Christmas Cultures

Christmas in Greenland

In the villages of Polar Eskimos, families like to visit each other and have parties. They drink coffee and eat cakes and exchanged brightly wrapped parcels. Traditional presents are model sledges, a pairs of polished walrus tusks, or sealskin mitts. Everyone in the village gets a gift and children go from hut to hut, singing songs.

Christmas trees have to be imported, because no trees grow as far north as Greenland. They are decorated, with candles and bright ornaments. Dancing goes on most of the night. After coffee, cakes and carols, a great delicacy called 'mattak', whaleskin with a strip of blubber inside, is passed around. It is supposed to taste like fresh coconut, but is too tough to chew and is usually swallowed.

Another Christmas food is 'kiviak'. This is the raw flesh of little auks (a type of arctic bird) which have been buried whole in sealskin for several months until they have reached an advanced stage of decomposition! Although it sounds strange, it is a delicacy in Greenland.

It is tradition on Christmas night that the men look after the women, serving their coffee and stirring it for them. Games follow the Christmas meal, including one in which an object is passed from hand to hand round a long table under the cloth. It is supposed to be repulsive: round, clammy and rough in texture, such as a frozen egg, wrapped in strips of wet fox fur!