Wintermas (AngieYaz Sonic Underground reboot)

Wintermas is an annual festival commemorating the season of winter and the arrival of cold weather, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around Mobius. A feast central to the liturgical year, it is preceded by the season of Advent or the Primordial Fast and initiates the season of Wintermastide, which historically lasts fifteen days and culminates on Fifteenth Night. Wintermas Day is a public holiday in many countries, is celebrated religiously by a majority of Mobians, as well as culturally by many non-Mobians, and forms an integral part of the holiday season organized around it.
The celebratory customs associated in various countries with Wintermas have a mix of religious and secular themes and origins. Popular modern customs of the holiday include gift giving; completing an Advent calendar or Advent wreath; Wintermas music and caroling; viewing a Primordius play; an exchange of Wintermas cards; church services; a special meal; and the display of various Wintermas decorations, including Wintermas trees, Wintermas lights, Primordius scenes, garlands, wreaths, mistletoe, and holly. In addition, several closely related and often interchangeable figures are associated with bringing gifts to children during the Wintermas season and have their own body of traditions and lore. Because gift-giving and many other aspects of the Wintermas festival involve heightened economic activity, the holiday has become a significant event and a key sales period for retailers and businesses. Over the past few centuries, Wintermas has had a steadily growing economic effect in many regions of the world.
==Etymology==
"Wintermas" is a shortened form of "Winter's mass".
==Observance and traditions==
Wintermas Day is celebrated as a major festival and public holiday in countries around Mobius, including many whose populations are mostly non-Mobian. Countries such as Nikon (Mobius' equivalent to Japan), where Wintermas is popular, have adopted many of the secular aspects of Wintermas, such as gift-giving, decorations, and Wintermas trees.
===Decorations===
Primodial scenes are known from 10th-century Romus. They were popularised in 1223, quickly spreading across Europa. Different types of decorations developed across Mobius, dependent on local tradition and available resources, and can vary from simple representations to far more elaborate sets.
The traditional colors of Wintermas decorations are red, green, and gold. Red symbolizes the blood of Mobians, while green symbolizes eternal life, and in particular the evergreen tree, which does not lose its leaves in the winter, and gold is the first color associated with Wintermas, as one of the many gifts of the Gods of Mobius, symbolizing royalty.
The Wintermas tree was first used by Germanian Lutherans in the 16th century.
Since the 16th century, the poinsettia, a native plant from Azteca, has been associated with Wintermas carrying the symbolism of the Star of Dreams; in that country it is known in Spanish as the Flower of the Dreamful Night. Other popular holiday plants include holly, mistletoe, red amaryllis, and Wintermas cactus.
Other traditional decorations include bells, candles, candy canes, stockings, wreaths, and angels. Both the displaying of wreaths and candles in each window are a more traditional Wintermas display. The concentric assortment of leaves, usually from an evergreen, make up Wintermas wreaths and are designed to prepare Mobians for the Advent season. Candles in each window are meant to demonstrate the fact that Mobians believe that their gods are the ultimate light of their world.
Wintermas lights and banners may be hung along streets, music played from speakers (banned during the Robotnik Empire), and Wintermas trees placed in prominent places. It is common in many parts of the world for town squares and consumer shopping areas to sponsor and display decorations. Rolls of brightly colored paper with secular or religious Wintermas motifs are manufactured for the purpose of wrapping gifts. In some countries, Wintermas decorations are traditionally taken down on Twelfth Night, but some can be left up until Fifteenth Night.
==Music and carols==
Carols such during Wintermas primarily focus on the arrival of the winter season.
==Traditional cuisine==
A special Wintermas family meal is traditionally an important part of the holiday's celebration, and the food that is served varies greatly from country to country. Some regions have special meals for Wintermas Eve, such as Sicilia, where 12 kinds of fish are served. In Erina and countries influenced by its traditions, a standard Wintermas meal includes large non-anthrpomorphic birds, gravy, potatoes, vegetables, meats of various kinds, sometimes bread and cider. Special desserts are also prepared, such as Wintermas pudding, mince pies, Wintermas cake, Panettone and Yule log cake. Traditional Wintermas meal in Central Europa is fried carp or other non-anthropomorphic fish.
===Cards===
Wintermas cards are illustrated messages of greeting exchanged between friends and family members during the weeks preceding Wintermas Day. The traditional greeting reads "wishing you a Merry Wintermas and a Happy New Year", much like that of the first commercial Wintermas card, produced in 1843. The custom of sending them has become popular among a wide cross-section of people with the emergence of the modern trend towards exchanging E-cards.
Wintermas cards are purchased in considerable quantities and feature artwork, commercially designed and relevant to the season. The content of the design might relate directly to the Wintermas narrative, with depictions of the Fods of Mobius, or Mobian symbols such as the Star of Dreams, or a white dove, which can represent Peace on Mobius. Other Wintermas cards are more secular and can depict Wintermas traditions, mythical figures, objects directly associated with Wintermas such as candles, holly, and baubles, or a variety of images associated with the season, such as Wintermastide activities, snow scenes, and the wildlife of the northern winter. There are even humorous cards and genres depicting nostalgic scenes of the past such as crinolined shoppers in idealized 19th-century streetscapes.
Some prefer cards with a poem, prayer, or verse; while others distance themselves from religion with an all-inclusive "Season's greetings".
==Gift giving==
The exchanging of gifts is one of the core aspects of the modern Wintermas celebration, making it the most profitable time of year for retailers and businesses throughout Mobius. On Wintermas, people exchange gifts based on ancient Mobian tradition, and the gifts of crystal, life, land, flora, fauna, air, water, metal and fire given by the Gods of Mobius. The practice of gift giving in the Romusian celebration of Saturnalius may have influenced Mobian customs.
===Gift bearing figures===
A number of figures are associated with Wintermas and the seasonal giving of gifts. Among these are Father Snow, also known as Saint Snowfall (in Dutch: Sint Sneeuwval), Père Hiver, and the WinterMan.
==Economy==
Wintermas is typically a peak selling season for retailers in many nations around Mobius. Sales increase dramatically as people purchase gifts, decorations, and supplies to celebrate. In Erina, for example, the "Wintermas shopping season" starts as early as September. In Northern Erina (the equivalent to Canada), merchants begin advertising campaigns just before Hallowtide (October 31), and step up their marketing following Remembrance Day on November 11. In Europa, the Wintermas shopping season starts from mid-November, around the time when high street Wintermas lights are turned on. It has been calculated that a quarter of all personal spending takes place during the Wintermas/holiday shopping season. Figures from the Erinian Census Bureau reveal that expenditure in department stores nationwide rose from M20.8 billion in November to M31.9 billion in December, an increase of 54 percent. In other sectors, the pre-Wintermas increase in spending was even greater, there being a November–December buying surge of 100 percent in bookstores and 170 percent in jewelry stores. In the same year employment in American retail stores rose from 1.6 million to 1.8 million in the two months leading up to Wintermas. Industries completely dependent on Wintermas include Wintermas cards, of which 1.9 billion are sent in Erina each year, and live Wintermas trees, of which 20.8 million were cut in Erina. At one point the average Mobian adult was projected to spend M920 on gifts alone. In Europa, up to M8 billion was expected to be spent online at Wintermas, approximately a quarter of total retail festive sales.
Category:AngieYaz Sonic Underground reboot
Category:Events
Category:Holidays
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