People all around the world celebrate holidays differently and it is mostly due to religion.

Christmas is a very important holiday to Christians, and most people in America. The reason Christians celebrate Christmas is because it is the day Jesus was born and the start of the religion. We say Santa is Saint Nicholas, and that is because he was nice to everyone and was known as the gift bringer.

“I really love Christmas time because of the feeling it gives off the cold breeze and the snow,” Lucas Pesle said. “I love it. It just gives a different feeling than the rest of the year.”

Hanukkah, also known as Chanukah, is celebrated because in the second century, the Jewish people rose up against the Greek-Syrian rulers in the Maccabean revolt, according to history.com. Hanukkah is the word for dedication in Hebrew, so when Jewish people celebrate their holiday, it is completely different than Christmas.

“I love celebrating Hanukkah, but I don’t see too many other kids celebrating it,” Joe DiNicola said. “I mostly see people that celebrate Christmas.”  

Kwanzaa is very important to many Black Americans. The holiday started relatively recently: In 1966, a woman named Dr. Maulana Karenga created it because of the Watts riots and she also just wanted a day so Black Americans would be able to celebrate their own holiday and not take it from anyone else, according to maulanakarenga.org.

“No one knows anything about this holiday. Only African Americans really celebrate it, but that’s what I like about it,” Mike Guman said. “It isn’t a big holiday everybody celebrates.”