Description of problems is informative and pretty much conforms to what I'd expect. Acceptance of 'new' ideas comes hard for many.

In many places, from a primarily religious holiday to a primarily family&friends one. Over 1000 years ago it changed from a mostly religious marking of the Winter solstice to a (religious) Christian holiday. But then it, and other things, has different meaning for different people (for kids it may just mean getting more stuff, for many it may mean a good excuse to party, etc.)

Thanksgiving quite obviously means different things to different people (Americans, non-Americans, Native Americans, food freaks, family freaks, restaurant owners, patriots, Christians, patriot/Christian & Christian/patriot Americans who can't separate the 2 in their heads, etc.). For most people in the US I think it's probably an American-nationalist thing, among others, & is probably that for non-Americans who pay attention to it as well, though one without too much flag-waving - still, it's sort of used to sacralize the nation.

I'm not sure meanings are lost (Though that can happen) so much as that they change. Example: Christmas, for many.

Gompo's right - modern human use of animals as merely objectivized matter is pretty disgusting. Interesting that this is counteracted by people's sentimentality and generally good relations with their pets. Makes one appreciate people who merely hunt for food, or even traditional animal-raising farmers.

@I would advise against the Skin disease hospital on Renminxilu - I couldn't get a clear diagnosis out of them and spent some money on meds that worked and some on meds that didn't seem to do much of anything. They use a combination of Trad. Chinese Med. & modern scientific med, which might have something to say for it but in my instance I never felt they were really clear about what they were doing. I'm sure they could do a simple mole surgery though.