Christmases Past - Phase 1
The Traditional Australian Christmas of my Childhood
Is Christmas still the same tradition for you as you’ve always had? Because mine have changed – dramatically over time.
We think of Christmas as a fixed range of festivities and customs. At least, I always have. But when I look back, I see that it has been an ever-evolving set of customs. I count 4 distinct phases as I re-created new customs with my changing circumstances. Over 4 mini-blogs I will outline each phase of my Christmases Past.
PHASE 1 – The Australian Christmas of my childhood
I grew up with a traditional Christmas. But this was the most bizarre of Christmas customs.
Most likely you think of Christmas as a time of toasting yourself in front of open fires, rugging up for carols, and maybe snow to deal with. Bizarrely, Australia was still doing the same through my childhood (roaring fire excepted).
Christmas was about huge dinners of all those foods that are so good to eat when it’s cold outside. But in Australia, December is hot. It isn’t mid-winter, but mid-summer. My husband – an avid surfer – loved Christmas Day because the beaches were empty.
As a teenager, my grandparents lived in Gosford. This is the Central Coast, about two hours north of Sydney. Anywhere north of Sydney in the summer is hot, and humid.
So how did this translate?
On a day that was typically close to 40 degrees centigrade (that’s over 100 degrees Fahrenheit), my whole family would gather at my grandparents’ house. The whole morning would be spent cooking the chickens – Australia mostly uses chickens, not turkeys. So the rising outside temperatures would be more than matched by the inside temperatures as the oven would add heat to the house with the rotations of cooking to get through all the roasting of chickens and vegetables.
For the entire morning.
In later years when I was in charge of the kitchen, I avoided using the stove during the day in the summer, and even at night I chose recipes which required a minimum. I boiled the water in the electric jug before the stove went on, cooked stir fries which take maybe 5 or 10 minutes, and had a range of cold dishes such as Thai and Vietnamese chilled noodle salads.
However, as a teenager, after turning the house into a sauna, the 12-20 of us (depending who turned up each year, and how many new baby cousins were a part of the picture at any point) crowded around a table pretending the electric fans were making an impact on the heat. We would enthusiastically devour the huge quantities of food designed to warm from the inside: Roast chicken with gravy, roast vegetables, followed by the very filling hot plum pudding covered in lashings of steaming brandy custard.
To top things off, there would be the litany of sweets and melting chocolates, nuts and dried fruits, and other paraphernalia. The Christmas cake in Australia is a heavy fruit cake, with or without the marzipan icing, no special Christmas biscuits or cookies except perhaps for some Scottish shortbread. An English style Christmas designed for a cold English style December – in the middle of an Australian summer heatwave.
Australia also doesn’t follow the custom of chopping down the fir for the Christmas tree. There isn’t the same plentiful supply of these northern hemisphere, cold climate trees, as it turns out. Instead, the normal tree in Australia comes out of a box. Ours was all silver.
Each year the box would be retrieved from the garage. Each wire stick would be pulled from its paper sheath to wave its shiny fronds for another season, its end stuck into the wooden trunk until together they created the silver tree. Nowadays the process has been streamlined. Trees are often green and in just 3 pieces, 3 thirds of the tree. The branches are already attached and simply need to be bent back out to spread around the trunk, more likely in green plastic frills. The same tree is used for many years, and has a special place alongside the collection of decorations.
Decorations are as varied as the individual, with all sorts of options including fake snow.
The other part of my childhood Christmases which were uniquely Australian and a part that I loved are the Australian Christmas carols. It saddens me that they are not more popular. They paint a unique spin on the traditional snowy Christmas songs.
They include:
The North Wind
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3VNj0diHCM
The north wind is tossing the leaves,
The red dust is over the town,
The sparrows are under the eaves,
And the grass in the paddock is brown.
As we lift up our voices and sing
To the Christ-child the heavenly king.
Carol of the Birds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b5HRxHICTY
Out on the planes the brolgas are dancing,
Lifting their feet like war horses prancing
Up to the sun the woodlarks go winging
Faint in the dawn light echoes their singing
Orana, Orana, Orana to Christmas Day.
Brolgas - extremely elegant cranes from the northern part of Australia, with their distinctive red cheeks.
Three Drovers
An excellent version by iconic Australian Country Music singer Lee Kernaghan, this is roubley the story of the 3 wise men retold:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwSrew2x81g
Across the plains one Christmas night 3 drovers riding blithe and gay
Looked up and saw a starry light more radiant than the milky way
And on their hearts such wonder fell they sang with joy Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel
The air was dry with summer heat,
And smoke was on the yellow moon;
But from the heavens, faint and sweet,
Came floating down a wond'rous turn;
And as they heard, they sang full well
Those drovers three. 'Noel! Noel! Noel! Noel! Noel!'
The black swans flew across the sky,
The wild dog called across the plain,
The starry lustre blazed on high,
Still echoed on the heavenly strain;
And still they sang, 'Noel! Noel!'
Those drovers three. 'Noel! Noel! Noel! Noel! Noel!'
Twelve Days of Christmas
This iconic song has several versions, but here are the words of one for some fun. Do you even know all these animals? The quokka and platypus are a couple that are missing.
On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me,
An emu up a gum tree…
The final verse:
On the twelfth day of Christmas
My true love sent to me
Twelve parrots prattling,
Eleven numbats nagging,
Ten lizards leaping,
Nine wombats working,
Eight dingoes digging,
Seven possums playing,
Six brolgas dancing,
Five Kangaroos,
Four koalas cuddling,
Three kookaburras laughing,
Two pink galahs,
And an emu up a gum tree.
Galahs - incredibly pretty birds. Also incredibly noisy. And very common where I grew up. If someone calls you a galah, it’s not a complement - they’re calling you silly.
Do you know a carol that is exclusive and reflects a different kind of Christmas?
Just for a final bit of fun, I love this Indian version of Jingle Bells. As the meme says, if you’re having a bad day, just listen to this to cheer yourself up.