A diver embraces a zebra shark during the Sunshine Aquarium’s annual Santa Dive performance in Japan in 2013. Even though Japan is less than one percent Christian, Christmas is a popular holiday.
Photograph by Shizuo Kambayashi, ApChristmas Eve fireworks, shown here in 2007, are part of Cuba’s oldest festival, Las Parrandas, which started in the city of Remedios in the 1820s but has now spread across the country.
Photograph by AJ Wilhelm, Nat Geo Image CollectionA scrap-metal Christmas tree was created by researchers stationed at the American Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica in 2005.
Photograph by Borge Ousland, Nat Geo Image CollectionAn Australian family decorates a Christmas tree on Bondi Beach in Sydney in 1956.
Photograph by Howell Walker, Nat Geo Image CollectionBelievers in the Christ of Siberia walk past homes in Cheremshanka while on their way to a sermon delivered on a mountain above Obitel Rassveta, a village in Russia, in 2016.
Photograph by Jonas Bendiksen, Nat Geo Image CollectionPope John Paul II coats the nativity scene at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican in incense during Christmas rites in 1990.
Photograph by James L. Stanfield, Nat Geo Image CollectionUnder layers of clothing, blankets, and hats, neighbours in Newfoundland went door-to-door in disguise in 1984 and asked their friends to guess their identities.
Photograph by John Eastcott and Yva Momatiuk, Nat Geo Image CollectionChildren participate in a 2013 school Christmas celebration in the small Inuit settlement of Isortoq, Greenland.
Photograph by Matthieu Paley, Nat Geo Image CollectionA girl hand-paints nativity figurines in Estremox, Portugal in 1965.
Photograph by Volkmar K. Wentzel, Nat Geo Image CollectionA dancing duo perform during the 2001 annual Christmas parade in Hobart, Tasmania.
Photograph by Gerd Ludwig, Nat Geo Image CollectionAmerican children are mesmerized by a live transmission from Apollo 8 astronauts in 1968. Watching holiday movies like It’s a Wonderful Life has been a common Christmas tradition for families in the U.S.