Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Christmas' Past and Present

10 days before Christmas and not a Christmas tree, holly bough, festive wreath nor twinkling Christmas light in sight. My office and home is naked without any seasonal decorations.

The boss doesn’t quite believe in decorating the office, after all we are a corporate and “professional organization”. We can’t have these trivial things lying around cluttering our office right? Plus, there isn’t a budget for a tree or anything. *Bah hum bug* I say.

My lovely but very practical dad on the hand, enjoys looking at decorations but thinks it’s a waste of good money to buy decorations and trees and ornaments and blablabla. Its only put up once a year and not many people visit our home (we go to our relatives homes during Christmas) so he thinks it’s not necessary. When we were younger, we did have a Christmas tree with really old and vintage decorations which would have been uber cool for today. Alas, the sad plastic tree and the box of decorations has been trashed by my mum who enjoys throwing away things. *Sniffles* I say.

Now thinking about decorations and Christmas, I am taken back to Christmas at the turn of the millennium when I celebrated my first Aussie Christmas with my host parents. 

My host family started decorating the whole entire house with lovely Christmas decorations ranging from  Angels to snowmen to reindeers to santas in mid-November. There were pillows and throws and candles and everything. My host mum who was good at quilting, made me a lovely Christmas stocking with my name stitched on it as well. We also went into the bush near my home and we had ourselves a real Christmas tree. How awesome is that??? 

My host brother and I decorated the tree happily after riding at the back of the ute with the tree thinking of how we would decorate the tree. Songs of Boney M’s classic Christmas carols (I know most of the songs by heart) blared out cheerily every day and the environment in our home was uber festive to say the least.

On Christmas day, I woke up to a full Christmas stocking packed with my very own copy of Boney M’s classic Christmas carols, a juicy ripe mango - which I ate happily in the front of the house, sticky juice running down my chin and the dogs Buddy and Bibby dancing around me waiting for the sweet nectar to fall - candies and some Christmas ornaments. 

I went for Christmas service with the host family and later Christmas mass at the Catholic church and spent the whole day with friends and my new host family who had all driven back home from different parts of Aussie and even from the US to celebrate together. 

We also had a huge BBQ in the garden and stuffed ourselves stilly with sausages, chicken, mushrooms and my host dad’s famous carbonara pasta! We also drove around the town several times a week to look at the super awesome homes decked out in lights and ornaments and motorized santa and reindeers guessing which house would win best decorated house that year. There was also candle light carols in the park one evening with hot sausages and drinks thereafter. That was probably one of the most best most festive Christmases ever!!!
*woot woo woot* I say.

I also remember one year when I was younger, about maybe 10ish… I donned my santarina outfit (I had to don a santarina outfit several years in a row when we went caroling), wrapped presents that I had bought for myself, displayed my hand made manager scene complete with sheep and star, and decorated the old plastic Christmas tree. My brother made fun of me and laughed and my “Christmas decorations”, however I was adamant on enjoying Christmas and enjoy it I did. I never bothered to wrap my own presents again (there was really no point to it I realized though I surely missed the sight of piles of presents on Christmas morning) nor did we ever see the green plastic Christmas tree again - my mum's doing I reckon.  
*sniffles sniffles*I say.

Nevertheless, I am so thankful for these different Christmases as they have only made my life richer and more colourful.

This year, we are having several simple gatherings with friends and family, attending our annual Christmas eve mass and having some office mini dos – nothing too fancy this time round. As for office decorations, unlike my previous years at the hovel and my previous torture chamber office where we had decorating contests and fun parties, I have the following this year:
  • A handout paper snowflake donated by a kind colleague, two M&M candy paper Christmas stockings from last years ‘The Sun’ papers.
  • A frosty the snowman magnet circa 2009.
  • A green bow I dug up from underneath my desk.
  • An adorable reindeer I named Rudolph (how original!)  from StarBucks from B.

I don’t think anyone would say my table is Christmasy.
*falalalalalalala* I say.

I will end this rather lengthy, nostalgic post with wishes for a Christmas one day with the works ~ Christmas tree with twinkling lights and pretty matching decorations, candles, wreathes, piles of presents underneath the tree in lovely wrapping paper and bows, festive pillow cases and all such other goodies! One day soon perhaps, one can certainly hope *grins*

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