Christmas Traditions No. 5

Greenland

In Greenland the women get waited on by the men on Christmas Night – a chance for a much-appreciated break!

However the festive food of Mattak (whale skin stuffed with blubber) and Kiviak (raw small arctic birds, buried in seal skins for several months until an advanced stage of decomposition!!) is a rather unique delicacy.

In the villages of Polar Inuits, Christmas is a community event. Families like to visit each other and have parties. They drink coffee and eat cakes and exchange brightly wrapped parcels. Traditional presents are model sledges, a pairs of polished walrus tusks, or sealskin mitts. Everyone in the village gets a gift

and children go from house to house, singing songs.