Christmas Like No Other By Toba Adedeji

If memories are food many of us would have been obese while some people will never have a balance diet of it because theirs are loaded with trash that they don’t want same experience of them. Going down the memory lane of childhood especially approach to Christmas celebration in a child’s perspective; one will like to be lost in those memories.

If an elixir had been concocted to elongate the childhood status many of us will have patronize the seller because of the inexplicable joy that accompany Christmas celebration. During that time we don’t have any bill to pay or be responsible for any charge expect the mundane things we want to purchase as part of festive material; our parent will definitely care for that.

Sequel to Christmas, schools will be organizing carol whereby pupils will painstakingly learn all the script for drama, songs, and chorography, memory verses from the bible which are purported to be presented during their carol program. It of no doubt that the colors to be flaunted during these periods will be definitely red, green and white which is a scepter of Santa Claus who always come from Rome.

During our time as a child, we have more regard for Father Christmas (Santa Claus) compared to what the norm has turn to now, when I saw one ridding motorcycle at Ola-Iya, Junction, Osogbo, Osun State. We so much believe in the allusion of him coming from Rome to give gifts to his promising sons and daughters.

At childhood, the euphoria of Christmas would have seized the community atmosphere as fireworks sound will be an indicator that something significant is set to happen. The gist from friends at school will be built around what each parent are doing and buying for the celebration that is coming. I trust entrepreneurs because market would have been filled with several glittering products that are revealing what is about to happen in town. We will look for the used notebook, tearing them sheet by sheet and making several cut on them to create a kind of shapes for design. Thereafter, we shall all proceed to Mama Korede Alate’s booth, who always made available all Christmas products, to buy some colors like; galura, arokin(blue), mokore and others which will be use to paint those papers that had been cut before hanging them on the rope in our sitting room as part of decoration while the Christmas light will second it.

If you walk around premises of many schools all what the pupils will be discussing is about what their parents are doing to make the season a best one for them. The clothes, shoes and other exotic materials is what the discussion will be built around. Many parents would have bought damask, lace, Ankara and foulard. Other big boys in our area will have used their long time savings gotten from menial jobs to buy JB style trousers. As part of preparatory to the fashion of the Yuletide our big brothers would have used glat (chemical used on hair) to blow their hair.

As a child, I and other children do chant several choruses that show our excitement about the festive period. We will be scrounging for money to buy some of the accessories purposefully design for the celebration and other consumable product. From my faint memory, we buy some fireworks popularly called “Disco light” ,we light it up then we start singing song like; “ina olorun kii joo eniyan, to’ ba jo eniyan, kii pa yan (God’s fire doesn’t burn, if it burn, it doesn’t kill). This on its own makes us to be happy everyday of December in a particular year.

Follow me as we continue to drink from the oasis of these memories. Course of the rural mentality, the best food we eat rice on the Christmas day is rice with the best of meat from our livestock, chicken. Money given to us from friendly disposition of our Dad, Mom and Elders around our neighborhood will be used to buy 7UP drink and other coloring drinks. Many children go extreme to beg for money by subtle way of visiting their parent’s friends
Without further ado, as all of us are growing older, our bones are growing tired, our vessels are growing weaker, as grass grows and it wither, as sun rises and it set, as storms gathered rain fall and the cloud is clear, we started seeing bigger and responsibilities are perching on us like kiwi bird of Zealand, I now took a critical look at Christmas celebration, now started seeing that we enjoyed the memories of childhood of Christmas compared with what we are set to see in years to come. So it is imperative for all parents and guidance to let their children to explore the joy and how the season will serve them.