The holiday season means many things to De Anza students: family, jolliness, Jesus, annoying jingles, hassle. Some even find it festive to scare the little ones.

Jon Rand, a kinesiology major, celebrates Christmas at his grandparents’ house with lots of family, food, and a bit of humor.

“We have a little custom that my family does,” he said. “Somebody dresses up as Santa, and then either we scare the crap out of the children because there’s a giant red guy coming through the door, or we usually hand out presents and have a Santa come in and everything.”

When asked if children are prone to Santa-related fright, Rand answered, “Yeah, three and under you think there’s a demon coming through that door. It’s great.”

Rand named eggnog as the “best thing about holidays.” 

When his friend Lidia Pacheco said pumpkin pie was the superior holiday treat, Rand presented a compelling counter argument.

“Can you put alcohol in pumpkin pie?” he quipped. “No.”

Pacheco, an 18-year-old art major, celebrates Dia de los Reyes in addition to Christmas. Dia de los Reyes is observed in parts of Latin America on Jan. 6 and commemorates the visit of the three kings to the baby Jesus. Pacheco said her grandparents come over to test her knowledge of the holiday.

“We have to know about the three gifts that Jesus gets and then the names of the dudes,” she said. “Then after that they will give us our gifts and we’ll drink hot chocolate.”

Pacheco isn’t the only student who celebrates a holiday tangentially associated with Christmas. Film and television major Jevin Lee’s family celebrates Saint Nick’s Day, a Dutch holiday on Dec. 6. In Holland, the night of Dec. 5 is considered a bigger holiday than Christmas itself. Lee said his family gives each other small gifts.

“We put items in these wooden shoes, which are sort of like stockings,” he said.

Nineteen-year-old Kelly Tanimura’s take on Christmas comes from a more religious angle. As the holiday nears, her family gets more involved in church activities. After attending a church service on Christmas Eve, Tanimura’s family gets an early start on the holiday by allowing everybody to open one present.

“I love Christmas; I love the winter holiday,” she said. “Everybody gets nicer and happier and I love celebrating Jesus’ birth and it’s just the most wonderful time of year. I love all the cold weather and the hot drinks.”

Although “Christmas” is often replaced by “holidays” to accommodate non-Christian sensibilities, there are Christians who don’t celebrate Christmas.

Sociology major Grace Ilao, 21, is a Seventh Day Adventist. She said though her denomination believes in Jesus, they don’t recognize a specific date of birth. Her family uses still Christmas as an occasion to link up, with sometimes more than 50 relatives from around the Bay Area getting together.

Computer science major Harkanwar Singh doesn’t celebrate Christmas, but said it’s a good time to get together with family because most people have time off.

“Personally I like it,” he said. “I don’t know about anyone else, but it just seems like a good feeling. Holidays are a time to get together.”

Singh, 20, is Sikh, a religion based in India with approximately 30 million followers. Recent holidays that Singh has celebrated include Diwali, a pan-Indian celebration, and multiple “Gurpuravs.” Gurpuravs commemorate important anniversaries in the lives of Sikh religious figures known as “gurus.” Singh said visits to temple and prayer take place on those days.

Some De Anza students don’t identify with any religion, but still participate in Christmas-time celebrations.

David Byers is founder of the De Anza DAMN club (Doubters, Agnostics, Mythbusters and Nontheists). Byers, currently a reserve supervisor at the library, said many aspects of Christmas have their roots in northern European pagan traditions. He cited the proximity of Dec. 25 to the winter solstice and the Christmas colors of red and white coming from blood sacrifices on the snow. The Catholic church incorporated pagan traditions into Christmas to ease the assimilation of non-Christian Celtic and Germanic tribes, he said.

Byers sees positive aspects of the holiday. Though he disapproves of the association of Christmas with consumerism, he said he appreciates the holiday as a reason to get together with family, and said gift giving could be positive for children.

“You get to give them toys, and they get to light up and appreciate that there are people who have spent enough time thinking about them to figure out what they’ll actually want and play with,” he said.

Current DAMN President Mitch Mikkelsen also had a generally positive view of the season.

Mikkelsen’s family does a “White Elephant” gift exchange, where people buy inexpensive gifts and exchange them multiple times. He said his family renamed the ritual “Baby Jesus gift exchange, because to them that’s the reason for the season.” Mikkelsen said it doesn’t bother him and he enjoys the spirit of togetherness.

“It’s a time that the community has created now for camaraderie, and I think that’s cool,” he said.

Though most students interviewed generally enjoy the holiday season, a few had negative feelings.

Eighteen-year-old business management major Ruth Haile said the combination of staying at home and stores being closed made her feel trapped on Christmas.

“I believe in Jesus, but I don’t like Christmas,” she said.

Gabriela Narnjo, a 35-year-old studying for her paralegal certification, said she didn’t like the decorating, cleaning and purchasing that comes with Christmas. But like so many other students, she cited family as the main reason for the season.

“I don’t like Christmas,” she said. “But I do it for the kids, because it’s their favorite thing to do.”