Christmas

Christmas is without doubt the most exciting festivity of the whole year, and not only for children! Gifts, huge lunches and dinners, the family reunited, lots of (maybe too many) sweets , the tree....let’s be honest, who doesn’t love Christmas and its almost magical atmosphere?! But Christmas hasn’t obviously always been like this, and mostly, not for everyone. For example, have you ever wondered how, fifty or sixty years ago our grandparents used to celebrate this festivity? Have you ever asked you grandmother of grandfather how Christmas was,  without having all we can dispose of nowadays? Well, if you haven’t, let’s begin a short journey through the traditions and habits of Christmas in the past, focusing on the Italian ones. Let’s start off by saying that even though times were hard for most people and money wasn’t really growing on trees, social differences  were really and still strong : wealthy people didn’t have any problems in buying the food for  the whole family, decorations for the house and gifts for everyone; whereas, on the other hand, people who didn’t have much money to spend had to be satisfied with what they owned. Gifts, for example, didn’t exist for these less fortunate people, but a lunch on the 25th of December,  usually with capon and boiled meat, couldn’t be missed, though. The same with the Christmas tree, that was just a juniper or another common type of tree taken from the nearest wood and roughly filled with walnuts and other small house-made decorations. Another aspect we, from these days, might find odd, is that after the big Christmas lunch, farmers had to return to take care of their animals, and so they had to work on that day too. So, think about past times when you complain about your Christmas, but also think how things might be in other fifty years to come!! Viola Nassi  3BL