[Sca-cooks] December 31st Holiday Exchange

[kingstaste at mindspring.com]

DEC 31
Lucky Day of Sekhmet - Ancient Egypt - Goddess of the Healing Arts

New Year's Eve -Worldwide-
Denmark-people make the rounds of the neighborhood and smash crockery
against the doors to chase away evil spirits and prevent them from crossing
the thresholds into people's homes.

Spain-celebrators take a bunch of grapes and must eat 12 of them between the
1st and last toll of the midnight bell.  The feat requires concentration but
promises abundance for the New Year.

Ecuador- families sew together the Ano Viejo, the ‘Old Year’, and tour the
town viewing all of them. At midnight, they burn the Ano Viejo while reading
his will, then break into a dance for the New Year.

Japan- called "O-Misoka" , it is a day for stocktaking and debt- paying.  No
one may sleep until their affairs are in order, and then a little
celebrating must be done.  Noodles are eaten at the conclusion of business,
and they are made as long as possible for they are a symbol of life, and to
eat them on this night is a prelude to the morrow's “long life and
 happiness” wishes.

Hogmany - Scotland – “Cake Day” - The first person to cross the threshold is
the “first footer”, foretells the year to come. The tradition varies, but
generally if the first footer is a tall and dark man, the year will be a
good one. Women portend death. The first footer should also bring a gift.
Whiskey guarantees a welcome in Scotland, but in Macedonia, the first-footer
brings a stone to signify strength, or a green twig to signify life, and
places it on the hearth.  Gifts of oatmeal cake were given on the eve of the
Julian New Year. Housewives in Scotland baked a Hogmany cake for each child,
nipped around the edge and filled with caraway.  She took care not to break
it for that foretold of the child's illness or death within the coming year.
In many places pipers announce the Hogmany beggars (local men and boys
dressed in rags with blackened faces), who sang carols such as “ God Bless
the Master of this house and Mistress also, Likewise the little bairnies
That round the table go. May your purse be full of money, Your cellars full
of beer, We wish you many a Hogmany, and many a New Year.”

Judas Iscariot (b. ?)  A manuscript of 1699 says that the  “31st of
December, of which day Judas was born, who betrayed Christ, is a dangerous
day to begin any business, fall sick, or undertake any journey.”

St. Sylvester's Feast Day (335) 34th Pope. He cured the Emperor Constantine
of leprosy and baptized him, and in turn, the Emperor made Christianity the
state religion of the Roman empire. According to one legend, if an east wind
occurs on St. Sylvester's night, it betokens a calamitous twelve months to
come. St. Sylvester's Carp is a special dish served at the best restaurants
in Germany.  Served with St. Sylvester's Punch, made of red wine with
cinnamon, sweetened and heated.  A few of the carp's scales are wrapped up
in a napkin and taken home as a charm for the New Year.

Predictions of the End of the World (999) Many Christians believed the
Millenia would mark the ‘second coming’, and the Rapture. Today this is
still thought by some at the turn of a decade.