Lurking behind Father Christmas is the evil Cert, a black devil who carries switches, threatening to whack bad children.
More frightening than a pile of coal under the tree, Cert is part of Austria's Christmas folklore.
Such ethnic holiday characters and traditions come alive in 27 classrooms, known as the Nationality Rooms, at the University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning in Oakland until Dec. 31.
Christmas traditions, Chinese New Year, Sukkot and Kwanzaa are represented in the Nationality Rooms, each decked in distinctive splendor by a committee of Pittsburgh-area residents.
The holiday dress-up is about preserving traditions. It has become a tradition itself, running for more than 40 years.
"People come here and discover something about their background they didn1t know," says E. Maxine Bruhns, director of the Nationality Rooms program and a longtime, former Fox Chapel resident.
The also come to learn about other cultures, as Bruhns did when she lived all over the world with her husband, the late Fred Bruhns, who resettled refugees.
"I've seen children burst into tears in Austria, when the little Cert comes along behind Father Christmas in the streets during Christmas parades," Bruhns says.
The characters of Christmas change with every room.
In Greece, St. Nicholas is the patron saint of seamen. His icon is in the Greek Room, but "he doesn't look anything like Santa Claus," Bruhns says.
The holiday centerpiece in the Greek room is the Christopsomo, decorated bread that is part of an elaborate Christmas Day feast.
More than trees
In the Chinese room, a dragon sits on gold paper commemorating the year of the dragon Jan. 23, 2012, on the American calendar.
Given China's predominant religions of Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism, there are no Christmas celebrations. So, the committee decorates for Chinese New Year and a string of other holidays, according to Karen Yee of Bethel Park, the chairwoman of the Chinese Nationality Room committee.
A favorite Chinese New Year tradition is the Lion Dance, featuring young ancers under a large, colorful fabricated lion head and body.
The New Year also is a time of giving: "The children wish the elders a happy, prosperous New Year and, like magic, the adults pull out red envelopes with the lucky money inside, like Halloween here," Yee says.
Red is the color of choice because it signifies luck, while white is considered the color of death, she says.
Yee's committee hung red banners around the Chinese Room's door frame for luck. Offering a plate of cut tangerines also is a good-luck tradition.
China's vast size makes it impossible to capture all of its traditions.
Yee estimates there are 300 ethnic minorities in China. "So, there are many different customs in many areas."
Yee's father, the late Hoy Fung, a Chinese immigrant who owned the Bellevue Tea Garden restaurant from 1926 to 1998, "always shared his culture. And he said that it was important for people to know each other and get along."
New Years trees
As students helped to decorate the Russian Room recently, they wondered why there wasn1t a Christmas tree, says Christine Metil of Squirrel Hill, treasurer of the Russian Room committee.
"Some people were disappointed," she says. "Russians have trees, but they are New Year's trees."
Fasting on Christmas Eve until the first star appeared is one of the earliest Russian Orthodox holiday traditions.
Then, Russian families sat down to a meal served on a white tablecloth with straw covering it to symbolize Christ1s birth, Metil said.
Another Russian Orthodox tradition is a door-to-door folk performance, a "vertap," a Bethlehem play using a box lined with straw and religious figurines of Joseph, the Three Kings and shepherds but no Mary or Jesus.
"In orthodoxy, it is not permitted to depict the holy Christ and Mary in statuary," Metil says.
But there are trees, branches and other Western Christmas decor, courtesy of Russian tsar Peter the Great.
After a trip to Europe in the 1700s, the Russian leader was impressed with the West and its trees and other decorations.
"Christmas trees never caught on in Russia until the mid-19th century, but were then banned from 1917 until 1992 in keeping with Soviet ideology," Metil says.
That's why the decorated trees during that period were known as "New Year trees," she says.
Legend credits christmas flowers germany with creating the Christmas-tree tradition, but it was love that brought the fancy-decorated tree to England in the Victorian era.
"Queen Victoria loved her Prince Albert more than anything," says Anna Lomando of Arnold, chairwoman of the English Room committee. 3But he was from christmas flowers germany blog and was lonely and wanted a Christmas tree. She would have done anything for him.2 So, the queen installed a Christmas tree in the palace.
"She may have loved Prince Albert, but her subjects loved her so much, they did the same thing and got Christmas trees," Lomando says.
So the Victorian Christmas tree, the storybook Christmas tree, takes center stage in the English Nationality Room.
Satin sashes rib the length of a tree richly decorated with candles.
The tree is filled with miniature wrapped gift boxes, decorative paper fans and cornucopia filled with candy.
"It's OK if they eat from the cornucopia," Lomando says.
"We don't care.
Christmas is for fun."
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