With every mall, shop and freakin’ shebeen looking like Santa Claus threw up all over it, I’ve decided to avoid the general CBD area until…well… until. As you can probably tell, I’m not big on Christmas time.
Especially not the part where I have to fight off countless people just to land a decent spot in a queue to pay for my bread and milk. And these days, I can’t even tell whether the Christmas rush has started or whether this crazy hustle and bustle of endless queues and waiting and hordes of people everywhere is just what Windhoek has become.
I can’t remember ever getting excited about carols over shopping mall speaker systems, tinsel on every possible surface and baubles hanging from white and green plastic trees standing at attention like they belong anywhere near the southern hemisphere. I’m not big on Christmas and what’s more, I’m not big on the frantic rush to buy anything and everything in sight just because television ads, magazines and pamphlets tell you to.
For as long as I can remember, every year around October I’ve been overcome with the most overwhelming urge to run and hide and not show my face until everyone has stopped saying “happy new year”. So until about mid-February. If I never hear ‘Feliz Navidad’ again, it will be too soon. Red and white hats do nothing for me, even on the cutest of babies. And you can miss me with glitter, tinsel and any kind of shiny wrapping paper and decorations. But I’m not the grinch who stole Christmas. I promise.
It’s just that the idea of a commercialised Christmas with plastic trees and snow spray in shop windows while the sun smiles a scorching 40ºC down on us will never take root with me as a Namibian. Presents are lovely and I will never say no to a new pair of socks, a corny t-shirt or even bath salts that I’ll never use, but I’m not about to bankrupt myself just to show up the Coetzees and drape my Khomasdal house in fairy lights. Because Lord knows that even if I could afford it, it would never be worth it. I’m not here for that.
But the whole families getting together, eating way too much and arguing about which answer should be allowed in 30 Seconds and which shouldn’t part, though, I can live with. The way I see it, whatever you do for Christmas, as long as you spend it with the people who mean the most to you, you’re doing it right. And if that means I have to suffer through Christmas carols about reindeers and snow in the middle of summer just because my mom likes it, that’s what I’ll do.
Besides, I’m pretty sure I’ll be singing my own version this year… “Dashing through the sand, in a one-man Dankie B…”
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