After some time away, including a Christmas celebration ‘upcountry,’ as we call our rural Kenyan homes, I am back at my desk in Nairobi. I am reflecting on the festivities and attempting to articulate the lessons learned from the eventualities. I believe that everything that happens in life is a lesson that teaches us something vital about the world around us and ourselves. My thoughts are philosophical, centred on the impact COVID-19 has had on the way we function in our daily lives, including how we celebrate holidays such as Christmas.

Christmas and COVID

COVID-19’s losses and lockdowns put a damper on Christmas in 2020. Despite the emergence of ostensibly more dangerous COVID variants, we felt safer and better protected in 2021 thanks to vaccinations provided by Pfizer, Astra Zeneca, Modena, and Johnson & Johnson, and Christmas 2021 promised to be more cheerful than Christmas 2020. Unfortunately, this was not to be the case for my family. The COVID apprehension dampened our Christmas celebrations. Our ‘upcountry’ festivities ended prematurely.

Despite careful planning for a large family reunion, the unpredictability of COVID-19 and its variants forced us to modify and minimize our Christmas celebrations. Several members of the family tested positive for COVID on Christmas Eve. We went into a mild panic, isolated ourselves, and cancelled gatherings! We tried to stay positive, but the fear of COVID overshadowed our festivities with limitation. I felt cheated. These are indeed trying times, and frustration is inevitable!

I am frustrated and exhausted by the constant uncertainty of COVID! Last-minute cancellations, last-minute changes in plans, and the fear of being close to other people are wearing me down! It is about time things returned to normal! I would like for ‘everything,’ especially the Christmas season, to rebound! My spirit longs for Christmases past, despite the reality of knowing that life will never be the same after the ‘COVID era’ and that we must adapt to this “New Normal”. I want a return to Christmases full of colour and excitement rather than dread and restraint. This past Christmas brought back memories and yearnings for large family reunions, joyful singing, feasting, and all the other elements of the Christmas season that we had come to take for granted.

Build up to Christmas

Sekukulu in Luganda, Krismasi in Kiswahili, or Eyenga ya Mbótama in Lingala has always been one of the most important days on our calendar. Before the “pandemic”, Christmas lasted more than one day for most of us. It was not limited to just the 25th December.  We took advantage of every opportunity to prolong the festivities for as long as possible. In East Africa, the Christmas season typically lasts three weeks, beginning around the 18th December and ending around the 8th January, with merriment peaking during the Christmas week.

Before the pandemic, the Christmas season began in November in Uganda, my birth country, and Kenya, my home country, when radio stations began broadcasting Christmas songs. The displays of Christmas merchandise and decorations in shopping malls, shops, merchants, and street hawkers on every corner accelerated the pace. Children picked up the Christmas tempo in early December, before schools closed, with Nativity plays and Christmas crafts. Schools, offices, and non-essential services began to close their doors by mid-December as the commercial sector ratcheted up the festive spirit with loud music and more displays of vibrant decorations and other Christmas paraphernalia.d.

Significance of Christmas

As I reflect, I am perplexed why Christmas, a borrowed celebration from our colonial past that we have infused with aspects of our culture, has such a profound effect on us. Could it be the warm weather and plenty of sunshine this time of year or the yearlong build-up of anticipation? Perhaps the bright flowers in bloom, such as the bougainvillaea, or the upbeat atmosphere created by families and friends gathered together? Is it the multi-coloured balloons, Christmas trees, ribbons, cards, and glittering rainbow lights that adorn people’s homes, shops, streets, and places of worship? Is it because we have commercialized Christmas? It could be because our generosity and kindness infect us or because the festive cheer unleashes our spirit of freedom and abandon! Whatever the case, Christmas in my region of Africa is uniquely East African. It is more than just Christ’s birth! It is about reunions, sharing, relaxing, freedom, and reconnecting with many facets of life that we often overlook throughout the year.

Christmas in East Africa is my best time of year! I would not be anywhere else unless necessary. It is my favorite time of year because I am thrilled with all of the activities! My spirits soar, my hopes fly high, and I radiate joy. I am not entirely sure what it is about this period that makes me feel this way. It is hard to pinpoint and define, but there is always a solid sentimental feeling that overcomes me! A big part of me will never forget and cherish festive season memories from past years. Christmas 2021 taught me not to take anything for granted anymore and savour and appreciate every moment because life is not guaranteed. Undoubtedly, the most important lesson I learned from last Christmas is gratitude. I am thankful to be here writing and telling you about CHRISTMAS!

I would like to share some interesting observations and reminiscences from previous Christmas seasons in the spirit of life awareness, as I also try to remain optimistic about the future.

“Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful”. – Anonymous

CHRISTMAS IN EAST AFRICA IS MANY THINGS

Christmas is, without a doubt, the most anticipated time of year for many of us, owing to the extended, all-inclusive break from our daily lives. While Christians observe the birth of Jesus Christ on 25th December, others participate for a wide range of reasons. Even in a predominantly Islamic city like Mombasa, it is customary for people of all faiths to greet their neighbours with a ‘Merry Christmas’.  Meanwhile, non-Christian vendors, particularly in Nairobi, Kampala, Dar es Salaam, and Mombasa, sell Santa hats and Christmas lights and decorate their shops for the festive season. Christmas is a time for family and friend reunions, preferably with copious amounts of alcohol and delectable food. It is a time to reconnect with ‘home’, wherever that may be, and partake in inherited, modified, or concocted Christmas traditions.

We look forward to Christmas and the end of the year because we can finally unwind, relax, and have fun. We spend the entire year planning and shopping for Christmas and end-of-year celebrations that we want to remember for years to come.

“I am not an African because I was born in Africa but because Africa was born in Me.” – Kwame Nkrumah

Christmas Traditions

Most of our Christmas, traditions, such as Father Christmas, Christmas Carols, food, and Christmas decorations, are inherited from our British colonial past and the commercialism and materialism of the contemporary world. We have modified and incorporated our cultures and habits into the inherited traditions to create a unique East African Christmas. Supermarkets, hotels, restaurants, coffee shops, and places of worship exhibit this unique element during the festive season. These places decorate their spaces with images of Father Christmas, Christmas trees, balloons, brilliant multi-coloured lights, and other Christmas ornaments as part of the festive spirit. Likewise, banks and other utility service providers put up the obligatory Christmas tree and use the period to promote their products or services by offering ‘Christmas Specials’.

The Christmas tree

The Christmas tree is a tradition that we have fully embraced. We contribute to global deforestation by cutting down many cypress trees to have a Christmas tree in our homes. The cypress can be thick and healthy or thin and lean, and it can be a whole tree or just a branch. It makes no difference because all we want is a Christmas tree. We adorn the trees with baubles, sparkling tinsel, ribbons, lights, garlands, and even white cotton wool to replicate snow. We have recently resorted to the simpler option of artificial trees manufactured in China. The artificial trees come fully embellished with plastic ornaments and snow. We put up the Christmas tree at least a week before Christmas in my house. I do this with my daughters while we recall and talk about our past Christmases and many other shared memories. Our baubles and decorations have become heirlooms. My daughters made some of them in junior school Christmas Craft classes, while we have collected the rest over time since they were very young.

Father Christmas

We inherited Father Christmas and his aliases, such as Santa Claus. We adopted the big guy, who visits our houses at night dressed in red and white, riding his sleigh and crawling through the gaps in our walls to leave gifts for our children. When I was about eight years old, I learned about consequences and the retribution of an angry God. My younger brother and sister received half a chocolate bar in their socks that Christmas because, as my mother explained, God was very angry with them as they had been very naughty during the year. For many years after that, I was terrified of offending God and his messenger, Father Christmas!

Most of us do not know or understand Father Christmas’s origins, but his legacy lives on, particularly in our cities. During December, many of our shopping malls have a person dressed in a red costume, complete with a long white beard and a stuffed protruding belly, who walks around ringing his bell and greeting children. As trade with China has expanded across the continent, the popularity of a Chinese-made artificial Father Christmas has increased. Father Christmas could be as little as 2 feet tall or as tall as 6 feet. He can be a gigantic, a sturdy plaster-of-Paris statue or an air-filled floater, but his pink face and crimson cheeks correctly identify him. A 4ft air-filled Father Christmas stood in a Nairobi supermarket a few years ago, his torso swinging in circles and his legs stuck in one spot as if he had drunk all the Christmas gin! If you got too close to him, he would yell a boisterous “Ho Ho!” “Merry Christmas!” He frightened me! I am sure he traumatised many children!

Christmas Carols

Another Christmas tradition that we have embraced is the singing of Christmas carols. Schools, churches, shopping malls, and radio and television stations begin singing and broadcasting Christmas carols as early as November, if not earlier. Every Saturday beginning in mid-November, my local shopping mall hires a choir to sing Carols! By mid-December, the intensity of daily singing increases by about five octaves.

Since we are a vibrant, continent we add spice to Christmas carols by injecting dances and displays from diverse cultures into the singing. It is common to see colourful cultural dancers performing alongside carol singers everywhere in East Africa.

We sing carols in a variety of languages, often with a twist! In Western Kenya, we commonly mix and interchange our Ds’ for Ts’ and our Ps’ for Bs’ in speech, resulting in discrepancies in pronouncing some words. One Christmas in Kitale church, the 1970 Spanish Christmas song ‘Feliz Navidad, Próspero Ao y Felicidad’ by José Feliciano, which translates to ‘Merry Christmas, prosperous year, and happiness,’ became ‘Police na vita, police na vita‘ in Kiswahili, which ironically translates to ‘Police and war, police and war – maybe an comment on the policing system in Kenya.

Reunions

The Migration

Many families spend the better part of the year apart, with parents and grandparents living ‘upcountry,’ while the younger generations live in towns, cities, and abroad. Typically, Christmas is the time of year when we can all be reunited. At this time of year, we ‘trek home’ in large numbers! ‘Home’ is generally defined as the geographic location of our ancestral roots. It is a homecoming for diaspora East Africans and a return to rural settings for urban dwellers. We never genuinely consider the diaspora or urban areas as “home”!

Airlines flying to East Africa’s capital cities see an exponential rise in bookings during the festive season. Our airports see an increase in passenger traffic and cargo handling as our diaspora relatives return home for Christmas. Our cities endure the most of urban-rural migration, as towns become empty and abandoned as we return to our “villages”. Vehicular traffic in our towns slows to a trickle, while traffic on city-exit roads increases. The highway connecting Nairobi and the Western Region in Kenya becomes a focus of traffic congestion, with numerous accidents reported as buses crammed with people, pickup trucks transporting furniture to rural areas, and 4×4 fuel guzzlers competing to arrive ‘home’ before Christmas day.

The drawback of this migration is that empty urban homes in cities become a target for home break-ins. Because of the increase in home break-ins, crime statistics skyrocket, and the Police routinely ‘advises’ the public to take extra precautions with their lives and property. We usually return ‘home’ a day or two before Christmas to assist with Christmas preparations such as clearing bushes, sprucing up the house, brewing local beer, and obtaining fresh food and other provisions for the feast, if we did not bring them from the city.

The primary motivation for our return is to spend time with our extended families and justify the construction of magnificent houses in our villages. We return home in style to impress our relatives. We want them to understand that we have accomplished great things and that our lives in the diaspora or the city have been prosperous. I have heard that Christmas is a perfect opportunity for our city children who usually speak English, French, Portuguese, or some urban slang to learn or practise their mother tongues from their rural relatives. Often, the festive season is the only time our urban children get to cook traditional dishes, do housework, play outside in the open, climb trees, get muddy, and possibly see and care for farm animals for the first time. Moreover, it may be the only time of year when they can disconnect from their electronic devices and the emotional stress of city life.

The Emotions

Family reunions have a way of bringing out the best and worst in us, and the festive season is no exception. Long-standing family feuds resurface as relatives try to resolve long-standing land ownership disputes and other family conflicts. One of the most common family conflicts occurs when diaspora relatives return home only to discover that their “most trusted” relative has defrauded them a vast amount of money. They realize that WhatsApp photos are of a different family mansion.

On the other hand, long-lost relatives frequently make an appearance during the Christmas season, much to the delight and relief of the rest of the family.

Family reunions away from the city provide an opportunity for many of us to de-stress and reconnect with nature. I am always delighted to see zebras and antelopes grazing, as well as baboons and theirantics, along the Naivasha-Nakuru Highway near Gilgil. On any other day, I would overlook them as a natural part of our East African landscape, but I am more aware and observant in December. I appreciate the breath-taking East African landscapes, such as the Kerio Valley, Mount Longonot’s crater, and the road that winds along the escarpments of the Great Rift Valley.

While Christmas allows rural residents to reconnect with their city relatives, it also affords them to indulge in rare treats like Christmas cakes, sweets, whiskies, and sodas while collecting ‘taxes’ and dues from their city relatives.

The festive season is an excellent time to restock city pantries with free or low-cost organically grown fresh goods like fruit and vegetables for urban relatives. I prefer to buy my potatoes and papaya from farmers along Elgeyo Marakwet’s rural roads and my maize meal from Western Kenya’s maize mills, which are bustling with activity as orders from city dwellers grow.

COVID may have slowed this East African migration pattern. Nonetheless, it has not diminished our desire to return ‘home’. Migration and family reunions, I believe, will return to our calendars in time for Christmas 2022.

“Bringing people together is what I call ‘Ubuntu,’ which means ‘I am because we are.’ Far too often people think of themselves as just individuals, separated from one another, whereas you are connected and what you do affects the whole world. When you do well, it spreads out; it is for the whole of humanity” — Desmond Tutu

Shopping

During Christmas, East African cities and towns come alive with people and shopping. We witness the marketing and consumerism associated with Christmas in the West in our city centres.

December brings an increase in the volume of shoppers in retail locations. Prices on practically everything increases by a factor of two or three, most notably transportation costs and food prices. Meat prices quadruple by Christmas Eve due to price raises by butchers and abattoirs.

We spend a large portion of our financial savings on food, beverages, and new clothes in the spirit of the season. The purchase of new clothing for Christmas is our most unusual shopping habit. Since I can remember, my parents have always purchased new clothes for us to wear on Christmas Day, and this is a tradition I have continued to this day. Most East Africans will tell you that they start looking for unique Christmas clothes and storing them in September because clothing prices rise as the festive season approaches. After all, retailers are confident that demand for unique Christmas clothes will exceed the capacity of second hand markets and tailors. Because there is such a high demand for new clothes, tailors frequently disappoint customers who expect to receive their Christmas outfits on time.

When we are in the holiday spirit, it is always tempting to buy items that are not ordinarily on our shopping lists. We buy gifts for our family and friends and stock up on special treats for ourselves. Many of us purchase meats and other gourmet delicacies based on advertisements, ‘special offers’, or because they catch our eye, not because they are necessary. December is a hectic month for butchers, farmers, and brewers as we gear up for a memorable holiday.

Before the ‘pandemic’, the more affluent East Africans frequently travelled to Western and Asian cities to buy Christmas decorations, gifts, Christmas cakes, pudding, mince pies, clothing, and alcoholic beverages, among other things. Online shopping has emerged as a viable alternative to traditional shopping due to COVID travel restrictions.

Christmas Food & Feasting

Many workers in Kenya and Uganda receive their December salaries in the middle of the month, which prompts them to start their festivities, including binge drinking immediately. Depending on one’s financial status and social circles, the celebrations may continue into the second week of January.   Christmas is not just a time to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. It is also a time to overindulge in food, alcoholic beverages, and other festive fare. The holiday season brings with it a sense of liberation, allowing us to let go of restraint and revel in excess. Our East African Christmas traditions revolve around food and feasting. We do not have a special Christmas meal, but we use our best cooking skills to enhance our everyday meals.

At this time of year, the passion for food lends a distinct flavour to everyday delicacies such as Matooke in Uganda and Nyama Choma, roasted meat in Kenya. Nyama Choma is seasoned with curry powder, turmeric, black pepper, lemon juice, and garlic and served with ugali, kachumbari, and green vegetables. We also provide rice, chapati, matooke, githeri, fruits, Christmas cake, sodas, and beverages as part of the meal. Even regional drinks, like Uganda’s Waragi and Kenya’s Muratina, improve quality during the holiday season.

The food tastes different during the holiday season and has a lasting effect on the taste buds. My taste buds can still recall a special custard pudding with RIBENA that my mother made for Christmas lunch when I was a child. I am not sure if the rarity of such puddings in our house daily made my mother’s custard pudding taste so special or if it was the spirit of Christmas.

To ensure that everyone has enough to eat, and even some to share with their neighbours, we often prepare Christmas meals in larger quantities than usual. Traditionally, any extra food from Christmas lunch is given away or saved for Boxing Day meals. Food preparation for the holiday season may begin months in advance. Days, weeks, and even months in advance, local farmers start raising their livestock specifically for the festivities. As part of our preparations, my daughters and I bake plenty of gingerbread using a special recipe that has become a family secret and Christmas cakes whose fruits are soaked in Rum at least a month in advance. We make almond biscuits and lemon drizzle cake. These have become our Christmas staples and our contribution to the large family gatherings.

Time seems to fly by during the festive season, especially on Christmas day. All activities, including meals, are intertwined. We might eat breakfast at noon, lunch at teatime, and dinner at night in my family. Usually, we set up a buffet-style table and replenish it as people come and go with whatever foods and drinks are available. We also invite our friends and neighbours to join us for the festivities. Frequently, friends and neighbours who are not Christians join us in our celebrations of life as a Christian family. The gathering and sharing are not unique to my family. People of all ages and backgrounds come together to eat, chat, sing, and dance in homes, churches, community centres, and villages throughout the region.

My favourite aspect of Christmas is the expression of generosity and kindness, which is a fundamental part of the Christmas spirit. With the fun and humour that we share, we experience a sense of compassion and benevolence that we do not usually experience much the year because of the stresses of surviving in the cities.

CHRISTMAS DAY

Christmas Day celebrations begin at midnight on Christmas Eve across the East African region. At midnight, the church bells ring in unison to signal the start of the long-awaited day. Christmas carols and praise songs echo in many towns and villages. Christians, singing popular Christmas carols, passed by our house in Kabale, Uganda, my childhood village, on their way to midnight Mass at Rushorooza Cathedral high up on the hill. After this service, most people went straight home to start the party and get ready for the big Christmas lunch.

My preferred time to attend church as a child was the midnight church service on Christmas Eve. I enjoyed the ambience created by the candles and mood lighting in the church, which enhanced the Christmas carols and near-whispered midnight prayers. Attending the midnight church service also enabled me to sleep in on Christmas morning while still getting enough time to help with the preparations for the feast on December 25th.

That was in my younger days; today, like many other Christians, we get up early on Christmas morning, put on our new clothes, and go to church. It is common to see well-dressed people walking to the church through villages, roads, and paths. As we, both devoted and casual Christians, all seem to feel the need to confer with our faith at Christmas, we pack our churches to the brim. We spend most of Christmas morning in church, listening to the same old sermon we have heard a thousand times. The priests and bishops encourage us to follow Christ, who exemplified love and selflessness by ‘being born of woman’ and dying on the cross for us.

The repeated message does not detract from the excitement of the Christmas season because of the upbeat atmosphere. Children’s Nativity plays are my favourite moment of Christmas services because, inevitably, a child or two will go off script and cause giggles and laughter, which breaks the poignancy of some churches, despite the festive singing, dancing, and praying.

The Love Offering and Communion are the most entertaining parts of the service. The tempo in church picks up a few notches at this point, and the singing and dancing become more intense. Worshippers proceed to the altar and form a line to place their offering, money, in a basket held by ushers or to receive ‘The Body of Christ’ in the form of a Eucharist wafer. Though these two observances honour the infant Jesus, I believe they are also an opportunity to show off our new clothes, shoes, and hairstyles.

When the final prayer concludes, we mingle with other churchgoers, exchanging ‘Merry Christmas’ greetings before returning home to share the much-anticipated Christmas feast and celebrate together.

BOXING DAY

Boxing Day or Sikukuu ya kupeana vijisanduku in Kiswahili, the day after Christmas, is a public holiday in East Africa. Although it is supposed to be about exchanging gifts, it is more about sleeping off the previous day’s hangover, finishing off the remnants of the Christmas extravagances, which is usually drinking the left over beer, and wondering where all the money one had saved for the festive season went in just one day. Sometimes, we visit family and friends and collect fresh foods to ferry back to the city and towns.

“The spirit of Christmas is the spirit of love and of generosity and of goodness. It illuminates the picture window of the soul, and we look out upon the world’s busy life and become more interested in people than in things”. – Anonymous