fairy lights, tree, nativity scene, tinsel, baubles, wreath, etc
|
| Decorate the house with pine branches and pine cones for New Year | Decorate the house with (real or plastic) holly and mistletoe for Christmas
|
|
New Year’s Eve is a family time.
|
New Year’s Eve is a time to go out partying (e.g. clubbing) with your friends.
|
| Welcome the New Year by eating (greyish) buckwheat noodles | Welcome the New Year by linking hands and singing “Auld Lang Syne”
|
| A lot of New Year superstitions, e.g. a slip of paper with your fortune for the next year
|
Some Xmas superstitions, e.g. good luck for getting the coin in the Xmas pudding |
| Most museums etc closed for a few days around New Year
|
No shopping, trains, buses etc on Xmas Day, and taxis three times the normal price |
| Beethoven’s Ninth popular around New Year
|
Most people know the words to many Xmas songs, including Xmas carols |
| Shops play traditional music around New Year
|
Carol singers sometimes go from house to house singing Xmas songs |
| Shops sell especially packaged bags of discount goods in the New Year
|
Some people sleep outside shops to get the biggest bargains in the January Sales |
Choose one of the things below and describe it without saying any part of its name until your partner guesses what you are talking about. Do they agree with your description?
| Japanese Xmas and New Year vocabulary | British and American Xmas and New Year vocabulary |
| amazake
bounenkai daruma dondo-yaki ekiden fukubukuro fukuwarai hakama hanetsuki/ hago-ita hatsumode joya-no-kane kadomatsu karuta kazunoko kimono konbu kouhaku uta-gassen kurikinton kuro-mame mochi mochi-tsuki nenga-jo omikuji o-sechi-ryori o-shiruko o-toshi-dama (o-)toso o-zoni saru-doshi shichi-fuku-jin strawberry “short cake” sugoroku tai takenoko toshi-koshi-soba |
advent calendar
Auld Lang Syne baubles brandy sauce bread sauce Brussel sprouts candlelit service (Xmas) carol chestnuts chocolate coins Christmas crackers cranberry sauce custard date eggnog fairy lights fig goose gravy holly marzipan midnight mass mistletoe mulled wine nativity (scene) nut roast nutcrackers office party parsnip raisin roast stuffing sugared almonds The Queen’s speech tinsel turkey walnuts winter ale wreath Xmas log Xmas pudding Xmas tree |
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PDF version for easy saving and printing: describing-british-and-japanese-xmas-and-new-year
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