The fight before Christmas

Harry never got along with his wife Claire's parents but the relationship reached breaking point last Christmas when they came to stay for a month. After three weeks of forced jollity and a couple of glasses of Christmas champagne, Harry cracked. He cornered Claire upstairs as she was putting the baby down for a nap.

'He started hissing at me,' Claire recalls. ''Do something! I've had enough, they've got to go, your mum's obsessively uptight and your dad's such a lecturing bore, and Claire, if they make one more comment about the children's behaviour I'll shove them out of the door myself'. He was getting louder and louder. It was so upsetting to have him criticising my parents, especially on Christmas Day, but there was much worse to come. As we walked back down the stairs the whole room was sitting in frozen silence. I could hear the baby crying over the monitor in the living room. They'd heard every word.

'It sounds like a scene from a movie, but when it happens in real life there's no happy Hollywood ending. Relations between my parents and my husband have been strained and difficult ever since.'

Hong Kong psychologist Lesley Lewis says family get-togethers at Christmas often cause friction. 'There can be conflicts that haven't been resolved for years, often there's too much alcohol, which only intensifies feelings, and people forget that not everybody is going to get along. They're getting together because it's Christmas, and some people feel like they are doing it out of obligation and responsibility, not because it's what they really want.'

Maggie can relate to this. She has spent many Christmases playing mortifying party games at her aunt's home with a gaggle of old relatives and neighbours. 'Embarrassing doesn't even begin to describe it. Fruit was always a big theme. Just imagine having to pass oranges from person to person down a line without using your hands, or apples mouth to mouth with 80-year-old Joe from next door. Or acting out the animal character hidden under your plate - horrible. I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me.'

For many, Christmas family gatherings are characterised by disagreements about moral and political issues.