Heiligabend is 24th December, known in English as Christmas Eve.

On this day most businesses and shops close around lunchtime and people start to prepare for the evening.

Many families still decorate their Christmas trees in the afternoon. Traditionally the children are not allowed in the room when this happens. Then the Christkind comes before the children return and brings the Christmas presents.

The main Christmas meal is eaten later in the evening with many families going to Church beforehand.

To hear a simple explanation and a short discussion in German, listen to the podcast:

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Tags: Christmas

Some other posts on this topic that you might like to read:

• Christmas Pack 2
• A collection of Christmas trees
• Christmas Pack 1

This entry was posted on Monday, December 24th, 2007 at 12:00 am and is filed under Christmas, German Words Explained, Podcasts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.