The irony of Christmas

MANILA
The irony of Christmas is that while it’s the happiest time of the year, it can be the loneliest for many people. The suicide rate in some countries rises during the holiday season.
Filipinos love Christmas. After New Year’s, Filipinos can’t wait until its Christmas again. The countdown to December 25 begins immediately on January 2. This is no exaggeration, Filipinos are crazy about Christmas.
Here in the Philippines, the “ber” months announce the formal start of the Yuletide. From the moment people turn the calendar from August to September, the Christmas carols start wafting into the air. Actually, “wafting” is the wrong word. The songs blare out of every radio station and shopping mall Muzaks. Malls bring out the red colors of Christmas early and deck out every possible space in their emporium. And the Christmas tunes attack the eardrums non-stop all day-long.
Television news here signs off with a countdown to December 25 about 60 days before Christmas day, which puts the start of the countdown to October 25. I don’t quite understand this practice. Cynics say it’s to promote Christmas buying, as if Filipinos need to be reminded.
Filipinos are generally a social bunch and they know how to hold each other together, look out for one another, and keep themselves emotionally strong and together. Pre-Christmas (which, as I’ve noted, starts very early in the last quarter of the year) socializing occurs regularly. Friends, office colleagues and families keep the season merry by getting together for drinks and meals. It’s a looong fiesta for Filipinos.
Filipinos abroad are no different. Maybe not as early to celebrate as their folks back home because of the multi-faith composition of society there, but quite in the Christmas mood and mode early too. It’s the social groups that keep Filipinos together.
Drinking buddies, mahjong or poker mates, bowling chums, tennis associations, and other types of kinship groups have their respective Christmas parties and gatherings. (Actually, when I was still living in Washington, DC, my tennis group didn’t need a formal occasion to celebrate. It was like after every tennis outing, the next item on the agenda was drinking and food until it’s time to go to work.) Filipinos know how to keep themselves amused and happy.
But what about those who are loner types and don’t have the usual support groups?
This is more prevalent among westerners, many of whom are away from their families because of work or other circumstances (like moving to where one’s spouse lives). The vaunted mobility of North Americans in search of jobs around the continent has sometimes resulted in isolated, insulated and lonely people, with very few people around them to provide emotional and moral support. Christmas for people in these circumstances is often a lonely time and place.
Even when they’re successful in their lives, many people often have nobody waiting for them at home. Not because they’re unsociable but because their jobs have taken them to isolated or unfamiliar places where they have few friends or acquaintances. Or where they’re based in small communities that afford them few opportunities to make social or emotional connections.
And then there are the more unfortunate ones whose lives are miserable because of bad financial circumstances. Or because they’ve abandoned their families and are now in dire straits or they’re the ones who’ve been abandoned. Just like the shoeless man in New York City who apparently prefers to remain shoeless because the shoes would just be objects of envy by fellow street people who would harm him for them.
Even among Filipinos, there may be those who find themselves in such dire circumstances, especially in the current economic hard times. Let’s hope the numbers of Filipinos who are bereft of social and emotional support are few, if at all.
Ah, Christmas…it’s supposed to be the happiest time of the year. But it’s not always so for many people. Hope you, the readers, are keeping warm during this holiday season and are in the company of loved ones. And if you know less fortunate compatriots out there, please reach out to them and give them love and affection. Happy Christmas to you and all whom you love.
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Special Christmas greetings to all colleagues on Balita, who work hard to publish this leading newspaper. And to the Cusipag Family whom the Filipino-Canadian community owes a big favor for pioneering the newspaper trade in Canada. Balita is a vital part of the Filipino community in Toronto and beyond. Greetings also to my college chum, Flor Mesina (who introduced Manila Observer to Balita), his wife Cecile and their family.
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