Christmas and the New Year are probably the most stressful and hectic times of the year nowadays. This year, it seems that Christmas mirth is a touch absent as more gloom and doom on the financial side has mushroomed in the daily news. Nevertheless, there is always the last minute shopping which adds to the stress. Many agree that it is very easy to get caught up in the ‘fever’ of getting everything completed without actually taking downtime to relax. Housewives are doubled hit with extra effort needed to render the house spotless before the holiday season arrives. Thank God we look forward to have some time off to relax in the privacy of our homes. This is an integral part of surviving the holiday season gracefully. Readers during festive season may well stop and reflect on what this great event means to us? Regrettably, due to the higher water and electricity tariffs, fewer homes are decorated with coloured lights around the rooms and windows. Shops in our towns and villages stock up with new merchandise and colour magazines barrage our attention to spend beyond our means. Banks are enthralling us with new special edition credit cards offering to pay back all our purchases if we are loyal to their schemes. It is surreal…the mythical shopper wearing the diamond studded Rolex who has just inherited a fortune from his rich uncle from New York. He or she will cash-in our shopping madness until one dies of exhaustion. No, I am not complaining because Christmas has become too commercialised. More so this year, since shops are sensing plummeting spending power and are consequently using all legitimate means to attract business. Why are we garlanded with classy adverts in glossy magazines issued free with all newspapers urging us to invest exceedingly in diamonds, designer gear and showing celebrities wearing furs and fine watches? Each cost a thousand times our annual bonus. So is there a rich middle-class needing to wet its appetites on such luxuries and prefer buying them here rather than in their pre-Christmas shopping in London, Paris or Milan? But banks do come to our rescue, regaling us with discounted charges and easy credit via dazzling platinum plastic cards. It seems we have not learnt our lesson from bankrupt families in Britain who extended their spending beyond their means via ostentatious credit on cards. The cavalier way banks are fanning the fire of consumer credit amid hubristic over optimism gives questionable relief to our cash strapped citizens. But who cares.... tomorrow never comes! Bankers will be expressing their ‘Schadenfreude’ once the new year’s retail transactions are scrupulously debited to overdrawn accounts. It is like myth depicting a never-ending jam jar. Materialism has progressively overridden the religious feeling and our greed to acquire and consume is made more accessible by a ‘spend now pay tomorrow’ policy. After all, relax, this is how our politicians have managed the economy over the past years… spend first and tax later and if taxes are not enough then borrow until the cows come.
For the working classes, trying to keep up with the ‘Joneses’ is more traumatic. It is of course rendered worse if you are flat broke as you burnt December ‘s salary in buying “Super five” jackpot tickets.
For the average shopper the madness just adds to pre-Christmas nervous tension as the turnstiles leading to luxury status shut us out. To add to the circus, political gurus battle for their share of the gravy train asking the party faithful for donations to fill their overdrawn budgets. Roughly close to €1 million was collected from ‘the many with a few’ last week by the two main political parties. One may comment that this may dry up the cash lake given that donors in ten days will be cajoled to stretch their generous again during the annual “Strina” jamboree. So is the religious feeling diminishing these days as consumerism takes over?
The answer is in the affirmative, one only needs to comment on incessant demands for expensive toys like electronic board games and the “Ultimate Bumblebee” robots fill our stores. Yes, there is little room for old sentiment such as reading A Christmas Carol. It is all a consumer frenzy as publishing agencies are busy ring up merchants to cough up for their €1300 a page advert in high definition colour.
Citizens are subconsciously reminded by well wishers that this is the time of plenty but where is the extra cash? Sadly children allowances and year-end ‘Cola’ increases are quickly eaten away due to cost of living hikes and tariffs.
Yet relish the thought that Santa is smiling while delivering his bounty. He is mindful to switch off the lights after each visit. Is it a consolation that older folks prefer to believe in an idealised vision of Christmas as a religious fest but for the others traditions and our zestful way of life are changing fast.
The feeling is poles apart from the sacred images of the pious religious presentation of the baby Jesus born in poverty.
Regrettably the traditional Christmas card is fast receding in popularity and is being replaced by impersonal electronic cards (some include spam) flooding the internet. Conventionally, Christmas cards showed religious pictures – Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus, or other sequels of the Christmas story. All this has now changed as fewer religious themes are in use.
Ironically, Charles Dickens’ tale of a Christmas Carol where images of churchgoing, turkey, paper crackers and mince pies is rapidly morphing into champagne and caviar breakfasts, wearing designer clothes, fine watches, savvy jewelry, with party poops sporting ‘crocodile skin’ stiletto shoes. Revelers drive fast SUVs to luxury five-star venues for New Year’s Eve where dinners start at a €200 each.
Concurrently end-of year office parties rave on till the early morning hours. Hedonists strike a chord chiding us that this is merely a sign of affluence. We made the grade as an EU member. Even for the working classes, gone is the tradition of hanging children’s gifts in socks to be opened after the Christmas Mass vigil.
Yet this is not what season’s festivities ought to be. Indisputably it is very stressful. Mythical Christmas turns out in the end to be just that – a myth. The ritual of gift – giving as the New Year takes over which is epitomised by the L-iStrina mega TV show. Last year it collected a cool sum for charity while donors try their luck to bet on fabulous prizes. As can be expected, politicians and TV personalities flock in to capitalise on its popularity. Yet nobody complains that two-facedness is wafer thin since the masked generosity at this time of the year is legendary.
In this mad-rush to work, play hard and consume in even larger doses little do we stop to think why we are so hedonistic in our habits. Perhaps the answer lies in ancient history and our roots. During the pagan times of the Romans in 336, citizens hailed a holiday then known as Saturnalia. It marked the winter solstice, it was the time of heathen festivities in worship of the sun. Outlandishly even in those pagan days during the Saturnalia work of every kind ceased and slaves were given extra sustenance. It comes as no surprise that the present day tradition of giving and receiving presents, and partying was almost as common place in ancient Rome as it is now. The burgeoning expense of buying gifts, the added stress of last minute shopping and the heightened expectations of luxury travel can all combine to undermine our best intentions (reach out for more tranquilisers). Notwithstanding that the season finds us penniless and overweight we all dream of unbridled delight and continue to treasure this time as the golden holiday of the year. A merry Christmas to all.
George Mangion
Partner at PKF – an audit and business advisory firm
