10 Romanian Christmas traditions

You hear it often in the movies that Christmas is not about the presents, it’s about family and traditions. Well, in Romania it is really about traditions, enjoying the holidays, time with family and gift giving is quite rare. These are the ways Romanians enjoy Christmas:

1. Carol singing

On Christmas Eve, 24th of December, groups of children will go from house to house to sing carols. The hosts will give them cakes, cookies and all sorts of sweets. This tradition is especially maintained in the villages, where children know the locals and after singing they are always asked about their families. In areas such as Maramures children dress in traditional clothes and sing songs such as : Trei pastori ( three shepherds) O brad frumos ( O christmas tree). As well, the second day when families visit each other they always sing at the door before entering the house.

2. The Goat

A group of young men goes from house to house to sing a special song about a goat ( on Christmas Eve as well). One man will dress as a goat and do the dance while the others sing. This dance is also done on New Year’s Eve in some parts of Romania.

3. Three wise men/Viflaim

This is a type of caroling/theatre play that involves character playing. A group of young boys will go to every house and re enact the scene where king Herod has asked them about baby Jesus being born. Herod then asks the military to go kill all children under the age of 3. After the play is finished ( it’s around 5-10 minutes) they sing. Scroll to video to second 0:20 to see the play.

4. Junii

Junii is a group of young men who go to unmarried young women’s houses and sing specific carols outside their house.

5. Pig slaughtering

On December 20th or Ignat day, traditionally a pig is slaughtered in the countryside. The family will then prepare sausages and other meats to be served for Christmas.

6. Decorating the Christmas tree

Decorating is done on Christmas eve, right before the carolers come. It is never done before that and if you do, it will be seen as quite strange.

7. The star

This is another type of caroling where children go to every house to sing ” The star” while showing off a home made star that usually has tinsels. The star carol refers to the star that leads the wise men to baby Jesus.

8. The bear

This tradition is mainly maintained in Moldova where men dressed as bears go out on the streets to do the dance.

9. Gift giving

There is no gift giving on Christmas so if you are wondering about when gifts are given, that is on Saint Nicholas Day- 6th of December. Children wake up in the morning to see gifts and sweets in their shoes and the traditional branch with bows and tinsels.

10. Traditional foods

There are some foods that Romanians always eat on special celebrations like Easter and Christmas and these are: sarmale ( stuffed cabage leaves), cozonac ( special fluffy cake with walnut cream or poppyseeds), pork sausages, gogosi ( doughnuts).