New Year in France.

New Year since childhood is for each person the most beloved and long-awaited celebration. It is a holiday of a Christmas tree, shine of lights, home comfort, pleasant memories, hopes and magic. It is celebrated almost in all countries of the world, the new year in France, Germany, Denmark and other countries is slightly different from our celebration. It is of a mass character and is accompanied by street processions, masquerades, songs and dances.

Curiously, how are they celebrating the new year in France?

This holiday the French call the day of St. Sylvester, all because his day falls just on December 31. Residents of France celebrate the New Year with the whole family, but not at home. It is customary to celebrate a holiday somewhere in a restaurant, cafe or nightclub. The windows of these institutions must be painted with thematic drawings, patterns and beautiful inscriptions. During the New Year's Eve dinner, the inhabitants of France wear bright pointed caps, dance, throw confetti or serpentine into each other and joke.

On a solemn night, especially crowded in the center of Paris, in Montmartre and the Champs-Elysees. The townspeople take to the streets of their city, and, having raised a glass of champagne for "new happiness", go for a walk along the elegant night streets. The boulevards and avenues that night are filled with people who friendlyly embrace each other and congratulate on the holiday.

Not one new year in France can not do without a lottery. This is the favorite entertainment of the French, thanks to which you can win a chicken, a turkey and even a pig.

The festive table is traditionally decorated with a mistletoe. It is believed that this plant is able to bring good luck. Of the dishes, the French cook blood sausages, a turkey or roast goose, a baked pork head, beans, peas, chestnuts, nuts, lentils, sweets and flat cakes made from milk. But the most important New Year's dish of the French is goose liver.

Traditionally, for the dessert, the housewives prepare a cake and put one bean into it. That person who gets a piece of a pie with a baked bob in it, is called a "bean king" and on a festive night everyone should obey only him.

For the new year in France, as well as with us, it is customary to give small friends gifts to their friends and relatives. It can be any elegant, stylish, funny, original, or simply pleasant things. For example, in 2002, the French, after putting the euro into circulation, gave their friends and relatives packaging and new pan-European coins, the cost of which was 100 francs.

New Year in France is unthinkable without Santa Claus, but here it bears the name of Per Noel. This magician on a festive night comes into each house and leaves gifts for children in shoes.

New Year trees, shining with colored lights, stand in every house and on the streets. Near them are usually exhibited clay or wooden figures, called santons. In addition, the French in the New Year decorate their homes with flowers. They place them one by one and huge bouquets, and necessarily put flowers on the festive table. In every French family there is a model describing the scene of the birth of Christ, it is also an element of the New Year's decor.

In the whole world it is believed that the French are a loving nation. However, on New Year's holiday, they prefer not to kiss at all. Instead, they eat up and get drunk to the dump. Traditionally, all the owners-winemakers necessarily clink glasses with a barrel of wine, congratulate her with the coming triumph and drink for the future harvest. And since the production of wine in France is not only lazy, you can imagine what fun reigns on New Year's Eve in this country.

The French cease to celebrate the New Year only on January 6 in connection with the coming of the next holiday - Baptism.

Now you will know how to celebrate the new year in France: noisy, fun, bright and amicable.