Christmas in Jamaica was sweet! It was about anticipation, not of gifts but just of Christmas--the pure joy of Christmas. Sweet, cool winter Christmas in the tropics.
As a child, Christmas took so long to come. It was an eternity--as long summer holidays. One way my sibs and I could tell that Christmas season was nearing, was by the white blooms on the "macca" (acacia) trees just on the ridge beyond our house. Whenever we saw those blooms we knew Christmas was just around the corner. Another way we could tell was by the sprucing up that began around the house. Christmas meant that we'd spring clean and paint the house in all new colors. I recall one Christmas we painted the house "duck egg blue." I think it was the last Christmas before my mother emigrated from the island. That blue didn't turn out quite like she wanted. It was the color in our house for all the years till we finally left and followed her "to foreign."
The slow approach of Christmas gave my father time to find and cure a nice ham leg. My aunties got the fruit drunk for the cake and pudding. And by the time Christmas eve rolled around, we kids would be knee deep in chores to make the house look good. Christmas Eve was for us, "Grand Market Night." In a place where most shops were closed by five and everything was scarce, Christmas Eve was the only time stores were opened late and stocked with stuff that was hard to get year round--stuff like dolls and all and sundry plastic toy goods made in China. (This was before lead was a care). Instead of presents, we kids traipsed around to the aunties and uncles with upturned palms into which would generously fall, the unheard of sums of $10s and $20s to fuel our Grand Market night shopping frenzy. We'd be our own Santa on this heady night. I never believed in Santa. It made no sense to me that this guy would traipse around dressed in furs, with reindeer and a sleigh. He'd be terribly hot there in Jamaica. Besides, we didn't have a chimney!
Christmas morning was filled with the smells of ham, cake and "new plastic toy" fumes. Oh yes and chocolate. Cadbury's Fruit and Nut! Pure olfactory joy. Church was involved and then a mighty feast of chicken or roast beef and "rice and peas." No turkey and stuffing for us. Not an island thing. A feast washed down with sweet, rum laced sorrel made from the dried fruit of the hibiscus plant. And a slice of black Jamaican fruit cake, laced with rum-drunk fruit.
Christmas was also the time for the annual school pageant of songs and plays. I loved getting the lead. I remember one year I wasn't chosen for the lead but went home and memorised it as if I were the understudy. Call it voodoo or wishful thinking, but the next day,Lanya Smith fell ill and there I was prepared with all the lines.
Christmas of my childhood was sweet indeed. I have no memories of gifts, just the anticipation of that lovely day upon which an entire year seemed wait! I miss those days of simplicity and joy!
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Click here to see what other J'cans miss about Christmas a "yaad" now dat dem deh abroad!
http://www.jamaicans.com/culture/christmas/MissJAatChristmas.shtml
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