Festes de Desembre
By early December, the Christmas season is in full swing. Decorations have been appearing for some time (without the boundary of decency offered by Thanksgiving), but in December the bar is raised.
Building decorations are intricate and impressive in the more commercial areas of the city.
The city thoroughfares are dramatically lit as well.
The Barcelonés, avid container gardeners, buy poinsettias (estrellas de navidad) in large quantities.
Bunches of eucalyptus leaves with pretty reddish pods, and fresh mistletoe are also popular. Moss is harvested and sold for use in intricate nativity scenes.
Pictured above is one of the many Christmas markets (this one in Tarragona), dedicated to gifts or traditional decorations. I visited the Feria de Santa Lucia, a traditional Christmas market in front of the cathedral. Vendors there sold thousands of tiny human and animal figurines, food and buildings for use in nativity scenes. It is traditional to purchase a few new items each year to add to the nativity (or 'belen' in Catalan). The feria also showcased the two very strange and scatological Christmas traditions: the Caganer and Tio de Nadal. The caganer is a ‘pooper,’ a figurine that is often part of the belen, usually in traditional Catalan garb. Caganers are also produced in the likenesses of famous footballers, politicians etc. I couldn’t bring myself to buy one, but I saw several Trump caganers. Tio de Nadal (or cagaTio) is a log with a face.
On Christmas morning, Tio is beaten (much like a piñata) until he poops out Christmas gifts!
