Call to Prayer and Christmas Trees
When cultures collide amidst holiday cheer
This isn’t the first Christmas I’ve spent abroad, and each time I do, it offers another chance to see this holiday through a fresh lens.
I grew up with a fairly typical American childhood, and I have mostly happy memories of Christmas celebrations—I was very fortunate to live in a house made full of Christmas magic, due to my mom’s festive spirit and copious decorations, and my dad’s hard work that made our holidays quite abundant. I am grateful for these memories, and I’m confident this paved the way for the part of my personality that takes particular joy in finding just the right gifts for those I love (especially if we’re talking books—but more about that later.)
But while there are parts of the Christmas tradition that I love, at the same time, it’s easy to become exhausted by the American style of celebration and excess: the Black Friday sale shopping outings of my youth turned into stampedes and weeks (if not months) of encouragement to buy.all.of.the.things. While we’ve run into a bit of this overseas as well, it all feels a bit muted compared to my experiences in the U.S. (I was very confused by the marketing logic behind Black Friday in Australia—after all, they don’t celebrate American Thanksgiving, which makes the Friday sales feel even more arbitrary than they do in the U.S.!)
My early Christmas memories and traditions were also influenced our family’s cultural practice of attending church on Easter and Christmas, as well as my teenage fling with evangelical Christianity (subject of a future post, perhaps.) Growing up in Colorado, Christmas didn’t always mean snow, but if often meant winter. So in my early years of adulthood (like many others, I’m sure), I was trying to discover and shape what Christmas would mean to Beau and me, in our newly created family, in new locations, and in the life we wanted to lead. During those same years, we were often separated from family during the holidays, due to military deployments, work commitments, and for the past two years, our global travels. While he was on active duty, Beau often volunteered for Christmas Day duty so that others with young kids or elderly parents could spend the holiday with them, so early in our marriage we adopted a flexible approach to when “Christmas” actually was. And then, with my mom’s death in 2012, Christmas forever shifted in both my expectations and my experiences.
So as I’ve brought fresh eyes to what Christmas means to me over the past decade and change, it’s been exciting to also seek out others who are creating fresh traditions (or unearthing long-dormant ones), to turn to nature and the rhythms of the Earth for inspiration, and to embrace the myths, stories, and songs of old that inspire this holiday of light and dark, joy and reflection, peace and grief, love and loss. I’ve identified the traditions that feel most crucial to me (like sending our annual holiday cards, which will be late this year, but are coming!) and I’ve found the recipes, books, music, and shows that make me feel like it’s Christmas, no matter where I am in the world. (I’m sharing some of these below…scroll down to see!)
While I look forward to a future Christmas where I can truly embrace the “Hallmark snow globe”—a 2011 trip to Tallinn in early December came close, and our winter in Vail offered this, too—it’s also been fun to experience Christmas in Pakistan, Australia, and this year, Indonesia: not to mention across the U.S. in a wide range of locations. And as I seek to center this holiday that carries with it weight and history and emotional baggage both good and bad, I’ve embraced a broader appreciation for not just Christmas cheer, but in a phrase inspired by my good friend Sarah, “Happy Winter Festive Time.”
Today I’m sharing a few snapshots and peeks into the Christmases we’ve celebrated around the globe, followed by the favorites that make the holiday for me. I hope you’ll share a favorite Christmas (or winter holiday of your choice!) moment or tradition in the comments section below.
Last year’s trip report on celebrating the Solstice down under:
I titled this post “Call to Prayer and Christmas Trees” because that encapsulates the experience so far of the Christmas season here on Gili Trawangan. We hear the Call to Prayer several times a day from the nearby mosque, yet we’re surrounded by decorations of decidedly non-tropical Christmas cheer, small shops selling Santa hats, and seasonal menus that look delicious but feel out of place.
I look forward to seeing what the remaining days bring, and I hope no matter where you are in the world, you can find some holiday cheer.
As promised, here are some of the things that bring me joy this time of year.
Traditions
Icelandic Book Flood: In 2016 (I know, because I have a tracking spreadsheet), I basically compelled my extended family to start participating in Jolabokaflod by deciding I would send everyone a book to open on Christmas Eve. Since then, they’ve started to reciprocate and this tradition has been cemented among a group of us. It’s something I look forward to so much each season. When you read as much as I do, there’s something especially touching when someone takes the time to hand-select a book for you. If you’re not familiar with this Icelandic Book Tradition, I highly recommend checking it out.
Recipes
Amy’s family’s wassail: While I’d had my share of mulled wine, I’d never tried wassail officially until visiting my high school friend Amy’s parents home years ago. They had a pot of it bubbling along all day long and I was a convert. Since then, I’ve made it every year (other than when we’ve been traveling) and I’m betting I can find or create a decent version here on Gili this season—stay tuned.
Me & Amy at friend Jena's New Year's Eve wedding years ago; A mug of wassail in our Virginia home; the wassail recipe Mom’s stollen: originally a recipe of one of my grandmothers, this German-influenced fruit bread was a staple in my house growing up. As a kid, I hated it: now, I love it.
Books
Katherine May’s Wintering is a book I return to each year in this season, but I am actively building my winter solstice seasonal reading library. Do you have recommendations for me? I’d love to know.
Music
A few of my favorite playlists for the season are included here for you:
Shows
We have our traditional favorites, of course: Elf, Love Actually, A Muppet Christmas Carol—but hands down, our most cherished holiday viewing tradition is Beau’s family’s time capsule Christmas special. They recorded multiple TV Christmas specials onto a VHS tape in 1985, before they moved to Moscow (when it was the U.S.S.R.) for two years. It’s been preserved and a few years back, we had it digitized. We now watch scenes each Christmas, which range from the Walt Disneyland Parade to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and, as seen below, the Statler Brothers. While each of these is full of nostalgic gems, the true magic is in the recorded TV commercials of the era.
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Love this Holly! Always enjoy reading.
It was fun reading about your traditions and travels, Holly! Two of ours are driving around to look at holiday light displays and throughout the year, we write about things that made us happy on scraps of paper and put them in a jar, and we all take turns reading them aloud as a family on NYE. I learn a lot about my kids' lives this way, and it's so great.