Christmas around the world: hippo attack on Christmas Eve

Tibet: encounter with death

Anselm Nathanael Pahnke , born in 1989, cycled through Africa in 414 days, from north to south. The film "Elsewhere. Alone in Africa" ​​was created from his trip.

For three years my bike carried me across the African, Asian and Australian continents and I never celebrated Christmas on the way. For me, Christmas Eve has to do with death today.

Once I was alone on a high plateau in Malawi on December 24th and barely escaped a hippo attack. And that was not the only near-death experience: During the Christmas days in Tibet, at over 4000 meters, a piece of metal got caught in the front wheel of my bike during a rapid descent. It lifted me out of the saddle before I landed roughly on my hands and face.

Anselm Nathanael Pahnke

Jamphel in Tibet: hospitality for Christmas

A young man who found me passed out on the side of the road took me to his family as a matter of course for Christmas. His name was Jamphel. He said to me: "The goal of life is not to run away from death as long as possible. I am preparing for death with my life."

While death is often censored here, others see it as a homecoming or ascent to a higher form of life. It took me a while to understand that the result of this attitude does not mean a dark, depressed outlook on life. Accepting death as part of life was a liberation for me.

Read more about Pahnke's journey through Africa in the interview.

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Camping in the desert: Christmas Eve in a T-shirt

Paul Nitzschke, 31, mainly travels in Eastern Europe and Central Asia with the Mercedes bus and UAZ 452. He runs the Passport Diary blog via #Vanlife.

In recent years I have spent more Christmas abroad than at home - to my parents' regret, it is a family celebration for them. For example, I was in Georgia once. There, like in Russia, they celebrate Christmas on a different date - so on December 24th there was not much festivity.

If I am in countries where it is not snowing at the time, it is more difficult to let Christmas feelings arise anyway. Nevertheless, I make myself comfortable with friends abroad and cook something nice. For example, when camping in the desert - celebrating Christmas in a T-shirt is an unusual feeling. I never really missed anything on the way. Since the Internet is getting better and better, with a video call every now and then the family is also there. I don't need Skype this year - I'll be home.

Read more about Nitzschke's travels in his van here.

Valencia: a beer in the tree

Jannik Jürgens

Jannik Jürgens: Sometimes a hotel room too

Jannik Jürgens , born in 1993, has been cycling for months for years and is building the community for cyclists, Tomorrow's People.

I spent the first Christmas away from home on my second major bike tour, which led from Barcelona to Marrakech, in Valencia. At that time I was traveling without a tent and always slept in the open air. Because of the holidays, I booked a room and then spent Christmas in the tree in front of the hotel in the crown with a couple of bottles of beer.

Christmas is celebrated at home in Spain, so the streets were swept empty, and I was able to take a long tour of Valencia in peace and quiet until the "Misa del Gallo", the Christmas fair, took place at midnight.

It was nice to escape the Christmas obligations - but getting together with family and friends is also something very valuable. I don't want to miss that this year.

Read more about Jürgen's passion for cycling here.

Buenos Aires: A Christmas miracle at midnight

Lea Rieck, born in Munich in 1986, works as a journalist and consultant in digital conception. With the motorcycle she drove around the world alone for 18 months and 90,000 kilometers and wrote the book about it: "Tell the adventure, I'm coming".

I arrived in Buenos Aires from Australia on December 23rd. My plan was to have a good meal early on Christmas Eve and then simply oversleep the hustle and bustle of Christmas. I specifically asked in my pension whether restaurants were open that evening. Unfortunately, it turned out that the city was completely extinct - everything was closed, there were no people or taxis on the streets. After an hour of walking at 35 degrees and with a growling stomach, I stopped at the Hotel Four Seasons - my only chance of something edible.

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When I wanted to order a taxi after dinner, it was said that it was unfortunately not possible at this time. It was just before midnight, and in Argentina Christmas is celebrated a bit like New Year's with us, with big fireworks.

So I called my pension. The owner and her husband picked me up - and had moved their own family celebration to the pension with 40 people. The reason: they had noticed that they had given me wrong information about the restaurants and still wanted to offer me a party.

Back in the pension I was adopted by the whole family and was allowed to become part of a special Argentine Christmas tradition: At midnight you let paper lanterns, which are globos , go up and send a wish to heaven with them.

Read more about Lea Rieck's motorcycle tour in the interview.

Melbourne: Homesick in Downunder

zweidiereisen.de

Lisa Kraft and Maximilian Gierlinger: first sad, then exuberant

Lisa Kraft and Maximilian Gierlinger, 27 and 28, started their long-term trip in March 2017. Today, the two see themselves with their Instagram channel @zweidiereisen and blog zweidiereisen.de as travel influencers with a focus on sustainability.

Two years ago we hadn't been to Germany for Christmas for nine months because we first traveled through Southeast Asia for five months and then arrived in Australia. Although we lived in Melbourne in one of the most beautiful cities in the world for us and in a nice flat share, the advent season even made us a little sad at the beginning. We missed our family and home.

Christmas mood just didn't come up. On the one hand, the usual cold was absent at temperatures of 30 degrees in the shade. On the other hand, in Australia, Christmas is not celebrated on December 24th, but only a day later. We wanted to celebrate anyway!

So we invited our friends and roommates to a Christmas party. There were Bavarian bread dumplings with sauce, salad and dessert, along with wine and a few small gifts. Later we went to a bar, danced wildly and had a lot of fun. It was only late that we noticed that we had ended up at a gay party and we understood why Maximilian had received so many nice compliments from strangers.

A few hours and many glasses of wine later we fell into bed early in the morning, where we then consistently spent the next day. Ultimately, it was a completely different Christmas than the years before, but certainly one of the funniest!

Read more about the two bloggers' travels in the interview .

New Zealand: chilling on the road

Jakob and Tina Haeusgen

View on the water: far from hysterical pre-Christmas stress

Tina and Jakob Haeusgen, 44 and 45, traveled seven months with an expanded truck on the Silk Road to Ulaanbaatar. They describe their experiences on their blog "The Haeusgens".

The really nice thing about Christmas "on the road" is that you don't have to listen to "Last Christmas" until you go crazy - once you've experienced this, you don't really want to spend Christmas in the broadcasting area of ​​German radio stations. We have already spent some holidays away from home. But surely the most unique thing was in our expedition vehicle "Aloisius" in New Zealand: deep blue lakes, snow-capped mountains, wonderfully blooming lupins up to the horizon, pleasant 20 to 25 degrees Celsius and camping in front of a fantastic backdrop - and all without the hysterical pre-Christmas stress.

Read more about the Haeusgens' journey here.

After an accident Thailand: The best gift ever

Jennifer and Christian Juraschek

Christmas in Chiang Mai Grand Canyon

Jennifer and Christian Juraschek , 30 and 31, were on a trip around the world when they crashed their scooter in Northern Thailand shortly before Christmas. After their recovery, they traveled on and blog about it at Unaufschiebbar.de.

On our trip around the world, we were in northern Thailand in December 2017. The country is almost 95 percent Buddhist, and the festival doesn't really matter. At tourist locations, however, it is actually Christmas: At 30 degrees in front of the large shopping center in Chiang Mai there was an approximately 20-meter-tall Christmas tree with reindeer, Christmas music played inside.

But then we had a traffic accident with a scooter and were seriously injured. On the ward in the international hospital in Chiang Mai, the sisters once pushed us with our beds to the "Christmas corner" with wrapped presents and kitschy fir trees.

On the evening of December 23, we arrived in Germany with the ambulance plane, and we were taken to a quarantine room in the hospital. Our families were only able to visit us, hooded, with gloves, face masks and smocks. Unfortunately, Christmas was exactly as you would imagine it to be when you read it: not a festive approach. At lunchtime there was at least goose, red cabbage and dumplings, but the "banquet" in the evening consisted of two slices of bread, as is typical for hospitals.

Nevertheless, on Christmas Eve there was probably the best gift we ever received: After 2.5 weeks of lying in the hospital bed, we were allowed to take a shower, wheelchair and lots of help for the first time. Incredibly beneficial - and our best memory of this otherwise sad Christmas.

Read more about the Jurascheks here.