The New Year is a time of festival, rebirth, and reflection. In America it is common to send out the past year with a party and start the new with resolutions. However, ushering in the New Year around the globe can be a unique celebration depending on where you live. Let’s explore some of the culture traditions around the world!
Armenia: Baking Bread
When people in Armenia bake bread on New Year's Eve, they add a special ingredient into their dough: luck. This tradition for metaphorical good wishes is kneaded into every batch of bread baked on the last day of the year.
Brazil: Throwing White Flowers in the Ocean
It is tradition to throw white flowers in the ocean on New Year's Eve to make offerings to Yemoja, a water God, to elicit her blessings for the year to come.
Chile: Mass in Cemeteries
New Year's Eve masses are held not at church, but in cemeteries. This change of scenery allows for people to sit with their deceased family members and include them in the New Year's Eve festivities.
Denmark: Smashing Plates
It's a Danish tradition to throw dishes at your friends' and neighbors' front doors on New Year's Eve. It symbolizes leaving any ill-will behind before the New Year begins. They believe that the bigger your pile of broken dishes, the more luck you will have in the upcoming year.
Ecuador: Burning Scarecrows
New Year Eve’s festivities are lit by bonfires. At the center of each of these bonfires are effigies, they represent a cleansing of the bad from the past year and clear the air for the good to come.
Germany: Pouring Lead
In Germany, all of the New Year's Eve Festivities center around a rather unique activity known as Bleigießen, or lead pouring. Using the flames from a candle, each person melts a small piece said to reveal a person's fate for the upcoming year.
Greece: Hanging Onions
Greeks believe that onions are a symbol of rebirth, and so they hang them on their doors to promote growth throughout the new year
Ireland: Sleeping on Mistletoe
In Ireland, it's customary for single ladies to sleep with a mistletoe under their pillow on New Year's Eve as it is thought to help them find their future husbands.
Italy: Wearing Red Underwear
Italians have a tradition of wearing red underwear to ring in the new year. In Italian culture, red is associated with fertility, and so people wear it under their clothes in the hopes that it will help them conceive in the coming year.
Japan: Ringing Bells
Buddhist temples in Japan ring their bells on New Year's Eve, 107 times on New Year's Eve, and once when the clock strikes midnight. This tradition, known as joyanokane, is meant to dispel the 108 evil desires and cleanse the previous year of past sins.
Spain: Eating Grapes
In Spain, locals will eat 12 grapes at the stroke of midnight, one fore each tole of the clock, to honor a tradition that is thought to bring a year of good fortune and prosperity.
Turkey: Sprinkling Salt
It is considered good luck to sprinkle salt on your doorstep as soon as the clock strikes midnight on New Year's Day. Like many other New Year's Eve traditions around the globe, this one is said to promote both peace and prosperity throughout the new year.