MANILA
As we all know and are so proud of, we Filipinos are gung-ho about Christmas. Nothing on the calendar beats Christmas. We’re simply mad about Christmas.
We go all out. We celebrate as if the day after Christmas, which isn’t December 26, it’s January 7 or thereabouts, is Doomsday. Like there’s no tomorrow, like it’s the end of the world.
That’s how crazy we are about Christmas.
But Christmas, the happiest day for Filipinos, can also be the saddest and loneliest day.
Too many poor people. Too many problems, personal and national. Too many concerns: personal, communal, regional, national, global.
After Christmas our problems will remain with us. After Christmas our debts will remain unpaid and even added to. After Christmas, our aches and pains will still be with us. After Christmas, food will still be scarce for many of us. After Christmas many will still be jobless, homeless, hopeless.
After Christmas traffic will still be monstrous. After Christmas thieves and burglars will still be around to prey on us. After Christmas the police will still be inept and corrupt. After Christmas the MRT will still be a scary and chancy ride. After Christmas our bosses will still be tyrants.
After Christmas our politicians will still be stealing our money. After Christmas garbage will still be uncollected, our drainage system still clogged, our streets unswept, and our environment defiled.
In short, after Christmas all our problems will remain, unsolved and festering.
Maybe that’s why there is Christmas. And maybe that’s why the Filipino Christmas is so long. So we can have a longer respite from all those problems.
Now I get it. We make our Christmas months-long so we can escape our normally dreary lives. So we can take a break from our miserable existence. So we can find a distraction from our concerns.
Imagine all the poor people in our country. They try mightily to have a passable Christmas. They do what they can to have a decent Christmas meal, clean if not new clothes for the children, a Christmas lantern outside the window, fire-hazard Christmas lights in the living room. (Imagine also those who don’t even have a living room; even worse, a home.)
Imagine families that have an illness in their midst, taking turns tending to their sick loved one(s). Imagine the burden on them, and on the family member who is ill. But this is when love appears and is magnified, and felt. This is when people realize how they love one another as they look after each other. This when people come together and be one and reinforce each other. This is when people find strength in each other. This is when people hold hands and carry their collective burden together, unflinching and determined to do their duty to one another and to their sick family member. This is when they say “We love you” and “We’re here for you” without saying a word.
Christmas should be the merriest day in the year. But it can also be the loneliest.
Christmas is an escape, a respite, a break from the tedium or harshness of life. But Christmas is also a haven, a refuge, a sanctuary.
Evildoers in society, those who do the rest of us harm or injustice, should also take a break, a vacation, during Christmas. They should let us enjoy the season, the season of love and sacrifice, of patience and exhilaration, of reflection and exuberance, of fun and suffering, of merriment and loneliness.
Christmas is many things. It depends on who you are, where you are, and what you do in the scheme of things.
***
