The winter months bring about a plethora of holidays, and students at EHS have been busy celebrating by engaging in various traditions with friends and family. We all celebrate different holidays during this season, such as Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and New Years. Some traditions align with certain cultures and/or religions, while some are just celebrated for the sake of being festive. EHS is lucky to be home to a diverse community where there are unique traditions incorporated into the homes of many.

While some holidays receive more mainstream attention than others, all are important and deserve recognition. To briefly review some of the major holidays in December, see the list below:

• Christmas: a religious holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, celebrated on December 25th.
• Hanukkah: a religious holiday celebrated by many for eight nights in a row where each candle lit on the Menorah commemorates the miracle that a one-day supply of oil lasted for eight days. 
• Kwanzaa: a week-long annual celebration of African-American culture, honoring African heritage. The holiday spans from December 26 to New Years, and each day, a candle is lit to honor a certain virtue (including unity, self-determination, collective work, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith).
• New Years: the introduction of a new calendar year (in accordance with the Gregorian calendar) on January 1st of every year; different families celebrate with different traditions in order to achieve luck for the upcoming year. 
  • Twelve Grapes: Several members of the Unity Club celebrate the New Years by eating 12 grapes 12 seconds before the New Year begins. It is a tradition that originated in Spain and has spread to other countries around the world. People are supposed to eat 12 grapes before the New Year begins in order to experience twelve lucky months. 
  • Año viejo: Some latin countries celebrate the New Years by creating a life-size dummy that is meant to look like a celebrity, politician, friend, or family member. At midnight, everyone joins together to destroy and burn the dummy to represent burning the old year.

Molli Gordon– This is my Chanukiah, although it’s commonly called a menorah, a menorah traditionally only has 6 candles. The Chanukiah is lit each of the 8 nights, adding 1 candle each night of Chanukah, to represent one of the miracles that the holy oil burned for the 8 days before they could get more. A fun fact about my Chanukiah is this the same one that my father got for his Bar Mitzvah.

Madeleine Diaz- January 6th, is known as Dia de los Reyes Magos in many Latin countries, otherwise known as Three Kings Day. This religion based holiday celebrates the three wise men that came to visit baby Jesus and left him gifts. Similarly, if children leave their shoes out the night before, the three kings visit and leave a gift for them as well. There is also a party thrown where we eat tamales, pozole, and atole, among other things. There is a bread that has five baby Jesus’ inside that everyone in that party has to cut. If you get the baby Jesus, you have to throw the party for next year and make tamales, but it is also said that you get good luck and prosperity for the upcoming year.  

Mia Bonner- On Christmas Eve, my extended family and I normally gather together, and every year, we sing The Twelve Days of Christmas song, symbolizing our faith. Our family gets divided into twelve groups, and each group gets a glass with one line from the song on it. That group sings their line in the song when it comes, and it’s something fun we like to do to get ourselves all together and involved for the holidays. 

Renni Johnson- Hanukkah this year was a little different than previous years. Usually, my grandparents have a party with my whole family. We eat foods such as brisket, matzo ball soup, and potato pancakes. During dinner we usually read a few pages from the Torah before eating. We also exchange gifts and play games. One of these games include hiding a bag that looks like a sheet of matzoh and inside is money. This year we did not have our usual party, but my mom, sister, and I made our own potato pancakes to eat and had a zoom call with my grandparents. We eat them with applesauce, ketchup, or sour cream.

Ms. No– I celebrated Korean New Year’s Day by eating tteokguk (dumpling and rice cake soup) with my entire family. Before the annual celebration, my mom and I always make dumplings from scratch!