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Welcome back to the Christmas Around the World Series on The Storied Recipe Podcast!

This series began as a crowd-sourced post titled Christmas Desserts Around the World. As the Storied Recipe community shared their cherished Christmas recipes and the memories surrounding them, I really wanted to hear MORE. So I decided to expand on a few of these with a little mini series about Christmas traditions all around the world. You can find the entire series here.

Welcome Mai!

There wasn’t much question about which episode I would release first – of course, we had to begin in the Holy Land of Palestine, the very land where the birth of Jesus took place. Today I’m grateful to welcome Mai to the podcast (again!) to share her memories celebrating the Christmas tree lighting at the sacred Church of the Nativity in Manger Square in Bethlehem.

She also talks Chrstmas celebrations in the rest of Palestine, including in Ramallah, where the Muslim-majority government hosts annual Christmas parade, full of drums and music, as a way to include Christians and promote Palestinian unity.

Of course, we’ll hear more about Mai’s Teta (grandmother) and the other women and recipes that created the amazing Arabic feasts for their Christmas tables.

Finally, Mai shares how Palestine is choosing to celebrate the peace and joy of Christmas in the midst of decades of checkpoints, arrests, death, and struggle amid the Israeli military occupation.

I am just delighted to share the delightful Mai and her Christmas memories with you today – welcome to the podcast, Mai, and thank you all for being here!

Highlights

The Christmas tree lighting in Bethlehem
The unity between Christians and Muslims in Ramallah
Weather at Christmastime in Palestine
Mai’s memories visiting The Church of the Nativity for the Christmas Tree lighting
Christmas music in Palestine
Christmas markets in Palestine
How Christmas in Palestine brings hope and resistance in the face of occupation
Special treats available at Christmastime in Palestine
Her Aunt Ida’s goodie bag
Christmas presents in Palestine (and Father Christmas)
Wreath decorating parties at the church
“Christmas presents weren’t a thing”
ALL the Palestinian Christmas foods!
The importance of visiting in Palestinian Culture
Two Christmases: December 25th and January 6th
Celebrating epiphany at the Jordan River
Cooking with "Nafas"

Listen to Mai Now

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Mai's Storied Recipe: Ghraybeh Cookies

https://thestoriedrecipe.com/ghraybeh-middle-eastern-cookie-recipe/

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Related: Listen to Mai's Original Episode, Honoring the Women of Palestine

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Partial Transcript - 15 of 60 Minutes

Becky

Hey Mai, how are you?

Mai

Hey hey hey how are you?

Becky

I'm good. I'm so happy to be talking with you again.

Mai

Hey listen, we could do this whenever you want. It's always a pleasure. Yeah, I'm really excited about it. It's my favorite time in Palestine and actually thinking about it when you sent me the questions yesterday made me want to go. I haven't been home during Christmas time for years and years and it really made me long even further to kind of like be there during the holiday season.

Becky

I mean 'cause yeah, yeah you go. During the summer?

Mai

You know what? Because I don't have enough vacation days with my children to go in the wintertime. I mean I'm paying all this money I'm not going to go for 10 days or week, it's it's barely enough. To get over the jet lag and drive my mother nuts. It's almost like now I'm starting to answer your questions. Here we go. The story. The Christmas scene had changed through times and I you know when I lived in Palestine when I was born and raised there those first you know, 18 years of my life, or actually maybe 21 years of my life, it's changed over the years and it kind of brings me in a way a little more joy and and that makes me want to go back and be there.

Becky

OK, so if you if you did, like let's just say in two months it's October 24th when we're doing this, so let's say you landed on Christmas Eve in Palestine in two months.

Mai

Let's go.

Becky

What would you... let's imagine it. Walk me through it.

Mai

It yes, OK if I would go to Palestine in two months and land.... Actually the preparations for Christmas start long before the weekend, the weekend before Christmas. For Christmas Eve, so there would be lots of preparation, starting with the tree lighting in Manger Square in Bethlehem. So that's a huge event that actually marks all the holidays and it's assigned to light up all the trees across the big cities in Palestine. Honestly, that brings me pure pure joy to see this gigantic tree in the middle of the square - we call it [phrase in Arabic] Church of the Nativity, right into Manger Square. They light the wall at the tree and people from all over - whoever can obviously, based on permissions and based who lives where and checkpoints and curfews and all that stuff. But it's a filled town at that moment and there's choirs of Palestinian people usually from all over Palestine. There are choirs, international choirs that come and perform at Manger Square, so it's a really quite an event. Uhm, yes, that that marks the beginning of Christmas season, which actually is the Advent. So it's the beginning of Advent season in Palestine.

Becky

So does that happen? Does that happen 4 weeks before? Like when does? When does Advent begin?

Mai

I don't. I don't know exactly when the church lights up because that's the Catholic Church that lights up the candle.

Becky

Ah yeah.

Mai

There's two Christmases in Palestine, maybe, maybe 3 even between all the denominations, but I grew up in the Anglican church so the Protestant, uh, the Protestant, the way I grew up is t...