Christmas around the world in pictures
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Surfing Santas, crazy cows and traditional carols: see how people around the globe celebrate Christmas in 2025.
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The annual Surfing Santas event on Christmas Eve at Cocoa Beach in Florida.Credit:Dalton Smith/@NPI Productions/Florida Space Coast via AP
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Children play with bubbles during a Christmas dinner organised by labour activists for people in need outside Congress in Buenos Aires, Argentina.Credit:AP
3/24
President Donald Trump, accompanied by first lady Melania Trump, speaks to children whose calls were patched through to the Trumps’ Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, during the annual Santa tracking operation by the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD).Credit:AP
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Acting Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Pierbattista Pizzaballa leads a Christmas Midnight Mass at Saint Catherine’s Church in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.Credit:Mussa Qawasma/Pool Photo via AP
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People drive up to the top of the Feldberg mountain near Frankfurt, Germany, to join the traditional Christmas Eve meeting of tractor and motorbike drivers.Credit:AP Photo/Michael Probst
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For the past century, the historic Smithfield Market in London has held a meat sale on Christmas Eve at which traders sell off their surplus supplies,Credit:Getty Images
7/24
A woman poses amid Christmas lights in Istanbul.Credit:AP
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Christian Jennert and his dog, Spatz, in front of the Union Square Great Christmas Tree in San Francisco.Credit:AP
9/24
Pope Leo during the Christmas Eve Mass at St Peter’s Basilica.Credit:AP
10/24
A child runs with a traditional vaca loca, or crazy cow, during Christmas celebrations in Quingeo, Ecuador.Credit:AP
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A woman takes a photo as she arrives for a Christmas Eve service at the Santa Cruz Cathedral Basilica in Kochi, India.Credit:Getty Images
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A Nativity scene near Kazansky Cathedral in St Petersburg, Russia.Credit:AP
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A hotel lobby on Christmas Eve in Beijing.Credit:AP
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Christmas carollers in traditional Ukrainian costumes at a subway station in central Kyiv.Credit:AP
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Emma Coke (left) and Stephanie Finnegan walk along the beach with their dogs after taking part in the annual Christmas Eve swim in the cold waters of Belfast Lough, in Helen’s Bay, Northern Ireland.Credit:AP
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A procession ahead of the midnight Mass at the Cathedral-Basilica in Vilnius, Lithuania.Credit:AP
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US Postal Service worker Lyne Jerrika delivers a package in Austin, Texas, on Christmas Eve.Credit:Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman via AP
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A Christmas Eve service in St Mary Cathedral in Yangon, Myanmar. Credit:AP
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A Christian neighbourhood in Islamabad, Pakistan, is decorated for Christmas.Credit:AP
20/24
A Christmas Eve service at Indonesia Arena in Jakarta.Credit:AP
21/24
People re-enact a Nativity scene at the Saint Anthony of Padua Church in Istanbul, Turkey.Credit:Getty Images
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Children celebrate Christmas Eve in the southern Lebanese border village of Alma al-Shaab.Credit:AP
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A boy walks with his mother in Lalitpur, Nepal.Credit:AP Photo/Niranjan Shrestha
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Lifeguards walk by a “snowman” made of sand on the Gold Coast.Credit:Getty Images
