Inside the other cultural holidays Australian creatives are celebrating this festive season
Words by Enya Roberts
“It would be great if, in addition to Christian holidays, we could also have national holidays to celebrate days that are valuable to minorities in Australia.”
December is the last hurdle we cross before entering the new year. It’s a month packed full of present shopping, decorations and activities, with a non-stop rush of gatherings and preparations until we can finally take some time to breathe afterwards.
But with all this talk of Christmas, it’s easy for the voices of other diverse Australians to be drowned out, to the point where few of us may know more than one or two other holidays celebrated around this time. It’s easy to forget that December is full of events for all cultures, each saying goodbye to the year in their own beautifully unique ways.
Interested to hear how others navigate the world? Head to our Life section.
Some cultures don’t even celebrate a holiday in December and must find ways to entertain themselves at a time when the rest of Australia stands still. Others celebrate small holidays, while still more have massive celebrations that last until dawn. So, to provide some insight into how we all choose to end our year, we asked seven Australian creatives about their plans for the festive season.
Gabby Apter, studio assistant and photographer
Christmas and Hanukkah
My family and I celebrate parts of Hanukkah, but we also celebrate Christmas and New Year’s Eve. My plans for Hanukkah are always kind of last minute because we always assume we’ll be going to my grandparent’s house. My family will all go, and my grandma always cooks a lot of food. My brother, my cousins and I will also get Hanukkah gelt, which is where we get money, so that’s always fun. It’s all very sweet.
I’m more culturally Jewish, so Hanukkah is centred around getting together and enjoying the food and each other’s company. It’s kind of similar with New Year’s Eve as well – we’re Russian, so we celebrate that a little differently. We’ll go to our family’s house and do presents as well. Christmas isn’t taken too seriously – we kind of just use it as another excuse to get together again!
Moná Kíání, author
Yalda
Yalda means ‘rebirth of the sun’. It celebrates the triumph of light over darkness and falls on the winter solstice in the Northern hemisphere. We usually stay indoors away from darkness and wait to welcome the new light. Traditionally, everyone stays up reading poetry (Hafez and Sa’adi) and singing and dancing until dawn. But with three young kids, our family still sticks to our usual bedtimes!
Some families light a fire outside the family home and gather around a korsí – a low table covered by a blanket overhanging on all sides with a heater under the table. In our home, we make a korsí and gather around eating nuts, pomegranates and watermelon. The funny thing is it’s usually sweltering hot in Australia so we don’t always switch on the heater! But we’ll gather around to eat [while] playing Persian music and reading Persian stories.
Freya Boltman, actor and musician
Christmas and Chanukah
Being Jewish in the festive period is a bit weird in Australia. When I was 13 and obsessed with YouTubers’ ‘Vlogmas’, I’d rally my family to buy gifts and decorations for Christmas, practically forgetting about Chanukah. Nowadays I’m not as influenced by the internet, but do get caught in conversations with Christmas lovers shocked that I don’t have a tree or have never tried eggnog. Chanukah rates pretty low in terms of importance in the Jewish calendar – it’s just because it’s close to Christmas that many people think it’s so big.
I’ll probably light some candles and eat sufganiyot (doughnuts) with my grandmother and family. My mother’s side is Jewish, but pretty secular, so we usually have a lunch on Christmas Day just for the hell of it. I’ve also been invited to my boyfriend’s Christmas where I’m a part of the Kris Kringle! It’ll be my first authentic Christmas so I’m a bit nervous but looking forward to seeing how it’s actually done. This festive season I’m also working at the Comedy Theatre handing out fruit mince pies for A Christmas Carol so my exposure to festivities is at an all-time high!
Amber Hammad, artist
No official December celebrations
I love the end-of-year holidays! Days off from work, [the] atmosphere of celebrations, getting together with friends and family – what’s not to enjoy? On Christmas day my family and I join our friends who celebrate it, often over a nice barbeque at their house. Similarly, we love when our non-Muslim friends join us for Ramzan and Eid celebrations!
It would be great if, in addition to Christian holidays, we could also have national holidays to celebrate days that are valuable to minorities in Australia. The literal meaning of the Arabic word ‘Islam’ is ‘Peace’. I believe celebrating and valuing diversity, advancing cultural dialogue, and trying to understand the ‘other’ instead of ‘otherisation’, is the key to a peaceful future. Peace and happy holidays everyone!
Becca Crawford, photographer
Photography by Victoria Zschommler
Christmas and Hanukkah
I’m the granddaughter of Polish Holocaust survivors and was raised Jewish, so lighting the eight days of Hanukkah candles in my grandma’s bronze menorah and eating Glick’s jam doughnuts marks the start of my festive season. We also celebrate Christmas.
Being from such a food-obsessed family though, Christmas Day has always been used as a way to indulge and celebrate the beginning of summer at our farm on the NSW South Coast. Always featuring prawns (duh!), crispy roast chicken, oozy cheeses and my mum’s inimitable pav. But the festive season this year will be slightly different as I’m heavily pregnant and due with my first babe around Christmas Eve! I’m imagining less champagne and more trying to keep myself cool in our blow up paddle pool.
@beccacrawford
Pegah Ghaemi, film director
Christmas and Yalda
Growing up in Sydney while attending a Catholic School, Christmas felt more ‘normal’ to celebrate. But as Shabe Yalda is an old Persian tradition, my parents and family friends would celebrate with a spread of pomegranate, pistachio, figs and other festive Persian foods. My films then brought me to the United Arab Emirates, where I actually celebrate both Yalda and Christmas as a tradition and festivity!
This year I’ll celebrate Shabe Yalda at a Persian friend’s house and possibly continue on to a Persian restaurant which will remain open until dawn. We’ll play backgammon [and] cards, listen to live music and poetry and eat lots of pomegranate and other Persian foods. I’ll be celebrating Christmas with a multicultural group of friends at a brunch actually! By brunch, I mean the true blue British meaning, not the Aussie ‘breakfast/lunch’.
The celebration will begin at noon and end in the early hours of the next morning. Some years I’ve celebrated Christmas in Dubai with family and family friends in the traditional Australian way, but generally as most of us here are ex-pats with little or no blood-related family around, we celebrate in true Dubai style, which is different for everyone by the way (Dubai Bling on Netflix isn’t really a great representation of how everyone lives here). So, Christmas Eve will be at brunch and Christmas Day will probably be on the beach or at the pool.
Ramak Bamzar, artist and photographer
Nowruz and Yalda
As Christmas approaches, busy shopping centres remind me of Nowruz (Persian New Year): children’s joy, gifts, new clothes, and the exciting countdown to the final day. After immigrating to Australia, I kept celebrating Nowruz, but never experienced the same joy and excitement I had in Iran – but maybe it’s just my age.
Nowruz in the Northern hemisphere occurs on the first spring day. Each year, I’ll prepare a small table of symbolic foods and objects, called the ‘Haft Sin’, a few days in advance, invite friends over and celebrate by sharing drinks and dancing.
I also celebrate Yalda Night. This year I’ll be celebrating with friends by drinking, sharing poetry and dancing (it’s not an Iranian event without dancing). Even though the seasons are opposite here on the other side of the world (Yalda Night in Australia is the shortest, not the longest night of the year), the symbolic beauty of both Nowruz and Yalda Night are still heartily celebrated by Iranians, connecting them to their ancient culture while projecting their hopes and dreams into the future.
Sadly, the authoritarian Islamic regime in Iran has been trying to destroy many of these ancient customs. This year, as my friends and I celebrate Yalda night, we will be celebrating in honour of all those back in Iran fighting for truth, justice and the freedom to dance, drink, love who you desire, dress how you want, and choose your own path in life.
For information on other culturally diverse dates in Australia, head here.
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