Queations for people either currently in, have been to, or from japan?

Question:

I'm intrested in Learning all i can about how the japanese celibrate christmas. Like the songs always found playing on the radio, the moives everyone has seen a thousand times everychristmas, the traditinal foods that everyone expects to have during chrsitmas, the tipical people you give gifts to, and things like that . Is anyone willing to give, or exchange infromation about a japanese christmas? I would gladly share everything i can on an american one~

Answer:

They certainly do celebrate Christmas - just not exactly in the same way it's done in western countries. It's not a Christian country but there is quite a proliferation of Christian churches and private schools/universities, especially in the larger cities. Most people know what it's about due to their awareness of it's importance to the rest of the rest of the world and via media and cinema. It's probably more of a marketing scheme than anything else to encourage gift buying just as it is for Valentine's Day. It probably weighs in more on young people as a another excuse or opportunity for gift-giving. You certainly see it in Japanese movies and television shows. Tokyo becomes Christmas-ly festive. If you google "Christmas in Japan" and then click on Images, it will be hard to see much of a difference from any other western country. And of course, they do it in their own special way.

An interesting thing that's come about since I left Japan is the tradition of Christmas cakes and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Here's are some links to sites that more adequately describes this and all the other things about Christmas in Japan.

http://www.planettokyo.com/news/index.cf…
http://tanutech.com/japan/jxmas.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_w…