Christmas, in perspective

Well, being a huge suck, I’ve started playing Christmas tunes quietly on my laptop during breaks at the office. I’m heading back home for the holidays soon and so try as I might, I’m having a tough time not day-dreaming about family, turkey, and snow.

But before that all happens, I’ve planned an early Christmas celebration with Enos Banda, my farmer friend and host out at the village where I stay. Last weekend we decided that, since I’ll be gone home for Christmas, the two of us would head into town this Saturday to buy presents for his family so we could have a “Christmas with the Bandas” this Sunday evening.

It’s not going to be anything huge—likely a few new clothes, maybe a pair of shoes, and a chicken and rice for dinner instead of maize porridge and vegetables. But it's Christmastime and that requires celebration, even if it's just a small one.

However, the weekend plans that Enos and I made were given a little twist last night. After I arrived back in the village from work and had changed clothes and washed up, Enos called me aside to ask if his wife (who I call Amayi, which is Chichewa for mother) could come with us to town on Saturday to pick out presents. Since I had agreed to pay for all the expenses of our Christmas party, Enos said he was worried about the extra cost of her minibus fare into town. Nonsense, I told him, of course Amayi should come.

Enos was happy to hear it, but Amayi was even happier. She told me that she hadn’t been into town since 1992.

“Sorry, huh?” was my response, in Chichewa of course.

It was true: she hadn’t gone into Lilongwe since 1992. In 1992, Amayi had only one child; she now has five. In 1992, Malawi was still a one-party dictatorship; now it’s looking forward to it’s third multi-party elections next year. In 1992, Lilongwe was about half it’s current size. Amayi hadn’t made, or hadn’t been able to afford, the 15-minute minibus ride into town for the last 16 years.

In September, when Enos and I had made a trip into town together, he had told me that the last time he was in Lilongwe was over a year ago. I remembered then being surprised. But now, Amayi’s admission left me speechless.

It also got me thinking: having travelled across the world just to get to Malawi, and now planning on making the two-day plane trip back for Christmas, I wondered just how different from Amayi’s my perspective of the world is. To her, the price of my plane ticket is equal to her family’s four-year food budget. To her, me boarding a flying machine that will take two days to transport me to a land of snow and skyscrapers must be at least equivalent to my idea of boarding a rocket ship at Kennedy Space Centre and traveling into outer space. Heck, at least at night I can look up and see outer space. She’s never seen Canada, and most likely never will. The differences are striking, to say the least.

Where did all of this even start? Oh, yeah, going to buy Christmas presents. Well that’s still on for this Saturday. And I’m still flying back to Canada in two weeks time.

Oh man, this world sometimes throws me for a loop.