Worried That Your Kids Could Be Losing Tradition After Living Abroad?

How breaking tradition might have been one of the best things we've ever done as parents.

I am American and my husband is Dutch. Our three kids were born and raised in Switzerland until we moved to Japan last year. This creates a complex and often confusing situation when it comes to heritage and traditions. Children process and identify with all the little bits and pieces of the rituals swirling around them, but what they grasp—and what they hold on to—isn’t always clear. For our third culture kids, the traditions and customs they experience are very different from those of our own childhood, and in some ways, we feel like we’re losing tradition as we navigate new cultures together.

Our Typical Christmas

© Photo by iStock: David Taljat

In Switzerland, we followed old traditions and did all of those little things, just because it was Christmas time. We spent this time of year baking sugar cookies, getting the skis out of the cellar, visiting the Christmas markets, planning holiday menus and secretly stashing presents around the house.

Our family of five knew exactly what to do and when to do it. Christmas Eve, for example, was always spent with Tante Maria and Uncle George, Oma and Opa, and any other family members who happened to be in the Swiss mountains that night. We always ate filet mignon. We always set out sugar cookies for Santa and carrots for the reindeer. It was a simple formula.

But what happens when you break tradition?

This is a first for us. We are based in Tokyo as expats, and even the lead-up to the holiday season is much different.

Instead of eating crepes in Colmar, sipping a Heisse Schoggi in Konstanz or watching the street light up on the Zürich Bahnhofstrasse, we are admiring the illumination light displays at Tokyo Midtown and going to Christmas concerts at school. We are navigating our way through a new city and strongly considering whether it is really worth spending ¥40,000 for a real Christmas tree.

Christmas Abroad

© Photo by iStock: davidf

Honestly, we probably don’t need a real Christmas tree. If anything, our decision not to go home to Switzerland for Christmas is deeper and much more complex in its implications. This year, we are packing our tennis rackets and our flip-flops and legging it to Australia!

It will be the first Christmas spent away for our children. There will be no snowy mountaintops, no hoards of family and gaggles of friends, and none of the old traditions and customs that they knew. Instead, we are going to wear Santa hats on the beach, BBQ our Christmas lunch and take photos with Old Saint Nick under the Harbour Bridge. We will have a Christmas tree (a real one!) with lights and presents and stockings. We have told the Elf on the Shelf where we will be and even written Santa three, explicit letters with logistical instructions.

Change is normal … and should be encouraged!

Some say we would be better off without the more “traditional” aspects of the typical Western Christmas. I suppose we can all relate to the tendency to spend too much, eat too much or stress too much during the holidays.

I believe that traditions can change, perhaps should change, as time passes. But when I think about this in terms of our third-culture children, I actually believe that our very programmed holiday routines would be positive and even essential for them.

I was actually a little bit worried that we would be pulling the rug out from under our kids’ young, developing feet until I realized that they are tougher than we think and that they perhaps understand a thing or two that we do not.

International Kids

These resilient, international-minded children are used to the fact that their accents are different, that they hold a couple of different passports or that “home” is difficult to define. They are used to not taking anything for granted and remain fully open to the world around them. They are not easily shaken or shocked.

Through their eyes, I was stunned to understand what actually is important to them at Christmas. In their words, Christmas is about people.

My kids are sad about not going home to Switzerland because of the people they will miss. But since the five of us will be together, they say it’s going to be okay. It is more about lasting memories created by people you love than all the little things we do just because.

Christmas Is About Giving

© Photo by iStock: Choreograph

Christmas traditions may change a little bit with time. We may alter the menu or have new people at the table. Or, perhaps we spend it in our bathing suits on the beach.

But what always stays the same is the “coming together,” celebrating a few slow and important moments and feeling gratitude for the world around us. Giving or feeling a part of something bigger than ourselves lasts longer than sugar cookies or tinsel.

For kids, especially in a world full of uncertainty, change and more than a bit of sadness, the Christmas tradition of giving is grounding.

In our Tokyo home, we are still sneaking Amazon packages in the front door and hiding bits around the flat. We are still sending packages and cards to our family and friends around the world. We are donating time and resources to those less fortunate. And we are, more than ever, remembering the people we love.

A sunshiney Christmas in Australia is not without roots or traditions… perhaps it is just focused on what is really important.

What do you think about kids losing tradition when living abroad?