Navidad de Nicaragua

While we were in the states at Thanksgiving time, lots of people asked me, "So what is Christmas like in Nicaragua." All I could answer was, "I dunno--haven't been there."
Now I have been there--and I probably still don't know.
Here, just like in your town, there are probably as many variations of celebrations for as many different reasons as their are houses on the street. But here are some generalizations and reflections from my first Nica Christmas.

It was neat!
Christmas Eve is the bigger holiday here and on the 24th we were so blessed to be invited to the home of a fantastically fun family.  We laughed and told stories about our families. We ate chicken, rice, yucca, and salad. We drank Coke and ate a spicy gelatin desert (with sprinkles!) out in the garden as neighbors came and went bringing greetings. The kids performed goofy magic tricks and we giggled and teased. We played silly parlor games in the living room--8 of us sharing a couch and one chair--and felt completely at home with our Christian family.

Their house, like almost every home I could peek into, was decorated for the holiday. In a few houses we saw tabletop Christmas trees, in others Nativity displays. Most had some kind of lights somewhere around the house. Even those without what I normally recognize as coming from the Christmas-decoration-aisle of the store decorated with clay bells, lacy curtains hung on walls, garlands of flowers or paper, or something sparkly.

As Jonathan mentioned here, gifts/packages/presents are not really in evidence. But there is definitely a spirit of sharing and giving. As we hung out with our friends, I was amazed when the 9 and 11 year old ran out into the street saying, "We are Santa Claus! Go get all the kids! We have lots of candies to give them!" The 11 year old girl took her whole stash of about a dozen small individually wrapped pieces of hard candy and gum and gave them to the lined up group of younger neighbors--completely delighted to be giving away every last piece.

It sounds so cliche' to say that it was a time about "giving and sharing"--except that it was. As the night got later people drifted out into the streets to greet their neighbors and watch as kids played with fireworks. Ah--the fireworks. Every house on the block we were on had kids out front with sparklers and roman candles and other loud and sparkly things. But that didn't prepare us in the least for what happened at midnight.

We'd been hearing fireworks off and on for a week--and the frequency was certainly increasing--but we still weren't prepared for midnight. Around 11:30 the frequency of the familiar "pop" was every few seconds or so, so we headed up to the roof to watch.
Wow.
Jonathan said, "This must be what it was like in Beirut in the 80's." Non-stop rockets from every direction possible. Sometimes aiming up in to the air--sometimes, it seemed, in our direction. Imagine the kind of fireworks display a small town puts on down at the baseball field--but coming from every direction at once. When midnight rolled around there was an undeniable sense of common celebration. Every person in town was having this same experience of hearing the booming echoing off the mountains and seeing the sky light up again and again.

The fireworks really exemplify the public nature of the celebration here. You can't shoot off fireworks for yourself. By their nature, they are a shared experience. And that's the biggest thing I noticed about this Christmas: it only exists if shared.
I think that's so appropriate.
I pray I carry this lesson with me through this new year.