{"id":15918,"date":"2018-07-02T03:04:21","date_gmt":"2018-07-02T08:04:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/blog\/uncategorized\/holidays-around-the-world\/"},"modified":"2018-09-13T19:35:47","modified_gmt":"2018-09-14T00:35:47","slug":"holidays-around-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/blog\/uncategorized\/holidays-around-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Holidays around the world"},"content":{"rendered":"

The month of December is such a special time of joy, warmth and excitement. Families and friends\u00a0all around the world gather for festivities that\u00a0they hold near and dear to their hearts. Curious? Read below to learn a bit about what some of your friends may be celebrating\u00a0a country away.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Santa Lucia\u2019s Day<\/h3>\n

St. Lucia\u2019s Day takes place on December 13th in Sweden. It is a celebration of light on the longest night of the year. Girls wear white dresses with red sashes around the waist and a crown of candles on their heads. These Lucias share their light and songs in church concerts, processions and visits to hospitals, factories and retirement homes. Each year, a national Lucia is chosen through a contest and each town and village chooses their own representative Lucia.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Omisoka<\/h3>\n

Omisoka is a Japanese New Year celebration that takes place on December 31st. The \u201cnew year, new me\u201d mentality is celebrated with a purifying of the home. All the clutter that was collected throughout the year is organized and the home is left squeaky clean in a process called osoji<\/em>. Families also stay home to watch a national New Year\u2019s talent competition and enjoy a meal of Toshikoshisoba. These are long noodles that signify a long life. Temple bells toll at midnight which holds spiritual significance for many Japanese individuals as it represents the human desires that cause suffering.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Hanukkah<\/h3>\n

This eight-day \u201cfestival of lights\u201d is a Jewish celebration filled with a nightly lighting of the menorah, special prayers and fried\u00a0foods. The Hanukkah candles lit on the menorah are a symbol of courage because they honor the Maccabees\u2019s victory over King Antiochus, who forbade Jews to practice their religion.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Las Posadas<\/h3>\n

Las Posadas is nine days of religious observance celebrated by Mexico, Guatemala and other Central American countries. Each of the nine days commemorates the Christian journey that Joseph and Mary made from Nazareth to Bethlehem in search of refuge to give birth to Jesus. They were ultimately only able to find shelter in a stable, where Jesus Christ was born. Family and friends celebrate by visiting one another\u2019s homes, singing carols and reading scripture. Children also break open pinatas modeled after the star used to guide the three biblical wise men to the newborn Jesus.The word \u201cposada\u201d literally translates to \u201clodge.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Greenheart wishes a happy holidays\u00a0to all of our beloved community members. We hope this season is filled with so much love and joy!<\/span><\/p>\n

Open Post<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The month of December is such a special time of joy, warmth and excitement. Families and friends\u00a0all around the world gather for festivities that\u00a0they hold near and <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":15202,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,218],"tags":[21],"class_list":["post-15918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exchange","category-greenheart-international","tag-auto"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/15202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenheart.org\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}