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If you have decided to visit Cuba next December, here are some interesting facts about Christmas on the Island. Christmas in Cuba is a family-oriented holiday, gifts are not as important as spending time together.

Christmas Eve is called “Nochebuena” (that is, since it was the night Jesus was born it was called a “good night”) and it is when families have the most important dinner celebrating together.

The traditional main dish is roast pork (some families like to roast a whole pig) normally served with fried bananas, rice and vegetables. From the pork, the skin is also cooked, becoming crispy with the most incredible and indescribably delicious taste and texture. The crispy skin bites are called chicharrones. It is one of the standout specialties of a Cuban Christmas.

Dessert is often rice pudding or boniatillo sweet potato pudding, coconut dessert, the very famous guava dessert and there is always a piece of nougat that generally comes from Spain: Yema? Alicante? Jijona? Marzipan? Coconut? Everyone has their favorite.

In the city of Remedios (near Santa Clara), on Christmas Eve a great celebration and parade called “Las Parrandas” is held.

This deep-rooted tradition was born around 1820 from the initiative of priest Francisco Vigil de Quiñónez, who invited a group of children to help him wake up the locals by making a great racket in the streets, so they would attend the traditional Christmas Masses.

From this evolved the tradition of going out into the street and making a ruckus during the Christmas period and, although it has deviated from its religious meaning, it is a celebration that prevails despite time; gradually replacing the whistles, rattles and cans full of stones that children used for music with fireworks, allegorical floats and many other surprises.

Currently the celebration begins in the morning with a pilgrimage that starts from the Parrandas Museum to the local cemetery, where tribute is paid to illustrious revelers who have passed away, during a tour in which government authorities, professionals, musicians and people of all ages join to symbolically ask the deceased to accompany them to the great celebration that will be held that night.

Around 5 in the afternoon the melodies of the celebration begin to play, in which the sounds of trumpets and paila predominate; a sound that becomes full around 10 at night when the neighborhoods take to the streets.

Silence returns to the streets at midnight, giving the opportunity to celebrate the Christmas Eve Mass called Misa del Gallo, this expression is due to the fact that the ancient Romans associated the Rooster’s Crow with the beginning of the day, precisely at midnight.

After the mass the celebration continues and one begins again to savor the folklore of Cuba.