Christmas: The Preparations

Chapter 2

The Preparations

Christmas was usually a long time preparation in those days. It is a preparation for an event but one could describe it as “preparations” because of so much that is involved. The preparation usually starts two or three months to Christmas. Parents begin to save money for clothes, shoes, food and “happy Christmas” money.

The “happy Christmas” money is given to children as part of Christmas celebration when they wish someone happy Christmas. Some men prepare to give happy Christmas money by going o the bank and changing their money into new and lower notes. It seems some Muslims men also prepare the happy christmas money. This is because as children we use to wish them happy Christmas and they will give us some money. 

The tradition is when someone wishes you a happy Christmas by saying, “Happy Christmas” you will give him something usually some loose change or say, “Same to you.” As children we did not like same to you. We wanted a gift preferably some money.

Parents who prepare early will buy clothes for their children and hide them in their boxes. One will not like his Christian friends to know what his Christmas clothes looked like. It is however interesting to know that we did not mind showing our Muslims friend our Christmas clothes. We will secretly take it to them and usually the comment is, “It is nice.”

One will however guard it as a secret to his Christian friends. This is done in order to surprise them on Christmas day. If your younger one makes the mistake of telling your Christian friends your type of Christmas clothes you will punish him. If he goes beyond that and shows them the clothes before the D day that will really be serious. The only thing you will desire at this point is to have another one.

Many children do not have Christmas clothes until the actual day of Christmas. Their parents will be struggling to raise the money. It will be a game of waiting and hoping for the children. One’s mother will usually take him to the market to buy his shoes. In those days most families where poor. This true to the point that Christmas clothes were the only new clothes that many parents can afford to buy for their children annually. This is one of the reasons why the Christmas clothes were special.

  This also means that in many instances apart from the Christmas clothes no one will buy a new cloth for you again until another Christmas. Occasionally your mother will buy second hand cloths call “gonjo” for you. Some very poor parents will go to the market and select a very good gonjo and iron it for their children for Christmas. In most cases however families in those days go to the tailors for Christmas clothes. One of the worse things that can happen to one is for his friends to know that his dress is gonjo. They will ridicule him and he will feel belittled.

It is usually a busy time for the Tailors. All tailors whether Christian or Muslim will be busy in the season. Since my family believes in going to the Tailors for our Christmas clothes; Most of the time I wore tailor sewn clothes on Christmas rather than already made. My brothers and I always have the same type of clothe.

In those days we use our mothers a common question over and over again as the chrisstmas draws near. This question is, “Mummy when are we going to the Tailors for measurement?” This is important because the measurement gives one hope that he will be having Christmas clothes. As long as you have not been taken to the tailor you are not yet sure that you will have Christmas clothes.  We use to ask our friends, “Have you been taken to the Tailor for measurement?” If the answer is yes we will celebrate with them. If the answer is no we will feel sorry for them and encourage them by saying, “We believe they will soon take you to the Tailor go and ask your mother.”

One of the highlight of Christmas in those days was the counting of days. We were always counting the days to Christmas. This is particularly done in the so call “ember” months. The ember months are those months that end with e-m-b-e-r.

If one is young and can’t count he will ask his older ones to tell him when it will be Christmas. The most exciting day is when one is told that, “If we sleep and wake up two times it will be Christmas.” There were some children who will keep stones and be removing them one by one in order to count the days of Christmas.

For example if they keep thirty stones each day they will remove one and count the reminder. This is the way they will know how many days are left. When you remove one stone from thirty, twenty nine will be left. The subtraction and counting will continue until the day of Christmas. The day it remains two stones one know that it is a day to Christmas Eve that is two days to Christmas. Another way is to tell one that if we sleep and wake twice it will be Christmas.

Many men do not bother themselves with Christmas clothes. This is not the case with women and children. It was a must for them in those days. I remember one Mrs Alfa who had a fight with her husband. This was because he did not buy Christmas clothes for her.

We heard the husband saying “Me ya sa baki yi dahuwa ba?” This Hausa words when translate in English means, “Why did you not cook?”  Her answer was, “Domin baka saya mani kaya Christmas ba?” The translation in English is, “Because you did not buy Christmas clothes for me.” He slapped her and a quarrel insure. Interestingly as children we were supporting the wife secretly in our heart. We could not understand how a man will not buy Christmas clothes for his wife.

It was also common for children whose parent could not afford to buy Christmas clothes for them to cry. There were some that will refuse to got to church on that day.

Tailors palava was common in those days. Our tailor who was a Kurama man a “play mate” to us has never failed us. The fact that we stayed in the same compound also contributed to this. It was however, common for tailors to collect a lot of clothes for sewing beyond their capacity. This is done in a bit to make a lot of money in the season. The end result will be their inability to bit the day of collection that they themselves have assigned to people. They usually run and hide on Christmas day or spent the day sewing clothes.

It also seem to me that there were cases of complains that were not genuine. Looking back now I suspect that some parents could not afford to buy Christmas clothes for their children. This will now cause them to hide behind putting the blame on tailors. In this regard some of “The Tailor could not finish the dresses” generated were false. This is also palatable to parents because it was easy for children to accept it since such practice was common.

Many a times the customers also contribute to this problem. They will not plan or bring their clothes early. They will come late and insistently plead with the tailors to collect their own clothe whereas they can see clearly that the Tailor’s hands were full. There were cases of children who did not have anything new to wear on Christmas day and hear them complain, “My clothes is with the Tailor.”

Interestingly I had favour with a particular Bajju woman one Mrs Elisha. She considered me as one of her children as such she will sew Christmas clothe for me. This is an extra Christmas cloth for me apart from the one sewn by my parents. In this way I was lucky. I will wear one on Christmas day and another one on New Year day.

The Christmas day in Zaria was a special day. All the Christians will go to church. The children, women and in some cases men will dressed in Christmas dresses. Christmas in Zaria is usually windy and cold. It is a time when the Hamatan will be blowing hard. This however does not reduce the excitement or stop the celebration at all.

Children will defile the cold and move about freely. They will throw “knock out” that is fireworks. The knock out was more pronounce on the Christmas Eve and the New Year Eve Celebration than on the actual day of Christmas.  Our own celebration as children will continue from Christmas day to New Year day since we were on Holidays.

It must also be mentioned that we use to pray that the National Electricity and Power Authority (NEPA) will not take electricity so that it will result in black out. You will hear children telling one another, “Allah ya sa kada NEPA su dauke wuta wannan Christmas!” The English translation is, “May God make NEPA not to take electricity this Christmas”. The answer is usually, “Amin.” That is, “Amen.” Electricity has improved now but it was and is still a major problem in Nigeria.

I was recently told by someone that Nigerians are the number one users of generating set in the world. One can never be sure of when electricity will be available. Some have said the real meaning of the acronym NEPA is Never Expect Power Always.

Therefore in those days when NEPA makes electricity available there will be a loud shout of “Yeee!” in the whole community. All our singing and dancing on the Eve and Christmas day will not be possible without electricity. The provision of electricity by NEPA was therefore a major prayer point for us as children. I guess it was also true of the adult since in many cases children say what the adults are thinking.

There wasn’t much problem with water at Christmas on the order hand. There was tab water in many house. If you do not have one you can easily fetch from the neigbours. The water board hardly takes water from the tabs in those days. In any case if they do most of the houses had wells that one can fall back to. We therefore learn to draw water from the well early in life. Everyone had his own guga. Guga is a small bucket or container tired to a long rube that one uses in fetching water from the well.

The table of water was not far therefore one did not need to dig more than seven or eight feet to get water. I however remember a well we dug that the channel of water was the same with our toilet and the water got contaminated.

I particularly remember a certain Christmas that our father reared Agri-Chickens for Christmas. That particular Christmas was chicken galloo. We ate and also gave neighbors chicken. However one particular hen was left.

It grew big and terrorized little children by collecting their food. As an example if a child is taken tea and bread the hen will attack the child and collect the bread from him. In most cases the tea will pour on the ground. We nicked name the hen “Kaza breadi” that is a chicken that its bread in Hausa. This is because it mostly attacks children when they are eating bread. The day they slaughter it we all mourn for it.

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