Hello everyone, and Happy… Saint Nicholas Eve ! This might sound strange to some, and familiar to others, but in many European countries, Saint Nicholas is an essential part of the Christmas celebrations in December. The official feast is on December…
Austrian Advent Calendar Day 4 Hello, dear friends, and happy Advent! For this fourth day of our Austrian Advent Calendar, I invite you to an afternoon coffee break accompanied by a delicious traditional Austrian dessert: the Linzer Torte. This elegant…
Welcome to day 3 and to our first book review of this year’s Austrian Advent Calendar ! I started my series of discoveries in the land of Austrian literature with a light and amusing read : Wolfgang Hermann’s Herr Faustini…
Austrian Advent Calendar Day 2 Welcome to the second day of our Austrian Advent Calendar, dear friends! Let’s talk about Christmas music. It’s often the first element that signals the season’s arrival. Before department store windows become galleries of glitter…
Austrian Advent Calendar Day 1 Winter has arrived in Vienna, and with it comes the opening of the Christmas markets—those enchanted corners of the city where wooden stalls glow with warm light, the air fills with the scent of roasted…
Hello dear friends, and Happy Advent ! Welcome back to the most festive time of the year, here at The Ritual of Reading, where we follow the tradition of the Advent Calendar by opening a new video every day of December…
Scandinavian Advent Calendar Day 24 Welcome to Christmas in the heart of Copenhagen, dear friends. Before you lies Tivoli Gardens dressed in its finest party attire, transformed into something that exists halfway between dream and reality—a place where the boundary…
Scandinavian Advent Calendar Day 23 We’ve nearly reached the end of our Advent journey together, dear friends, and so I’ve saved one of the most endearing Scandinavian Christmas traditions for these final days. The quintessential Christmas dessert throughout Denmark, Sweden,…
It’s been a while since I last read drama, but I couldn’t let my Scandinavian Advent Calendar finish without diving into the work of Norwegian writer Henrik Ibsen. A major figure of universal drama writing, and one of the most…
Scandinavian Advent Calendar Day 21 Hello, dear friends! Today is December 21st—the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, when darkness reaches its fullest expression before beginning its slow retreat toward spring. Up north in the lands of the…
