Celebrating Christmas has always been about lots of food, lots of family and a general all round celebration of emotional warmth, but celebrating Christmas in forty degree heat has always been a bit of a challenge.
Although I'm English - and therefore all of my associations
with Christmas are of the traditional English variety - I've lived in
Of course, the argument can be made that Christmas is about the birth of Jesus, so it doesn't matter how hot it is, but it must be remembered that the nativity is only one facet of the holiday, with the rest coming to us from the various winter festivals that predate Christ.
I will talk more about separating the two in other posts, but it is enough to say here that nearly every tradition we hold onto at Christmas is derived from a winter festival and therefore is rather ridiculous in a hot climate.
Let's face it - people can usually be divided into two categories. Some love the heat and some prefer the cold. I am the latter, but there are many who enjoy traveling to a hot climate every Christmas. Every December, the beaches at Bondi become packed with tourists who've chosen a sand and sea barbecue over the traditional turkey roast. They revel in avoiding the snow and the long nights.
Out of necessity, Australian culture has also adapted Christmas. Every year, the traditional Christmas decorations, books and food are joined with Australian variations.
The Twelve Days of Christmas might pop up as a children's book with the various gifts transformed into Aussie sun-drenched icons like emus, beach life-savers and gum trees. Antipodean Carols are written, describing Santa's sleigh being pulled by six white boomers (kangaroos). Prawns are more common than Christmas Pudding.
These adaptations are understandable, as Australians want the holiday to be relevant to them. So, many choose to remove the winter trappings and turn the holiday into a festival of all things Australian.
To me, these things seem bizarre, but then my insistence on eating a hot roast dinner, when the air conditioner can barely keep the paint from stripping off the walls, would also baffle many of my neighbours.
The European ex-pats do still try to hang onto the original winter festivities. It is possible to see the occasional window with fake snow painted in the corners, creating a strange climactic paradox. In the mountain areas, many also celebrate Christmas again in July - our midwinter - by organising large feasts and running elaborate parties.
But something is lost. These are our attempts to hang onto something that struggles to find relevance down here, but, we insist, relevant it is. Christmas may have started as a winter festival hundreds of years before Christ, as the hardships of life in the bleak midwinter of ancient history brought communities closer together in a fight for survival, but it is remembered in the same push for community and family and joy, even though the original winter trials have gone.
Even so, spare a thought for the poor guy in the Santa suit and beard when the temperatures hit the top of the thermometer!
