Umm, Christmas is a great marketing ploy and all that but I can see why many in Japan would not be all that happy with it. What people don't ever say, and the Japanese have no way of guessing, is that Christmas is always underpinned by sorrow. Jesus is born to die on the cross. The poor go hungry unless those that have more reach out to those in need. Express affection to your loved ones while you and they are still living and remember the ghosts of the past, for they are watching. So, to celebrate Christmas merely as a fun if stressful holiday of too many parties and giving presents and getting and trying to ram romance for couples in on top of it...well, that's a pretty tall order without anything to support it because it has no meaning. Simple affection isn't it

So, Christmas in Japan? Take it or leave it, I would say. Meh. Why celebrate a half understood notion that just costs everybody money? Japan has plenty of festivals that refer to exactly the feelings I was expressing. They just happen not to be in December.