{"id":433,"date":"2008-12-23T19:06:13","date_gmt":"2008-12-23T23:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/?p=433"},"modified":"2014-06-10T15:02:27","modified_gmt":"2014-06-10T15:02:27","slug":"christmas-eve-in-poland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/christmas-eve-in-poland\/","title":{"rendered":"Polish Christmas Eve: Wigilia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tomorrow is Wigilia<\/a><\/strong> (Christmas Eve) and it\u2019s one day that most Polish families take very seriously. I said \u201cmost\u201d because some celebrate it in a less traditional way \u2013 like at an all-inclusive resort in Madeira or Tenerife, for example.<\/p>\n

But for most Poles, Wigilia<\/strong> means getting together with their extended family, eating huge amounts of food and exchanging Christmas presents.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Wigilia<\/strong> is not only the day before Christmas, it\u2019s also the traditional Christmas Eve supper (dinner) that\u2019s supposed to consist of different 12 courses\/dishes. Now, I don\u2019t have much experience with that, because as I mentioned on this blog already, my family was not the traditional type when it came to cooking. So while I\u2019m familiar with barszcz<\/strong>, I\u2019ve never seen \u201cuszka<\/a><\/strong>\u201d in it. \u017burek<\/a><\/strong> I know only from other people\u2019s stories. And I have no clue what \u201ckutia<\/strong>\u201d is. We did have karp<\/strong> (carp, ugh, hate that fish) and \u015bledzie<\/a><\/strong>, either as “rolmopsy<\/strong>” or “w \u015bmietanie<\/a><\/strong>” (herring, either as rolmops or with sourcream – now, that I can eat!), zupa grzybowa<\/a><\/strong> (mushroom soup), barszcz czerwony<\/a><\/strong> (red borscht), some sort of salad (the one with veggies and eggs all chopped up into small bits and slathered in mayo), some pickles and whatever cake my mom managed not to turn into \u201czakalec<\/a><\/strong>.\u201d Sometimes we\u2019d have savory galaretka<\/a><\/strong>, which I quite liked.<\/p>\n

Traditionally, Wigilia<\/strong> is supposed to be a meatless affair, but in a house full of picky eaters, fried chicken was a necessity.<\/p>\n

There would always be an extra setting on the table \u2013 traditionally, for an unexpected guest or a lost traveler, because nobody should be spending Wigilia<\/strong> alone. I\u2019d normally pile my chicken bones, or anything I didn\u2019t want to eat, on that extra plate.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>We never started the celebration with a prayer, but with me hogging the Christmas wafer (op\u0142atek<\/a><\/strong>) and refusing to share with anyone. What can I say, I liked the stuff. It was crunchy and had no flavor. When we did manage to do the traditional thing and share op\u0142atek with each other, it inevitably ended up with me collecting all the pieces and dunking them in my glass of cherry juice to make them turn red. We never sang any Christmas carols (kol\u0119dy<\/a><\/strong>) either, simply because nobody could remember any words past the first two lines.<\/p>\n

Afterwards, it was time to open our presents. One time when my sister was little, our aunt dressed up as Santa Claus. And she was a very fierce Santa, too. My sister had nightmares for days to come.
\nAnd then, as a punishment for my atrocious behavior during dinner, I\u2019d be delegated to help with doing the dishes.<\/p>\n

We never went to the midnight mass (pasterka<\/a><\/strong>), choosing instead to sit in front of the TV and watch \u201cA Christmas Carol\u201d for the umpteenth time.<\/p>\n

And Christmas day itself was boredom incarnate. More food, more TV, more dishes to wash. I didn\u2019t quite mind, I could go to my room, stick headphones on my head, crawl under the blankets and not come out until the 27th.<\/p>\n

Oh, how I miss the good old days!<\/p>\n

PS. Regarding the hay from the last post \u2013 I asked ten Polish women (real Polish women with names like Katarzyna<\/strong> and Agnieszka<\/strong> living in places like \u0141om\u017ca<\/strong> and S\u0142upsk<\/strong>) about the proper placement of hay for Wigilia<\/strong> and the answers I got were:
\n1. It can go on the table.
\n2. It can go under the tablecloth.
\n3. It can go under the table.
\n4. It can go into four corners of the room.
\n5. Save yourself some trouble and just give it directly to your dog\/cat\/small child, because you\u2019ll be stuck cleaning it up afterwards anyway.<\/em><\/p>\n

So, in other words \u2013 it doesn\u2019t really matter where the hay goes, as long as it\u2019s there.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Enjoy your holidays and I\u2019ll see you again on the 27th!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Images: Wikipedia<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

Tomorrow is Wigilia (Christmas Eve) and it\u2019s one day that most Polish families take very seriously. I said \u201cmost\u201d because some celebrate it in a less traditional way \u2013 like at an all-inclusive resort in Madeira or Tenerife, for example. But for most Poles, Wigilia means getting together with their extended family, eating huge amounts…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":435,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3,13],"tags":[2701,306823,2584,306826,7618],"class_list":["post-433","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-vocabulary","tag-christmas-eve","tag-culture","tag-tradition","tag-vocabulary","tag-wigilia"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5433,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433\/revisions\/5433"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}