start decorating now, africa – so that they know we know it’s christmas!

THIS YEAR WE started decorating for Christmas on Sunday the first day of November.

The timing was perfect in all the ways we needed.

As a family, the only challenge was that we didn’t have one home host a gathering for all of us to do decorations there, along with the other festivities that come along with it.

My little sister pressed the point in very many ways, as all the hints and suggestions were aimed at hers.

She was not having it.

Instead, she sent us back her own hints, suggestions and various video clips AND a research citation about how setting up your Christmas decorations early makes for a happy home.

Personally, I did not need convincing – I have been known to kick off on October 1st.

The scientists are serious about holiday decorations being mood lifters and depicting people as sociable and friendly.

I found one paper dating back to December 1989 in the Journal of Environmental Psychology that confirmed this – with a focus on the sociability of homeowners as depicted by their Christmas decorations.

In another (I only picked up a few quotations), Psychologist Dr. Deborah Serani told a media house that holiday decorating “does create that neurological shift that can produce happiness…Christmas decorating will spike dopamine, a feel-good hormone.”

Again, I do not need to read the research – I am a whole experiment of my own.

And even though I started late this year, I am in a very good place; even more so because of how unhappy so many people around me (us) appear to be these days.

I feel it every time I go to the internet or open up WhatsApp groups the majority of people there are actively seeking unhappiness.

I shook my head recently at some advertising employee in Uganda who responded to a tweet about a neat tarmac road here that even had street lighting with something like: “Yes – but one day it will get potholes and the lights will be stolen, so why are you celebrating?”

If I knew where that fellow lived, I’d go and put up a string of tinsel on top of his door.

That’s one of my favourite season gifts for special loved ones – a home-made Christmas wreath or garland; one crafted by my own hands – with help from other family members and one or two eager dogs.

(Here’s one of the wreaths we made at home the other day – all photos by me:)

Yes – we even make our own decorations, appropriately Ugandan while being Christmassy to the core of the season’s theme – complete with removing snow and other such things that do not make sense in our tropical setting.

I enjoy seeing eyes light up when they receive these gifts; that’s another way Christmas decorations are the visibility of the warmth and cheer of the season, and all that comes with it like Pavlov said of his dogs.

It may seem easier and more viable for the well-heeled, as some would say.

Not true. Everybody will smile a bit more when they put decorations up, and so we should encourage them to do so NOW, and start playing the music.

On the day my decorations started going up we played Christmas Carols as usual – forwarding quickly through the ones that do not make sense.

One of them was that irritating “Do They Know It’s Christmas”, which I have disliked for many years because of its tone, message and how outdated its meaning is today.

I was even more disturbed because I had to stop what I was doing to go and forward it past the nauseating lyrics that go, for instance: “And there won’t be snow in Africa this Christmas time, the greatest gift they’ll get this year is life, Where nothing ever grows, No rain or rivers flow, Do they know it’s Christmas time at all?”

Imagine that?

In the year this damn song was released we celebrated Christmas in Kamwokya, on Kiira Road, and I distinctly recall the decorating we did, the food we ate – including the small, hard bundaazi people now call ‘Daddies’ – and the hard-to-come-by toys we received as gifts.

All this even as a war raged on right around us and we had fear hover over our heads till the season opened up a brief bit of warm sunshine in our hearts and minds

And even back then there is no way a serious person could say about Africa that nothing every grows, no rain or rivers flow – or be believed when they did sing it.

Yet, today, some people position their corner of Africa that way.

It is those people who need Christmas decorations put up in their homes, their hearts and their minds.

Put up just one piece of tinsel and a bauble or two, however broke you are. Be Serious about Christmas and what the season means, so that they know that we know it’s Christmas.

More seriously, focus on the cheer and spirit and hope that comes with the season, as we have always done when it gets to Christmas time, and smile.