Coming Up on Christmas
For those who are wondering where we are spending Christmas, we have come out of the village for a couple weeks to share it with colleagues of ours. We are staying in Bamenda, a large city in the Northwest, and are consuming massive amounts of unhealthy, Christmas goodies. We arrived a couple days ago and were thrilled to see our friends. The other night, the kids saw a little advent lesson put together by our friends and it has been fun to celebrate in our own cultural way. Cookies, fudge, pancakes with syrup, peppermint, hot chocolate, Bing Crosby, Vince Guaraldi, Andrew Peterson, a Christmas tree and stockings hung on the bookshelf.
By living in a culture different than our own, we are beginning to see our own cultural habits and bent through our celebration of Christmas. So once again, it becomes clearer to us how ‘culture’ is something that is almost imperceptible unless put in stark contrast with another. Does everyone have to celebrate Christmas with stockings, music, cookies and multiple Christmas movies? Absolutely not. But the effect of cultural habits on our perception of events is a strong one. And, in my humble opinion, there is nothing wrong with doing some strictly ‘American’ activities to get in the holiday spirit.
