Let’s Talk Christmas
Putting COVID aside… Christmas is usually a wonderful time of the year for most people. As you read this, I hope you are imagining all of the things you usually love and associate with Christmas. All of the special, shared traditions with your family, lots of joy from games and probably a whole lot of great food too which turns into some kind of food coma by the evening. If I am being honest with you, I - Ken - am a bit take it or leave it with Christmas. Don’t get me wrong Christmas is great and all, but it does come with a lot drama. Before we get into it, let me paint you a picture of how my standard Christmas usually goes and what Jo’s is usually like.
My usual Christmas
So, I have big family. I have a massive extended family as most Africans do. I have so many aunts and uncles to the point I am not sure which aunt or uncle is a biological relative or just someone I call aunt or uncle because they’re my elder. So, Christmas as I remember it (sounding as if I am old right now) would involve all my cousins, aunts and uncles staying around our flat or house from about the 18th December all the way until Boxing Day. It was literally organised chaos - but I loved it.
Being one of the younger siblings in the family I would always have to give up my room to my aunts and uncles which meant I’d sleep in the front room - which I also loved. That basically meant a 10-year-old me watching cartoons until 2am.
My usual Christmas Day would involve being woken up at around 7am by my parent or aunts and uncles beginning to cook in the kitchen. Put simply, it meant their bedrooms were vacated and I could get some extra sleep before coming downstairs for the main event - CHRISTMAS DINNER.
Christmas dinner included a plethora of foods. I’m talking jollof rice, various stews, roast chicken, lamb chops, plantain (pronounced PLAN-TIN - not up for discussion), rice cakes, rice sticks and way more. Once round one is done, round two begins immediately before the young one’s slump on the sofa and watch Christmas films.
Jo’s usual Christmas
Firstly, welcome to one of Jo’s most favourite times of the year - it must be because she usually hates the cold but seems to forget that fact over Christmas and does everything inside or outside to make the absolute most of it. Her Christmas usually starts on Christmas Eve by watching Christmas movies and playing ALL of the Christmas songs on the radio while eating mince pies. She’ll also decorate the tree as soon as possible whereas I am of the mindset of a week before Christmas is more than fine. Safe to say we don’t agree on this.
Christmas Day means opening presents with family, then going for a walk with them all before – put frankly - pigging out with all the food in the house, playing games and then vegging out on the sofa while watching Christmas TV together. Grandparents probably moan at some point and the family would start to become agitated and irritable by the afternoon. Of course, it would all be forgotten by the time the cheeseboard and Christmas memories came out – another festive and magical Christmas enjoyed by the whole family. Then the family leaves to go home and they prepare to do it all again on Boxing Day. You get the picture, right?!
So, the main traditions here include long winter walks, spending hours at the dinner table talking and then enjoying games as a family.
What those differences meant for our first Christmas together
So, when Jo and I started discussing our first Christmas together, you can imagine we had mixed expectations. The first challenge was trying to fake how excited I was for Christmas as Jo reeled off how special Christmas was to her and how she can’t wait until we make our own traditions and enjoy it together. Oh, her face was radiating disappointment as I was so obviously failing to convince her with my over-enthusiasm. Truth be told, it was going to take some time to work out how Christmas would work for us.
The whole ‘shall we spend Christmas together and how will it work?’ plan not only meant thinking about what we’d like it to be like… but also how it could fit in with both our family’s plans and expectations.
In case you’re thinking of skipping to the end of the article to see the answer, don’t expect to find one. I don’t really think there is a one size fits all answer… so you might as well just read on to hear our process.
So, what actually happened…
Firstly, we had to do a few Christmases separately. It took the pressure off and meant we didn’t have to worry about letting down one family - however we found out this made us pretty miserable! We’d be texting each other all day saying we missed each other and next year it would be different. But the truth of that was it wasn’t different for a few years for practical reasons… and it sucked. Being ‘the young couple’ somehow means in families that you separate and just go to your own family for Christmas even if you’ve been together for years… why is that?!
Secondly, I did manage to make going to Jo’s for Boxing Day work. It meant driving for hours to her family home and almost missing food - which isn’t ideal for anyone during the time of year. Who wants to miss out on the one time of the year when it’s socially acceptable to eat until you fall asleep?!
Since then, I have been to Jo’s for Christmas. That was… errr… shall we say… very different for me and not what I’m used to. That year we went out for Christmas dinner. I had to wear a suit - still not sure how I feel about that several years later. Christmas for me is usually never getting out of my pj’s, so having to wear a suit that restricts turkey space was a challenge.
Last year’s Christmas, Jo and I hosted my mum and little brother. It was as the first Christmas Jo was away from her family. She was upbeat throughout the lead up to it and we were excited to do things differently - after all, it was at our new flat and mum had said she’d do the cooking (and boyyyy I do love her cooking).
Things started off well and we all had a great catch up. Jo and I went to church on Christmas Day whilst my mum cooked. By the time we got back from church at barely 12pm, dinner was ready… definitely earlier than we were expecting. All Jo was craving for was caffeine… So, Jo had her coffee and didn’t eat until she’d finished whilst my mum, little brother and I tucked into our Christmas dinner. Jo made some effort and started on the plantain but wasn’t able to stomach the jollof rice at that time and that was just the start of how the day would end up.
Things quickly turned into 21 questions about our upcoming wedding (I’m sure there’ll be a wedding blog at some point). There was an argument over invites and whether we’d agree to wearing African clothing for our wedding reception. But, I mean, Jo being 5ft 2 and tiny would need a lot of tailoring so that she didn’t look like she’s walking around in a tent. That comment then caused mum to take offence and spent the rest of the day in her room. Jo ended up studying and we all had an early night. My little brother did the usual and spent his time winding me up throughout the important conversations. So last Christmas wasn’t quite what we’d hoped for. But does Christmas ever go to plan? Or am I just being a scrooge?
This year’s Christmas
This year COVID-19 happened. Due to having family members working on the frontline and spread across the South of England, the ‘three households bubble’ thing did fill up pretty quickly. And since then, everyone is now is chilling in Tier 4. Luckily for us we decided early on that the right thing to do for everyone was to have ‘a quiet one’ by ourselves – interspersed with Zoom calls of course (maybe even a cheeky quiz).
I can honestly say after all those years of Jo talking about how excited she gets around Christmas… I think I can finally say that I am coming around to the idea of it this year. We’ve been talking about how we can share the day and how we can do what we want to do with it this year - alongside some of Jo’s more ‘extreme’ ideas being thrown in of course. I really think this one this year will be a really good one.
This is the year we can start our own traditions and mix our cultures. Yes, Jo gets her long winter walk, but there will also be plantain on our table. We might have some traditional Christmas music on, but we’ll also definitely have Radio 1xtra on all day so we can have a whine whilst doing the cooking.
A couple of months ago Jingle Jangle, a Christmas film with black main characters, came out on Netflix – yes, a CHRISTMAS FILM with BLACK MAIN CHARACTERS. We gave it a watch and reflected on it. For the first time, I can actually relate to Christmas! I have finally seen a film where I can relate to the people in the Christmas film. The costumes with African print were so colourful and showed me how I can bring my flavour to Christmas. I’d definitely recommend watching it!
Jo and I now are so excited to have our first Christmas together to explore and blend our cultures together to make our own traditions - I am buzzed.
On reflection…
I guess what I’ve been reflecting on is that Christmas holds so many expectations for different people. And, this year in particular is going to be so different for so many people because of COVID. It is probably going to be a lot more difficult and, for some, a really sad Christmas. Although we aren’t able to see our families this year, we are going to enjoy this Christmas and make it special in every way we can.
We hope that by reading this, it’s helped you to think about what you find special at Christmas and to make the most of old traditions, but also embrace some new ones.
How are you guys spending Christmas? Or, if you are reading this after Christmas, how was it? How did you spend it and was it what you’d hoped it was, or was it different?
Merry Christmas everyone and a Happy New Year!
Thank you all for following us and we can’t wait to have more conversations with you in 2021 – let’s raise a glass to next year and what amazing things lie ahead!
