blogger · book · Christmas · Culture · Europe · Finland · Travelblog · Uncategorized · writing

Merry Christmas!

Elena

Merry Christmas! 🎄🎁🎉🎀🤗
My most memorable Christmas moment was probably 10 years ago. It was my first year in Finland, and my mom came to visit me. We planned to cook a nice dinner, and we made a long shopping list for that. My mother wanted to do shopping already on December, 23. I assured her that we can do that on December, 24. My mom was sceptical about postponing it. Obviously, she understood the local culture better than me, and she had some concerns about the shop open hours… It was December, 24. I wanted to finish one of the assignments for uni, so that I can relax and enjoy the holidays. I took my time. Finally, we went to the shop, and of course, it was already closed. Like any other shop in town… I was very naive thinking that shops work longer on that day. I also did not know that shops were also closed on December, 25 and December, 26. So, instead of an awesome Christmas dinner, we ended up struggling with our modest provision 🙈😄

Published by Elena

Foreigner in Finland. Learning languages and exploring this lovely world. :)

26 thoughts on “Merry Christmas!”

  1. Sorry for the somewhat difficult lesson. I like cultures that close for extended holiday and the fun of stocking up ahead of time. US really doesn’t close much except for Christmas Day now. Most things will close early on the 24th, but the grocery workers and some other stores will stay open. I wish all could go home and enjoy Christmas Eve. I will be off work in 1 hour (1pm) and have time to pick up last minute shopping – wish they could go at 3pm like they used to. Merry Christmas, Miss Elenka!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  3. New Zealand has finally reached the 21st Century … not long ago everything closed for the weekend—pubs and bars shut at six in the evening, shops usually slammed shut at five but stayed open till nine on Fridays … and that was THAT until Monday!

    Yes. It was horrible—but you couldn’t tell people, brought up to it they couldn’t relate at all. No wonder kiwis are so good at sports …

    All the best of the Season to you and yours, Miss Elenka; and more or your post and photos, please!!

    Like

    Reply

    2. I like such a transition. We still can do things at the weekend, and there are some people who actually want to work during holidays either to earn extra money or not to feel alone. Best wishes! 🎁🎄

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  5. Not the same anymore though as opening hours have been “liberated” and shops can choose for themselves although 25th is still pretty dead that is true. In my childhood I remember the teenage agony of everything closing down for four days pretty much and you were not allowed to meet friends or anything… A bit different that too nowadays 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    2. I love the change. People still can get extra food if needed or meet for a coffee. Not everyone wants to be indoors, or some people may simply not have a company. Some also wants to earn extra money. I think that the current system gives more choice to people how to spend their holidays. But for a child, it is tough to be without friends for so long… 😮🙂

      Like

      Reply

  8. I am sure your mom found her Christmas wonderful because you were with her. The other things don’t really matter anyway. I can say this because I spent the days before the holiday with my loved ones and after with Chinese food and a movie and my Christmas was blessed. We celebrated the birth of Jesus and that was very special. Love ❤️ Joni

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s