The Swedish Christmas Straw Goat

Christmas is less than a month away, so it's time to put up your Christmas straw goat. That's what the town of Gävle, Sweden has done every year since 1966, although residents support the practice for different reasons:

Half of the people take pride in the giant animal, while the other half take equal pride in attempting to burn it down. To date, the goat has been burnt down more times than it has survived the Christmas period. Large sums of money apparently change hands, as people bet on whether it will survive, or how long it lasts before being burnt down and previous attempts to sabotage it have even included the bribing of security guards

http://www.thelocal.se/37594/20111127/# -via The Agitator | Photo: Wikimedia Commons