December 25, 2010
Power went out a couple of times due to the heavy rains and bad weather that Colombia has been experiencing and I didn’t think once of complaining as it meant the shop music from across the road was out too. Hooray some sleep! It was the best Christmas present I received (well almost ...)
It was early morning and already people knocking on the door again by 7:00 am.
After coffee and some fresh mango (I had told Padre that I was looking forward to eating a mango when I arrived in Santa Marta so he grabbed one from a friends yard) for breakfast it was time to get ready to start delivering some gifts!
Oh wait I forgot to tell you that I also discovered that Colombians here in Santa Marta are always late. We waited for some people to come over to Padre’s house to join us for passing out gifts in the neighboring barrio. And we waited. Then we waited some more.
Padre suggested I take my small bags of numerous little gifts that my mom helped me wrapped for the ninas and ninos. I had a very weighted down backpack full of small toys for girls and boys as well as some small gifts for some of the mothers and grandmothers. I had no idea that we would be trekking up and down some muddy, treacherous and watery terrain for the next 3-4 hours looking for people who had no house addresses but just a name on their letter with their barrio address. It was so hot, so humid and my bags were getting heavy in addition to carrying my camera bag but it was Christmas in Colombia!
All I can say is look at these pictures on my flickr. You’ll see what it meant to me. This was the best Christmas present! It was a real blessing to see and experience handing out toys and presents to mothers and children who had nothing. My favorite house (pictured here) was so humbly decorated. The mother of two little girls was so gracious and overwhelmed to get toys for her children. Padre explained to me that her husband passed away a couple of years ago and her mother (in this picture in the background) is blind. I gave them some treats from my bag as well and the little girl ran over to her grandmother to tell her about it.
Padre was like a real life Santa Claus - checking his long list of names to see who had received their present and who was left.
Good news is that we were able to find almost all the children in the village even though there were no addresses on the clapboard shacks or dodgy brick type buildings. I think next year Padre should ask parents to also write what kind of outdoor speakers they have as it might be easier to identify the houses. Man the Colombians here love their musica!
Playing Santa Claus. Part Dos.
So after trekking in the village all day it was time to prepare for some children visiting the school for more Christmas celebrations. And yes, it was still very hot, humid and rainy.
Around 4:30 pm we headed for the school to entertain the kids. Padre said this was my opportunity to don the Santa Claus costume that I brought from the states. It was actually saved from a 10k Santa run I did in London a few years ago which I had sent to my mom to use for her kindergarten class (and yes, sure enough my dad used it one year and stretched it out quite a bit!) I also had to improvise a beard to go with it since the original was lost somewhere between the 10k and my dad delivering pizza to my mom’s Kindergarten class a few years ago.
You can see from the pictures that
a.) The kids in Padre’s village had never seen someone dressed in a santa costume
b.) no one cared if I was a woman dressed as Santa
c.) even the adults liked Santa Clausine (see picture of Joseph the grounds keeper with his big smile)
Of course I am leaving the Santa costume here in its new home. Next year I hope to see pictures of Father Augusto dressed as Papa Noel.
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