pastry). On December 24 and 23 housewives make the Christmas cake with a cross in the middle and which are subsequently offered to the elderly and children. Children go singing carols from house to house either before or on Christmas Day. People go to church early the morning of Christmas on December 25. Christmas morning after church there is the practice to become the "pork batches," served with wine to open the appetite, and "thick," done by Eve, which is boiled pork with plenty of lemon that is left to clot overnight. Pork dishes are a hallmark of Greek Christmas. In many Greek cities and ports like Thessaloniki, Volos, Patra, and the Greek Islands, traditional Christmas boats are decorated. And in many central squares of the country a large Christmas tree is decorated, where many of the Christmas festivals take place. Some of the Christmas festivals in Greece are , where all the residents of the city of Kastoria are delivered in a separate Dionysian revelry, with the accompaniment of folk melodies bodies all traditional musical sounds of the area. It is an ancient tradition whose origin has been lost to time. In Mani there are beliefs about demonic and other supernatural beings, who come from the Twelve Days of Christ as the Epiphany. These are the goblins and say that they are the descendants God Pan or Satyrs, who jumped from the mythology in the Christian life. Italy The Feast of the Immaculate Conception () on December 8 is a national holiday in Italy. Christmas decorations, including the presepe (nativity scene), as well as the Christmas tree, are usually put up on this day. Some modern takes on this holiday involve them hanging vultures to symbolize the cleaning of their spirits. Saint Lucy's Day () is celebrated as a Catholic holiday in Sicily and the northern regions of Italy on the supposed shortest day of the year, which is December 13. St. Lucy (Santa Lucia) is the patron saint of the city of Syracuse. Evening candlelight processions called the Parade of Light are conducted and are followed by the Feast of St. Lucy. Sicilians pay tribute to a miracle performed by St. Lucy during a famine in 1582. At that time, she brought a flotilla of grain-bearing ships to starving Sicily, whose citizens cooked and ate the wheat without taking time to grind it into flour. Thus, on St.