I have been warned not to go out tonight. Apparently, it is common for young people (and possibly older people too) in Wuhan to spend Christmas Eve window shopping, and eating dinner with friends. So the streets will be crowded with many young Chinese wishing each other a Merry Christmas. My language teacher told me that if you didn't make your restaurant reservations months ago, then you were already too late. Unfortunately, I will be taking her advice, although I'm now curious to see this phenomena, how does a country that is not even the slightest bit religious take on a Christian tradition? DH says that Christmas sells itself, it's shopping and giving presents, there are no strong food traditions, no weird foreign activities, just shopping. And while I want to disagree with him, he's right. In the fight to keep Christmas everywhere, what we have done is to take the Christ out of Christmas. Instead of keeping Christmas at home with our families and in our churches we want to force stores to put up displays, we want schools to have parties, and governments to celebrate too. But why should an Indian grocery store put up a tree, why does a Chinese restaurant need holiday lights? Because this is what Americans want. So we end up with that sanitized Santa version of Christmas which is all about buying and getting. And you end up with a country of Chinese people who don't even know that Christmas was a Christian holiday.
But don't get me wrong, I love Christmas, I love Santa, I love nativity scenes and mulled cider, and the Christmas story. I love all of it. I'm going to leave you with a quote from Michael Buble who sums up my thoughts on belief and Santa Claus. (this is from an interview with him on the today show).
Michael Buble
Even as an adult, Buble says he still has faith and is a staunch
defender of Old St. Nick. Don’t even TRY to tell him he’s wrong. When
asked how old he was when he learned Santa was fictional, Buble
responded with mock anger.
“There is a Santa Claus. When you stop believing, then he doesn’t come, and I feel sad for people don’t believe in him anymore.”
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!!!!!
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