The Very Non-Christmasy Christmas of 2018

The past weekend delighted me very much, in that I got to see my entire immediate family. However, this year I did not book off Christmas from work, so technically, unless I somehow get the Julian Christmas off, I have this season without an official Christmas Day holiday. When Christmas falls on Tuesday or Wednesday, I’m not so thrilled about its arrival either, and it’s the case where that is happening for this year. It doesn’t feel like it should be Christmas day. It just makes for a split-up workweek with really no recovery time for sobering up and digesting properly after a gluttonous binge, so I thought that I should just work it, whereas I would prefer some continuity of having a good long go of it where it phases into a weekend. The years with Christmas on a Thursday, flowing into a Boxing Day on Friday, with the weekend to recover are the best of the cycle. Second best is Saturday, Sunday, Christmas Day Monday, then Boxing Day Tuesday.

For today, I’m not getting bitter, nor lonely, nor depressed really, but I am also actively doing stuff during the day to avoid going into a darker place. I’m making concerted efforts to avoid all forms of news media. I don’t need to know what disasters occurred, nor hear what new stupid thing the Chinese government is pulling off to harass and persecute our diplomats and citizens in that country out of spiteful retaliation.  I have no cares as to what Justin Trudeau* is going to announce in his address to the nation (also his birthday today), nor do I need to hear the holiday greeting from her majesty the Queen, and I sure as hell am not wasting any time listening to whatever is sprouting from the actions, or spouting from the big mouth of the orange-tinted crook downstairs*, or the status, impact, and repercussions of his shutting down of the U.S. government. But, it’s a day of doing one’s best of wishing others well, and to keep it a peaceful occasion. So, I shan’t dwell, or digress anymore, on political stuff.

I don’t want to watch any TV either: with the over-abundance of Christmas programming to distract and rob one of any genuine spiritual or soulful moments of the day. So, I choose to lose myself in writing again, and I began entertaining myself with my own curiosity of factual demographics, statistics, and other trivia, about the rest of this world that isn’t really partaking in the holiday today either, with some surprises about who does observe it. I like such moments to gain perspective.

Countries that don’t officially have Christmas (December 25^th or Jan 7^th) as a public or statutory holiday*:

Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Brunei, Cambodia, China, Comoros, Iran, Israel, Japan, Kuwait, Laos, Libya, Maldives, Mauritania, Mongolia, Morocco, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Sahrawi Arab Republic, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Uzbekistan, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, and Yemen.

Largest Country in the World (by population) with Christmas as a public holiday:

India – There are 28 million Christians in India, according to their 2011 census. Surprisingly, Christianity is listed as the third most practiced religion there (after Hinduism and Islam). That is even larger, by about 4 million people, than the number of cultural/religious Christians living here in Canada.

Number of Christians in the largest country (by population) that doesn’t have Christmas as a national holiday:

China, despite being a communist nation that endorses atheism, has 67 million people who identify as being Christian. That's 4.75% of their population. That’s like a full quarter of the Christian population of the United States, and more than double of that of Canada’s. I can't help but to think that this would be a huge number of dissidents to process for them if the government there decided to get even more repressive to religious groups.

Largest Primarily Muslim country (by population) with Christmas as a public holiday:

Indonesia – The largest Muslim country in the world also has Christmas as a public holiday. Given that this region was once a colonial possession of the Netherlands, Christmas became an institution there, and it surprisingly remained as a public holiday. Ten percent of Indonesia is Christian, so of that nation’s population, that still makes for 20 million people possibly celebrating Christmas there.

Country with Christmas as a national holiday; with also the greatest percentage of irreligious people:

Sweden – 73% of people there describe themselves as atheist, agnostic, spiritual-but-not-religious, anti-theist, and all other flavours of non-religious philosophical moral-ethical thinking amidst all that. A close second is Czechia (Czech Republic) at 72%.

Country with the most Public Holidays (but not one of them being Christmas):

Cambodia (28 days) – If you’d like to surround yourself with citizens with lots of time-off, while at the same time watching them living in abject poverty, maybe Cambodia is the vacation spot for you.

I’ll be more forthright next year with booking time off, now that I have a greater sphere to visit with. So, as the final hours of Gregorian Christmas Day fade, and as first hour of Boxing Day approaches, I wish everyone the best from me to you for the season, whether you opt to celebrate or not, even if you are stuck someplace where you are forbidden*** to do so. Take care, everyone.  

*- Spoken with neither any liking nor any hating for our current Prime Minister, as I see a balance of both virtues and deficits in him. Trump, however, is a different matter. I pity the Americans living under his bigot-empowering, demented, hateful, wrathful rule.

**- Surprisingly less than I thought, i.e. I expected to see more African countries counted to be in this list of nations. Christmas is celebrated from here to Timbuktu, literally: e.g. despite the nation of Mali being a majorly Muslim country and only 1% Christian, Christmas still a national holiday for them there.

***- Like in the Sultanate of Brunei, where any public display of celebrating Christmas can get you up to five years in jail.