I just found this website, that explains how Christmas is celebrated in different countries and cultures... It's very interesting!

http://www.whychristmas.com/cultures

I've read about Poland and it's rather how it used to be ~20/30 years ago. I don't know many people who follow most of those traditions nowadays, especially keeping a carp in a bathtub. But yeah, it used to be like that simply because in those weird times carps were hard to come by even before Christmas so you had to buy it earlier (and spend 2 hours in a queue) to make sure you wouldn't miss it. I had an impression that it was a man who was supposed to kill it, not woman.

And another funny thing is that they didn't mention that during the Christmas Eve Supper you are supposed to place an additional plate for an unexpected guest. I said funny because most people actually follow this tradition even now.

I know some people keeping a carp's scale in their wallet but never heard of anyone putting them in a bra so don't ask me about it! I'm not sure if it's not a fake...

As for a fish in a bathtub. As I said above it's not really a tradition but a necessity of those times. Believe me, it's not that easy for a foreigner to understand how we were living in Eastern Bloc. If you wanted to have a Carp on your table you had to start looking for it much earlier (usually one week before, maybe a bit longer). You heard a gossip "There are carps in this shop" and you ran there. You stood two hours in a queue and... got nothing because they sold out before you reached a counter. So you tried with another shop and another. Eventually you got it but it was still several days before Christmas so you had to keep the fish in a bathtub. And obviously we didn't bath with a fish! In the evening we put it in a large bowl for some time, everybody bathed and then we put him back so that it could swim more freely. So yeah, I would never call it a tradition, there was simply no other option. Those were sad times in Poland (and other similar countries) but we saw it through without complaining. We had to cope with many difficulties and sometimes our "solutions" were weird, especially if seen by today's people and foreigners. I can give you tons of examples for similar shocking activities in those times. My personal favorite: can you imagine that some people breed chickens and even pigs on small balconies on let's say seventh floor? (we are talking about concrete block of flats!) How awesome is that? ;) Yeah, weird times...

Two things :

Street/house light decoration - this seems to be much more popular and common in canada than in australia (yes i live here but i also been to Canada over Xmas time as well) --- lived in australia all my life and ive ever only seem a handful of houses with lights - never seen a whole street .Its not very common (in newcastle or in Sydney). Are peoples experiences different from mine?. On flipside Canadians seem to decorate their streets and houses for Xmas quite a bit more than here in australia. Quite a big different.

Other thing is - here in australia we have a lot of different cultures - Xmas seems just a bit over commercialised and doesnt affect the large ethnic population who dont celebrate it for whatever reason (quite a few asian shops/establishments remain open over xmas and asian families use time to go for a holiday - no celebration at all).

Traditions of Lithuania are pretty much correct, but like Ghorpm said about the ones in Poland, it used to be like that ~20 years ago. Nowadays, many families try to keep up with the traditions and usually learn about them from their oldest family members. Exchange of the gifts now rarely occurs after the kūčios meal. Parents would come at night while kids are asleep and put the presents under the tree.

What changed a little about this holy dinner, is that these days people drink a much wider variation of alcohol. People often do more magic than just pulling out a straw. But two things will possibly never change: it is a holy evening when family gets together and rich or poor, people do their best to put 12 meals on the table.

Since traditions change during times, the lastest addition to ours is TV. I can't remember a single kūčios evening and Christmas without watching TV - it feels like it's impossible not to watch it.

I like that the article about the Netherlands says that we go to church on Christmas Day. I don't know many people who actually do that, except for the religious ones, of course. At a guess, the vast majority of Dutch people do not attend Church during Christmas. Most people here tend to spend Christmas with friends or family and have a fancy dinner to celebrate, although some people don't even do that. Presents on Christmas aren't really a thing here.

Yeah, I remember those carps in my grandpa's bath when I was a kid and it was the grandpa who killed those poor things. We started buying fillets as soon as they appeared in shops. But you can still buy living ones - for what reason, I don't know.

Yup, I would like to know that too. I do know some people who still buy living ones (usually on a Christmas' Eve but still) and I keep asking them why. The only logical answer was "because I need fish's head to make a traditional fish soup". I told her that she could actually ask for heads and in most cases she would get them for free. And so she stopped buying living ones but others (with silly responses) still do. Sigh...

christmas is pretty much over commeercialised everywhere
all major holidays are but christmas is the worst

I didn't even know about the stuff it lists for Pakistan. Very diplomatic of them to gloss over the bad state of affairs for Christians here, though, only going as far as to say "Most Christians in Pakistan live the country and are quite poor".

My mother is Polish. When she was a kid, they got so attached to the carp, feeding it breadcrumbs and watching it swim in the bathtub, that when my grandparents tried to kill it they wouldn't let them. My grandfather relented and the fish was released back into the wild. No living carp was bought ever since.

I nowdays celebrate Christmas eve Polish style, especially since usually my maternal grandmother visits me for Christmas, but it's not easy finding a carp in Ireland, so we substitue a different fish. And we have a turkey for the actual Christmas day.

Back when I was a kid I used to be annoyed that the Polish celebrate Christmas Eve more than Christmas day itself, but later learnt that this comes from the Christian tradition that a day ends and starts at sunset, hence the dinner starts after sunset on Christmas Eve. So it makes sense. Still if I can have it my way (i.e. if not enough Polish people are present who'd insist otherwise), we exchange Christmas gifts on Christmas morning, and not on Christmas Eve after dinner.

Here's a good video on Youtube:

Christmas around the world