Observance of the Boxing Day

Commonwealth observance

Boxing Day in the UK is traditionally a day for sporting activity, originally fox hunting, but in modern times football and horseracing.

In Canada, and indeed any other country that celebrates it, Boxing Day (in French, lendemain de Noël, "day after Christmas") is also observed as a public holiday, and is a day when stores sell their excess Christmas inventory at significantly reduced prices. Boxing Day has become so important for retailers that they often extend it into a "Boxing Week". This occurs similarly in Australia and New Zealand.

In Australia, a test match starting on December 26th is called the Boxing Day Test Match, and is played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground before the largest crowd of the summer.

European observance

Boxing Day is a holiday of peculiarly British origin, but in most years it falls on the same day as the Feast of St. Stephen (St. Stephen's Day - 26th December).

In Austria, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland and Sweden, the 26th is known as the Second day of Christmas ("der zweite Weihnachtsfeiertag" in Germany, Annandag Jul — "the day after Christmas" — in Sweden, "Tweede Kerstdag" — "Second Christmasday" — in the Netherlands, "Andre Juledag" - "Second Christmasday" - in Norway.) and is also a public holiday.

In Ireland, the 26th December is known as St Stephen's Day, or Wren's Day; in Austria it is called Stefanitag,in Italy Santo Stefano, and in Finland tapaninpäivä which also mean "St. Stephen's Day"; in Wales, it is known as Gŵyl San Steffan (St. Stephen's Holiday). In Catalonia, this day is known as Sant Esteve, Catalan for St. Stephen. A practice known as Hunt the Wren is still practiced by some in the Isle of Man, where people thrash out wrens from hedgerows. Traditionally they were killed and their feathers presented to households for good luck. In Germany the days between Christmas and new year are called "the days between the years" (zwischen den Jahren) and becoming more and more important for retailers to clear the unsold Christmas goods.

Canadian observance

In Canada, Boxing Day is observed as a holiday, except for those in the retail business. Boxing Day and the days immediately following are when many retail stores sell their Christmas and retired model products by holding clearance sales. Some shoppers will line up for hours at night (sometimes before midnight and after midnight on December 26th) for retailers to open their doors. Retailers often open their stores earlier than usual, such as 6 or 7 am. Some retail companies internally refer to the sales week after Christmas as the "thirteenth month."

Boxing Day, 2005, was the single-most highest economic transaction day ever in the history of Canadian commerce (according to Visa).

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Video: Carol of the Boxing Day Music Video