We've asked a number of Sight's regular contributors to tell us about their favorite memories of past Christmases...

A WHITE CHRISTMAS IN IRELAND

14th December, 2004

CHOE BRERETON

There was a year in southern Ireland when the snow had fallen so thick that the landscape seemed dusted with icing for weeks. I love the snow and would stand out in the flurry for hours until my hat and gloves would go damp with settling flakes. Bare skin would prickle madly and the cold of the hundredth snowball would eventually nip its way through the knitting turning my fingers zombie sallow.

PICTURE: Martin Boulanger (www.sxc.hu) "Christmas is always a poignant time for the Irish and for us it was a chance to emphasise and reflect on everything that was good about life and living."

The fir trees that lined the border of our home quickly donned majestic caps of white powder and the golf course across the drive way made great sledging grounds for make shift sleighs and toboggans. Sentinels of snowmen would eerily sprout to the surface and stay their glistening watch at the centre of every field and yard. Mallow, county Cork, was the one horse town that was home to my family for four years, and every December the tinsel and wreaths would be aired, smothering what there was of the shoebox hamlet in shiny flecks of green and red, silver and gold.

Christmas is always a poignant time for the Irish and for us it was a chance to emphasise and reflect on everything that was good about life and living. My parents did not skimp on food or decorations or presents. Yet, even so young, the security I felt was never in my very brand new doll or my very intricate Lego castle. Yuletide had always been about watching the magic that suddenly turned the world white take place, and seeing my mother cook for hours to make that dinner that was always so delicious, and so copious and so draining to prepare that she must have really loved us to do it year after year. God is good, was the mantra of our home, not Santa or fairies or elves. The fact that we had enough to eat all year round proved that.

Decorating was the best part, making up the tree, snaking round feathery tinsel and hanging up Faberge bobbles. Carols would spill out in force from the TV and the radio, and Dad’s Handel’s Messiah would overrun prime airtime. Last Christmas by Wham turned out to be my favourite music video. Played to shreds every Christmas it still inoffensively reminds me of the good times; the open fires of Irish family pubs, ankle deep snow, darkness falling early and our house, plump with excitement and good will. It has been close to eight years since we have had a similar family Christmas but the memories still live on. Being scattered to all corners of the globe, phone calls now suffice. But even across oceans and airwaves the connection can still be felt. God is good, is still the mantra of our home, and as the year winds down, the fact that my parents and all four of my brothers are alive and well albeit in different countries, only proves that.

SHARING LIVES TOGETHER IN SUBURBAN MELBOURNE

9th December, 2007

NILS VON KALM

(Caution: contains a spoiler)

Growing up a child of German immigrants, we used to celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve. As I think back to those days growing up in south-eastern suburbia in Melbourne, memories are rekindled of good times with family (as well as a little disillusionment!).

PICTURE: Gustavo Bueso Padgett (www.sxc.hu) "This year I pray that I will remember that for many in our world, indeed for many in our city, there will be no good memories."

Each year throughout my childhood, my brothers and I would leave letters for Santa asking what we would like for Christmas, being sure to convince him that we had indeed been good boys throughout that year.

On the day itself we would have Christmas dinner together, after which the lounge room door would close and the three of us boys would be shunted into the back room to wait for Santa to come. The door bell would ring and it would be Santa with his familiar “Ho ho ho!”. My heart would start racing; the time was near for us to get in there and open our presents. Santa would leave, we would hear the front door close, and Mum would ring a little bell. That was the signal for us to be allowed into the lounge room to open our booty. In we would come, German folk music playing on the record player and Christmas lights flashing. For a young boy like me, the excitement was electric.

For one of my brothers, there was one year when his illusions about Santa were shattered forever. That was the year when, after Santa rang the doorbell and Mum opened the door, my brother peeked around the corner through a crack and, to his horror, saw and exclaimed “That's not Santa. That's Dad!”. The secret was out and Christmas would never be the same for him again.

My most treasured recent memory of Christmas, however, occurred just last year when things came full circle in terms of the family Santa experience. My same brother and his partner came down to Melbourne with their own children. Little William and Charlie are still young enough to believe in the excitement of Christmas with the big man in red with the sack full of toys. So this year we decided to rekindle childhood memories for the boys.

I did the Santa thing, rang the doorbell and said “Ho ho ho!” while the boys waited in the back room with our wives. When I said out loud in my deep Santa voice, “Have William and Charlie been good boys this year?!”, the squeal of “Yeeesssss!” from the back room was accompanied by the noise of our wives frantically trying to hold the boys back from running into the room and exposing the secret. Being still in the same family house as we were all those years ago when we were kids, it brought back fond memories of Christmases past when time with family was made special by the togetherness and fun of sharing our lives.

Christmas brings good memories for me, for which I am grateful. This year I pray that I will remember that for many in our world, indeed for many in our city, there will be no good memories. There will instead be pain and memories of pain. Whether in celebration or in pain or in war, may we all discover the Christ child in whatever way we experience this holy season.

WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE MEMORY OF CHRISTMAS?  Have Your Say below...