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Enjoy Teaching - Message from L. A.@by Junko Nakamura
Happy Holidays!
@After Thanksgiving Day is over, we can hear many greetings of gHappy Holidays!h here and there on the street these days. We tend to think of gChristmash when people say gHappy Holidays!h but Christmas is not the only holiday event at this time of the year. Christmas is definitely a religiously important event to the Christians. And to non-Christians it is also celebrated as a social event at the end of the year. But Jewish people have a traditional event called gHannukahh, and some African Americans celebrate their own cultural holiday on g Kwanzaah at this time of the year. Since many African Americans are Christians, they celebrate Christmas, too.
On the first night of gHanukkahh, the family lights one candle on the menorah,@a candle holder with 8 branches, and the following night they light the second one and so on for 8 days. They eat a big dinner on the 8th day; I like their gLatkesh, potato pancakes that they make for that occasion. Children play a game with a dreidel, a kind of a top, and some families give money and gifts to children on Hanukkah. (Isn't it similar to our New Year holiday custom? )
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Kwanzaa is a relatively new celebration for African Americans. It lasts from December 26th to January 1st.@ It is the occasion where the African Americans appreciate their culture and tradition. The seven candles, whose colors are red, black and green stand for the flag of the African Americans. It represents the symbolic aspect of America, which consists of many races and religious groups and that there are different kinds of celebrations as the last event of the year and they respect each other's occasion, saying gHappy Holidays!h
@P. S.: And do not forget that holiday refers to New Year's Day, too!
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