From pooping logs to surfing Santas: Wonderfully weird Christmas traditions worldwide

Outside the U.S., Christmas traditions involve much more than reindeer and evergreen trees. While some traditions have emerged in modern times, many local holiday traditions stretch back centuries, morphing and evolving over time.

Take a look at a few weirdly wonderful Christmas traditions from around the world.

The pooping log of Catalonia, Spain

The tradition of Catalonia’s pooping Christmas log, typically referred to as Caga Tió or Tió de Nadal, may have begun during winter wood collections, Catalan News reported. Catalan families began bringing a log in from outside, propping it up and painting a face on it, often giving it a hat or blanket. Once the log was cozy inside, children “fed” the log and took care of it.

When Christmas came, the children gathered around the log to sing a song and beat the log with sticks. The song goes something like this, NPR reported in 2017:

Poop log / Log of Christmas / Don’t poop salted herring / They are too salty / Poop turróns / They are much better!

Afterward, the children leave the room to pray and return to find small presents on a blanket at the back end of the log, Catalan News reported. These presents commonly included a type of Christmas sweet, a turrón, made of nougat and filled with honey, NPR reported.

Catalonia is a region in eastern Spain that includes the city of Barcelona.

The rhyming horse skull of Wales

During Christmas time in Wales, a mischievous horse skull — the Mari Lwyd — wanders villages with a group of revelers, the Welsh Government explained. The Mari Lwyd is horse skull topped with streamers or holly for hair, stuck on a pole and surrounded by a white cloak. A person stands inside the cloak and animates the skull, snapping its jawbone.

The Mari Lwyd and its group of revelers go door to door, challenging residents to rhyming battles, Atlas Obscura reported. The people inside must answer the creature with a wittier rhyme.

If the Mari Lwyd wins, the group goes inside the house to eat and drink, an outcome considered to bring good luck to the residents. Although fairly rare, if the Mari Lwyd loses, the group must leave without entering, the Amgueddfa Cymru, or Museum Wales, reported.

The origin of the Mari Lwyd is unclear but typically considered to predate Christianity, the Welsh Government reported.

The KFC dinners of Japan

Christmas traditions in Japan did not exist until the 1970s when the country opened to U.S. and global influence in the years following WWII, CNN reported. As the imported holiday emerged, KFC found a creative way to market their product: “Kentucky for Christmas.”

Fried chicken fit well with preexisting Japanese food culture, which includes a type of deep fried breaded meat, and the extensive marketing efforts eventually paid off, CNN reported.

Now, KFC offers an exclusive Christmas bucket in Japan, and many — although not all — people eat fried chicken for Christmas dinner, Japanese writer Makiko Itoh explained.

The radish carving night in Oaxaca, Mexico

Why leave the vegetable carving just for Halloween? Gardeners and produce growers in Oaxaca put their artistic talent on display every year on Dec. 23, according to the state’s culture website, Oaxaca Mio. The night of radish carving — or Noche de Rábanos — grew out of the region’s annual Christmas market.

To make their stalls more attractive to prospective customers, growers began using misshapen radishes, a common crop and staple in local cuisine, to decorate, The Culture Trip reported. The first simple carvings became increasingly intricate when the mayor formalized the tradition in 1897 with a radish carving contest.

The tradition continues today, photos from the local magazine, Turismo y Vanguardia Oaxaca, show. The entire carving event lasts less than a day as the carved radishes eventually brown and wilt, The Culture Trip reported.

Oaxaca is a region in southern Mexico.

The surfing Santas of Australia

What began as a fun family outing has grown to a massive event at Australia’s Cocoa Beach: the surfing Santas, the group’s website explained. The first unofficial surfing Santas event was a family outing in 2009. Over a decade later, over 800 surfing Santas and almost 10,000 spectators come to the beach on Christmas Eve.

The organizers have begun using the event to raise money for local charities and bring together surfing enthusiasts for a fun time, the organization explained. Previously, the event has set the record for the largest surf lesson ever, BBC reported.

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