My memories of Secret
Santa
Studying
in a girls’ convent run by the Apostolic Carmel nuns in the eighties in Goa made
Christmas an as important festival as a Diwali or Ganesh Chaturthi. And a large
part of Christmas celebrations in the school consisted of playing the Secret
Santa. Of course, in those days we did not call it that..we called it Christ
mother ( it was a girls school,
remember?) and the Christ child- the giver and the receiver respectively. The
excitement began about 3-4 weeks before the Christmas. Each class conducted its
own event moderated by their class teacher. The names were written on chits and
each one had to pick up one. It was of course a secret, so you could tell no
one..or you could tell your best friend and tell them to tell no one 😉
Then there were chances you would get your own name, so you quietly put back
the chit folded and picked up another one. Sometimes you would get your best
friend’s name and that was so thrilling, now you couldn’t share your secret
with your best friend too. Sometimes you got that girl whom no one liked and
you try to tell the teacher that you wanted to change it- but no, the spirit of
Christmas doesn’t allow for that. You have to be nice whosoever name you get- that’s
the life lesson for you- your teacher lectures you. Now came the important part
– what do you give your Christ child? Well, the Sisters remind you that in the
true spirit of Christmas – its not the gifts that matter. The one month that
you have that person’s name- you be nice to her. You keep her in your prayers
every day. Wish the best for her and her family in your heart secretly. You pray
for her without telling her. Such a beautiful thought, na? Also we were reminded
that since we were students, we had to make sure our gifts weren’t extravagant.
Even if some of our parents could
afford, our teachers reminded us that all parents can’t afford so we don’t want
to make anyone feel small- that’s not the point of this exercise. We were
reminded to have the backs of our Christ child throughout the month – be a
little extra nice to them, watch out for them. Share your lunch with them, forgive
them if they hurt you. And the fun is – because we didn’t want the Christ child
to guess who we were, we ended up being nice to everyone. Now if that’s not the
true spirit of Christmas, I don’t know what else is. Finally on the last day,
when school would break for Christmas, it was time to reveal the Christ mother.
We made a small gift like an embroidered kerchief or a neat bookmark or picked
up some gift that was important to us and along with a homemade sweet, gave it
to our Christ child, revealing our true identity as their guardian angel for
the last four weeks. In turn, we also found out who our Christ mother was and
received our gifts. Just once in a way, it turned out that the person who was
my Christ child was also my Christ mother causing much joy at the mutuality.
And then we collectively had a pot luck lunch in class with all the delicacies that our mothers had packed in
our boxes for the special event. Even more than three decades later, every
Christmas, I still vividly remember how we were taught to celebrate Christmas
in its true spirit. And every time, I become a Secret Santa I remember to pray
for my chosen Santee.
Best wishes for the festive season !
