Does Japan Celebrate Christmas?

Not exactly. Only around 1% of Japanese are Christian, so very few celebrate any Christian holidays. Christmas is kind of a fun holiday sort of like Valentine's day--it's not religious, but gifts may be given, and actually it's kind of a romantic holiday, when couples try to get away for the weekend. Halloween is not much observed--there's no trick or treating, but some people might have parties and there might be a little in the way of decorations. Thanksgiving is an American holiday only and no one else anywhere celebrates it. They do have harvest celebration festivals in Japan, though.

Yes, the Japanese celebrate Christmas, but not for the Christian reason. Popular foods for Christmas in Japan is KFC and cakes. The cakes are popular because they usually go on sale during that time, I'm not sure why the do the KFC thing though. Also, it's more like Valentines day than actual Christmas. Halloween is celebrated too, but they don't trick or treat or anything. It's more like they just get into the spirit, they like the decorations. Recently there was like this "party/concert" thing that was based on Halloween in Japan. Thanksgiving is a holiday only Celebrated in the US.

Christmas is celebrated as a holiday but without the Christian theme. In other words, they like the idea of giving gifts, decorations, and festivities. But Christians makes up less than 5 per cent of the population, so for most Japanese it is just one of those strange but nice foreign holidays that gets celebrated. BTW: for some odd reasons and among many strange customs, they buy KFC for dinner. You really have to see it for yourself to believe how KFC gets all decked out during Christmas - more so than anywhere in the US. Halloween celebration was kind of forced upon the Japanese by all the foreigners who lived in Japan. The Japanese adults think it weird and irritating because foreigners dress up in costumes and ride the subways partying on the train and basically make a mess of everything. The Japanese kids like all kids think it's a great idea getting free candy from strangers. Thanksgiving is actually a holiday almost all cultures celebrate, but they do not all call it "Thanksgiving". The Thanksgiving that was celebrated by the Pilgrims was actually a harvest celebration which is very common among people who farm because it was the last big feast after the crops have been harvested and before winter when all the fresh vegetables and fruits are preserved or eaten. For example, in Germany they have the OctoberFest. In ancient Greece, they had the festival of Thesmosphoria, and in China they called their's harvest festival, Chung Ch'ui. In Japan, there are actually several kinds of harvest festivals. Here's a very good webpage about it - http://www.harvestfestivals.net/japanesefestivals.htm

I am not sure about that KFC thing(how about watermelons also?), but my parents used to give me a bunch of toy for christmas. It's like when I woke up on Dec 25th, there were toys beside my pillow that I had been hoping to have. They were such things as games, mini yonku, plastic models, etc. So as a kid I enjoyed christmas very much. Most other kids did too. But there wasn't a religious aspect to it at all. For me and probably for most of other Japanese it is a day when parents try to see their kids' happy faces and eat good foods, possibly not fried chiken and waffles. So the nature of the day doesn't matter. It could be called hanukkah or something if it doesn't change things much.

Japan isn't a christian country, the shops may be full of fake christmas and hallow'een **** but they don't celebrate christmas and hallow'een. Why on earth would they celebrate thanksgiving? Really. Think about it.