Xmas Traditions Across the Earth

From Icelandic book floods and Japanese families eating KFC to entire Peruvian villages staging single combat events, different cultures have their own offbeat and even bewildering holiday traditions 

‘Tis the season to talk about Christmas traditions throughout the world.

For years, people have embraced the so-called fictional holiday, Festivus. The holiday was first mentioned in an episode of Seinfeld. Personally, I never liked the show—I found all the characters highly annoying and unlikeable–but I did find the idea of Festivus amusing. Reportedly, a Seinfeld staff writer’s family had been celebrating Festivus since 1966; Dan O’Keefe’s father Daniel had the holiday as an anniversary celebration of his first date with future wife and Dan’s mother, Deborah. As detailed in the December 23, 1997, episode, “The Strike,” there are the “airing of grievances,” that happens during dinner: Yes, each person present describes how others have disappointed them over the past year. Afterwards, “feats of strength” ensue, including and in which each person tells everyone else all the ways they have disappointed them over the past year. After the meal, the “feats of strength” ensue, including wrestling with the head of the household to the floor . . . and if and when they’re pinned, the holiday concludes.

According to O’Keefe, there was never a Festivus Pole.

Since then, throughout the world, yes, Festivus has been celebrated on Dec. 23.

However, for many years, a similar holiday tradition has been celebrated in Chumbivilcas, a Peruvian province in the Cusco Region. It’s called Takanakuy—in regional language Quechua, it means “when the blood is boiling” or “to hit each other,” depending on the source.

On Christmas Day, communities throughout Latin America typically hold large public celebrations, with people in colorful costumes, lots of food, drink, music and dancing. In communities throughout the Cusco Region, however, celebrants flock to the local sporting arenas or public squares for Takanakuy and watch as people of all ages, kids to the elderly, men and women alike, engage in fist fights.

Yes.

Single combat.

Takanakuy is how grievances that people have had with one another over the past year. Be they personal matters or civil disputes, two people slug it out after calling one another out by name. The victor is decided by knockout or intervention by an official. According to tradition, Takanakuy is how people settle conflicts and resolve to spend the new year living peacefully with one another, strengthening community and even familial bonds.

Until more grievances arise.

The Philippines has the highest population of Catholics in the world. At midnight Sept. 1, radio stations start playing Christmas music, lights and decorations appearing everywhere. The city of San Fernando, known as the “Christmas Capital of the Philippines,” hosts Ligligan Parul Sampernandu, the Giant Lantern Festival. Surrounding villages compete against one another as they build large, elaborate lanterns; Japanese origami paper was originally used but now more modern materials are used and the lanterns with their kaleidoscope patterns are lit up by lightbulbs rather than candles.

Some lanterns can be nearly 20 feet in diameter.

In Japan, Christmas isn’t a national holiday but some still observe it . . . and eating chicken, Kentucky Fried Chicken in particular. Back in 1974, some savvy salaryman came up with a marketing campaign called “Kurisumasu ni wa kentakkii” or “Kentucky for Christmas.” Ever since then, Kurisumasu ni wa kentakkii has proven to be extremely popular in Japan. How popular? Well, KFC restaurants start taking advance orders for holiday meals as far back in September or October or it’s a two- or three-hour long lines of people wanting their Christmas chicken meal. Employees also dress as Santa Claus too.

Iceland has a number of Christmas traditions. A small nation yet one with one of the highest literacy rates, there’s the Jólabókaflóðið—the Christmas Book Flood. On Christmas Eve, books—the most popular holiday gift in Iceland—are exchanged and people stay up all night, reading their new books and drinking hot chocolate.

And while most countries observe the 12 Days of Christmas, Iceland has thirteen. Each night leading up to Christmas, the thirteen Yule Lads make their rounds as kids place one shoe in their bedroom window. Good kids get candy and the bad ones get rotten, stinking potatoes. The Yule Lads are elf-like creatures and were once depicted as being malevolent at times. Over the years, they’ve become more mischievous.

Their mother Grýla, however, is a horrific ogress living in the mountains. She’s always on the prowl around Christmas, searching for naughty children to throw in her cauldron of boiling hot water.

Icelandic folklore also has a large black cat that prowls the country on Christmas Eve–Festivus,everyone must get new clothes and if not, the Christmas Cat will kill and eat them.

Be thankful for those new socks or ties, okay?

In Barbados at Christmastime, people eat Jug: Influenced by Scottish immigrants, it’s a dish that combines salted meat, pigeon peas, guinea corn flour and herbs. Glazed ham and rum also round out holiday meals.

Going back to pagan beliefs, on Christmas Eve, Norwegians hide all the household brooms in closets, in the fear that evil witches will take them and fly about all night.

That said, in parts of Italy, a good witch named Belfana travels about, leaving gifts and candy for kids.

Instead of candy, kids in South Africa snack on delicious fried caterpillars. Seriously.

If you’re ever in Caracas, Venezuela during Christmastime, be prepared to see people wearing roller blades; skating to church services is so common that officials keep vehicles off the roads.

For years now, people have Christmas dinner at Chinese restaurants. Over a century ago, Jewish immigrants could dine out on Christmas because everything was shutdown. Save for Chinese restaurants. By the late 19th Century, Jewish and Chinese immigrants often lived close to one another, so, proximity was a factor. Another was that the Chinese didn’t adhere to antisemitic views held by other European immigrants or Americans. They felt safe there.

As New York restauranter Michael Tong said in a 2003 New York Times interview:

“Welcome to the conundrum that is Christmas New York style: While most restaurants close for the holiday, or in a few cases, stay open and serve a prix fixe meal laden with froufrou, thousands of diners, most of them Jewish, are faced with a dilemma. There's nothing to celebrate at home and no place to eat out, at least if they want a regular dinner. That leaves Chinese restaurants . . . .”

When the film A Christmas Story was released in November 1983, the practice of having Chinese food for a holiday meal gained more popularity overnight.

A Smith family Xmas Eve traditon was Granny serving both chili and oyster stew. It's been years since I've had that. That said, I have my own Xmas tradition: Chinese buffet lunch. Every year, it's domething I look forward to.

Happy Holidays!

Be seeing you.

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Stranger Things and the Ballad of Yellow Echo

 

The Yellow Echo story goes like this:

He Had No Mouth. Just Eyes and the Smell of Static.

In spring 1962, teachers at a small Wyoming school uncovered a chilling mystery. Some 37 children from different grades, who barely spoke to each other, had all drawn the same eerie figure during art class—a tall man. No mouth, only hollow eyes and something in his hand: A cord made of hair.

They called him “Yellow Echo.” The children whispered that he only appeared when it rained, that he whispered through TVs and revealed secrets they shouldn’t know—like where a teacher kept his gun.

Two weeks later, that teacher disappeared, along with every single drawing. The only thing left behind was a tape recorder, still running, capturing a child's whisper:

“We didn’t draw him. We remembered him.”

Ever since Season 5’s Volume 1 of Stranger Things, there’s been a lot of speculation about Vecna’s latest incarnation, Mr. Whatsit, and how did Matt and Ross Duffer come up with idea. Now, Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time features a character named Mrs. Whatsit and Holly Wheeler is seen reading the classic novel. It’s easy to see that Vecna tapped into Holly’s mind and became Mr. Whatsit.

However, as we all know, social media abhors factual explanations.

And, ever so easily, the legend of Yellow Echo was born.

Yellow Echo is now haunting social media’s digital backwaters and thousands have been sharing or reposting the story all over the Interwebs—and like that classic Telephone Game—there’ve been the inevitable embellishments. At its core, it’s a damn fine chilling tale of thirty-seven children, all of whom attending school in a nameless Wyoming mining town, and it’s noted that none of the kids allegedly know one another.

Which could happen in a small town circa 1962 . . . but I had red flags.

So, as the story goes, the Duffer Brothers found this intriguing story about thirty-seven students drawing the same image:

The charcoal sketches, executed with unnerving precision even by the youngest students, depicted a gaunt, elongated figure with skin like yellowed parchment. Where a mouth should have been, only smooth, taut skin stretched between hollow cheekbones. Its eyes—or rather the absence of them—were perfect obsidian voids that seemed to drink in light. A braided cord of human hair dangled from a skeletal thin hand. The children, when questioned separately by the school’s increasingly disturbed principal, insisted with eerie unanimity that the being they called “Yellow Echo” manifested only during rainstorms, pressing its lipless face against bedroom windows or hanging in the shadows, while whispering secrets and other things through television static.

The Yellow Echo entity allegedly revealed the location of a teacher’s revolver, hidden beneath the floorboards of his classroom closet or elsewhere in the classroom. Two weeks later, this teacher vanished without trace, as did every single drawing. At some point, authorities found nothing except a single reel-to-reel recording that has a child’s voice, barely audible above the tape hiss:

“We didn't draw him. We remembered him from before we were born.”

You must admit it’s a very creepy, unsettling story.

However, that’s what it is: A story, one worthy of Creepypasta; like Slender Man or Black-Eyed Kids, it’s just a creation of someone’s imagination and it never happened. Even researching known urban legends, Yellow Echo doesn’t exist—but I’m still looking. There are no news articles of something like this ever happening and the Wyoming mining town is never mentioned.

Plus, the Duffer Brothers never said Mr. Whatsit was based on some urban legend or Creepypasta.

So, if you come across the Yellow Echo story on Facebook or another social media platform . . . now you know the rest of the story.

That said, I’m looking forward to Volume 2’s debut on Xmas Day.

It’s going to be epic.

THE SATANIC PANIC WAS A HOAX LIKE PIZZAGATE AND QANON.

I had to write that in all caps. I needed to get everyone's attention.

Religious alt-right "paranormal investigators" are attempting to start another "Satanic Panic" and we can't let that happen again.

The McMartin School trials.

The miscarriage of justice surrounding the Memphis Three.

We have to stop it. Let's look at what happened in the past.

The "Satanic Panic" was a widespread moral panic and hoax that occurred primarily in North America from the 1980s to the mid-1990s, based on unsubstantiated fears of a vast, secretive network of Satan-worshipping cults engaging in organized child abuse, sacrifice and other crimes. These claims were proven to be entirely baseless, and no credible evidence of such a conspiracy was ever found by law enforcement or psychological experts. 

Origins and Spread:

Michelle Remembers (1980): The book, co-written by a psychiatrist and his patient, which detailed alleged "recovered memories" of satanic ritual abuse (SRA), helped spark the panic and provided a template for future claims.

Media Frenzy: Daytime talk shows and news programs, such as those hosted by Geraldo Rivera and Oprah Winfrey, uncritically reported sensationalist stories and "expert" testimony about SRA, amplifying the fear across the nation.

Recovered-Memory Therapy: Therapists used controversial and now-discredited techniques like hypnosis and leading questions to help patients "recover" memories of abuse, often inadvertently planting false memories.

Cultural Scapegoats: Anxiety over societal changes, such as more women entering the workforce and an increased reliance on daycares, led to these centers becoming primary targets for accusations. Other forms of popular culture, including heavy metal music and role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons, were also falsely accused of being recruitment tools for cults. 

Key Cases and Debunking

McMartin Preschool Trial: This highly publicized California case (1983-1990) became the longest and most expensive criminal trial in U.S. history. Despite years of investigation and hundreds of accusations, no one was convicted due to a lack of physical evidence and the use of coercive child interviewing techniques.

West Memphis Three: Three teenagers were wrongfully convicted of murder in 1994 based on the prosecution's claim that the killings were part of a Satanic ritual. They were later freed in 2011 after new DNA evidence and an admission that the initial evidence was faulty.

Lack of Evidence: A major 1995 report by the National Institute of Justice concluded there was "scant to non-existent" hard evidence for large-scale satanic ritual abuse. The FBI also found no evidence of an organized, nationwide Satanic conspiracy. 

Legacy: The Satanic Panic is now widely regarded as a classic example of a moral panic and a modern-day "witch hunt," where mass hysteria leRd to ruined reputations, wrongful convictions, and the neglect of genuine child abuse issues. Elements of these debunked claims have unfortunately resurfaced in modern conspiracy theories like QAnon, which echo the same baseless fears of child-abusing cabals.

Debunking the Satanic Panic hoax and other conspiracies.

Lost in Hollywood History: The First Cinematic Universe

 

It was on 5 March 1943 when Hollywood introduced the first cinematic universe to the world.

The was the date when Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man had its New York premier—a week later, it would have its nationwide opening. The film was a sequel of sorts to both The Ghost of Frankenstein and The Wolf Man . . . interestingly, Lon Chaney Jr. played the titular monsters in those films. This time around, he reprises his role as the tragic, cursed Larry Talbot and Bela Lugosi appeared as the Creature; in fact, it was originally planned that Chaney would play both roles but it proved to be way too physically demanding for him.

The script was written Curt Siodmak, German-American novelist and screenwriter, who wrote primarily science fiction and horror. Roy William Neill directed the film.

Four years have passed since the Wolf Man’s ravages and the specter of Frankenstein’s progeny. On a wind-whipped night in Cardiff, two tomb-raiders—one of whom played by famed character actor Jeff Corey—pry open the Talbot family crypt under the full moon’s glow. They snatched the wolfsbane that sealed Larry Talbot’s fate. Moonlight strikes his motionless body, ignites the dormant curse—and Larry rises from death.

That’s another facet of Talbot’s curse: Immortality.

Talbot, through some misadventures, meets Dr. Frank Mannering (Patric Knowles); begs Mannering to alert the authorities before he kills again. Mannering and the police find the Talbot family tomb, discovering the truth; an escaped Talbot, haunted by his immortality and lycanthrope nature, flees Wales to seek out the Romni seer Maleva. She whispers of Dr. Frankenstein’s lost research as the only possible cure. Together they traverse Europe toward the scorched ruins of Frankenstein’s Vasaria estate, each step a gamble with fate.

Once there, Talbot discovers an ice-encased Creature and breaks him—hoping the Creature will lead him to the knowledge that will free him of the curse. Events happen and all leads to the inevitable clash between the Wolf Man and the Creature. Both Talbot and the Creature are swept up in a flood and lost.

Despite lukewarm reviews, the film did well and Universal Studios planned a sequel. Studio press releases called the film, Chamber of Horrors, hyping it as a monsterfest spectacular starring Lugosi, Chaney, Boris Karloff, Claude Rains and other Universal horror film stars. Dracula. The Frankenstein Creature. The Wolf Man. The Invisible Man. Kharis, the Eternal Mummy. It was billed as a horror film fan’s dream—or nightmare—come true. Siodmak wrote the screen story, this one called The Devil’s Brood. It promised to be an ambitious project.

Alas, I guess, it was too ambitious.

Edward T. Lowe wrote the screenplay, keeping some of Siodmak’s elements and Erle C. Kenton would helm the film; Karloff would star as Dr. Gustav Niemann, the mad scientist, John Carradine as Dracula, Glenn Strange as the Frankenstein Creature and J. Carrol Naish as Daniel, a hunchback convicted of murder. Ladies and gentlemen . . . your monsters.

Not the hyped monsterfest some were promised but, nonetheless, it would bring in the fans.

At the beginning of the film, Niemann’s obsession with reanimation lands him in a dank prison cell, condemned for trying to duplicate Frankenstein’s forbidden work. There he meets Daniel, a hulking hunchback whose twisted body Niemann promises to rebuild once free—if Daniel will serve as his assistant. When an earthquake shatters the prison walls, the pair slips into the night.

As they flee, the pair meets a traveling showman, Professor Lampini. In a savage moment of ambition, Niemann and Daniel murder Lampini and seize his prized showcase: Dracula’s embalmed remains. Niemann, hell-bent on revenge against Burgomaster Hussman—the man responsible for his incarceration—rests his plans on Dracula’s revival. Under flickering lantern light, he awakens the vampire and sends him stalking the Burgomaster’s granddaughter-in-law, Rita. Hypnotized, she leads Dracula to Hussman’s manor, where the old ruler falls under fang and bite. The Burgomaster’s grandson sees the horror and raises the alarm. As screaming citizens give chase, Dracula scrambles back to the carriage where Niemann waits—only to find himself jettisoned into the road. Dawn breaks, and the rising sun turns him to dust.

Undeterred, Niemann and Daniel press on to the flooded ruins of Castle Frankenstein in Visaria/Vasaria. On the way, Daniel rescues Ilonka, a spirited Romani woman, from a jealous lover’s whip. Grateful and intrigued by Daniel’s gentleness, she joins their expedition. Upon reaching ruins of Castle Frankenstein, they find Talbot and the Creature. A love triangle forms between Talbot, Ilonka and Daniel

Chaos and monster-on-monster violence ensues.

While the film doesn’t hit the scare level of the original Dracula, Frankenstein and Wolf Man films, House of Frankenstein did thrill its fanbase and, again, Universal brought back Chaney, Carradine, Strange, screenwriter Lowe and director Kenton.

Carradine’s rather suave, dapper Dracula seeks cure for vampirism from Dr. Edelmann (Onslow Stevens), who uses his own blood for transfusions—with unexpected side effects. Meanwhile, Larry Talbot arrives seeking relief from werewolf curse. After transforming into Wolf Man under full moon, he's taken to Edelmann's castle. When Talbot attempts suicide by jumping into ocean, he discovers cave holding the Creature. Despite finding rare fungi that might cure lycanthropy, Edelmann hesitates to revive the Creature—at the same time, the good doctor undergoes a very nasty metamorphosis of his own . . . and it doesn’t go well.

House of Dracula would be the final Universal Studio’s final “serious” film featuring their classic monsters. It was an end of an era. In 1948, Universal released Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein—reuniting Chaney and Strange with Lugosi returning as Dracula—and the film became a classic and spawned more Abbott and Costello films featuring other Universal monsters.

None of them were as good as A&CMF.

The Gillman—the creature from the Black Lagoon—joined the Universal Monsters’ pantheon and people loved it. However, Universal Studios shifted gears: Giant, mutated creatures and alien invaders thrilled audiences throughout the 1950s. Universal released its final vampire film, a hybrid Western/vampiric gunslinger film called Curse of the Undead.

And that, you see, was the first cinematic universe. It was brief, silly, some would say, but damn, it was glorious for us fans. Those three films really ignited our imaginations and some found the inspiration to become storytellers, writers and directors. Makeup FX. What have you.

The Japanese Kaiju films introduced Gojira/Godzilla and Gamera and their respective cinematic universes. In 1987, Monster Squad reunited versions of the Universal Horror movies and 2004’s Van Helsing emulated the formula. A few years ago, Universal Studios  attempted to create a new shared Dark Universe—Tom Cruise’s The Mummy and The Invisible Man would be the first; however, The Mummy proved to be a disastrous flop, a critical and box office bomb.

The Dark Universe died right there.

That said, the original Universal Horror cinematic universe gave way to the MCU, the Arrowverse, the new DCU and the ever-expanding Star Wars Universe.

I’d love to see another Dark Universe reboot. Maybe it will happen but I have some doubts.

Who knows?

Today, I watched those three films and it brought back a lot of memories. Good memories.

Just what I needed for Hallowe’en.

Be seeing you.

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My Own Private Reset . . . .

 And . . . I’m back!

Sometimes—as we all know—things don’t go as planned, this blog, for example. Until serious health issues happened, I had a lot of big plans . . . I still do but there’s a lot of catching up to do. Like my series of articles about the TV series produced in the 1970s; with Hallowe’en over 80-plus days away, expect some paranormal-themed articles and a look at the first cinematic universe, the Universal horror films. I’ll also write about paranormal podcasts I’ve been following on YouTube—there a lot of problematic even outright offensive and bad podcasts and a few good ones.

There are a lot of major genre news too. The first four episodes of Stranger Things’ fifth and final season drops on Wednesday, 26 November; the second set of episodes will hit Netflix on Xmas Eve and the last feature-length episode debuts on New Year's Eve.

December will also see Fallout’s second series dropping on Amazon Prime—now date hasn’t been released yet. This season, we’ll find Lucy, the Ghoul (aka Cooper Howard), Dogmeat and Brotherhood of Steel Knight Maximus in the quasi-civilized New Vegas. According to production photos, the New Vegas sets look great and we’ve seen NCR troopers and Rangers, salvaged NCR powered armor, Securitron robots, Deathclaws and Caesar’s Legion. In interviews, the cast have said “a lot of wild shit” happens and I’m looking to see how both character arcs and their dynamics will change.

I’m hoping all the episodes will drop at once—it worked well last season and I think they will repeat the same strategy.

So.

Will we see Felicia Day as BoS scribe, Veronica and Danny Trejo as Ghoul gunslinger, Raul Tejada? In the game, Wayne Newton voiced the AI called Mr. New Vegas and will he do it again? Actor Michael Hogan played Doc Mitchell but Hogan’s had debilitating health problems and, sadly, Matthew Perry passed a few years back—no Benny, not even flashbacks unless the character is recast. MAGAt bootlicker and actor Zacharay Levi’s Arcade Gannon might be re-casted . . . by Macaulay Culkin. I’m fine with it.

Well, that’s it for now.

I hope you all will be checking out the website and I’m looking forward to your comments.

Be seeing you!

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Part 3 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Gunfight at the Enclave Outpost

 

Part 2 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Fear and Loathing in the Glowing Sea

Smith faces hostile forces—from the invading Dalek alien cyborgs to ghouls and mutants—as he searches for an Enclave outpost deep in the Glowing Sea.

Part 1 Fallout 4: Smith's Run -- Chapter 2 starts now!

 

Part 10 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: The Judas Protocol

 Parting is such sweet sorrow as Smith takes his revenge on Father and the SRB Coursers.

Oh.

One more thing:

Mishaps, deaths and other hijinks ensue . . . .

Part 9 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Angelo's Secret

 

Part 8 Fallout 4: Smith's Run -- Even Shadier Dealings

 

Part 7 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: An Atomic Culling

 

Part 6 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Help I've Fallen . . . . The Second Chapter

 

Part 5 Fallout 4 -- Help I've Fallen . . . . The First Chapter

Part 4 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Headhunter

 

Part 3 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: The Wonderland Line Radroach Massacre of 2087

It's a jaunt to the Boston Airport that ends badly for the Brotherhood of Steel.

It gets worse after a random encounter leads to a fight with a radroach horde.

Have fun!

Be seeing you.

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Part 2 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: A Scavenger Hunt

This is the second chapter of my Fallout 4 playthrough Smith's Run.

The Mean Machine bus unleashes fire-and-brimstone hell during a late-night attack. Then, it's off on onto a scavenger hunt to the Glowing Sea. If you download the Deus Ex Adam Jenson armor mod, I show you how to find it.

A lot of Cybermen and feral ghouls die. Deservedly so, I believe. They started it, after all.

I unalive myself too.

Deservedly so, some have said.

Be seeing you.

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Part 1 Fallout 4 -- Smith's Run: Wasteland Trackdown

I  haven't streamed in nearly two years.

Fighting both Covid and Writer's Block, I returned to gaming vids. Gaming jump-starts my brain and helps with the block; several writers play these games.

Jonathan Nolan loved playing the Fallout games—of course, he created the hit Amazon Prime web series by the same name.

So.

It's a bit slow and I'm getting back to the video gaming zone.

But I'll get there.

Here we go . . . again:

Renegade SRB agent and now a fugitive synth, Smith.0 returns to the Commonwealth Wasteland after years of wandering what's left of North America. After reaching Old Boston's ruined outskirts, Smith discovers a holotape with a shocking revelation: Husband and wife Nate and Nora Anderson were violently removed from their Vault 111 cryopods—only to be murdered by a merc named Conrad Kellogg, who kidnapped their son, Shaun. Kellogg was one of the reasons he returned to the Commonwealth; Smith set out on a quest to rescue Shaun.

And, after a century, finally kill Kellogg and settle some very old scores.