I had a very bizarre experience in the supermarket the other week when I was casually walking down an isle and came face to face with a display of hand painted Christmas ornaments and other Christmas paraphernalia. My brain had a spasm as I thought to myself “but we haven’t had Easter yet have we?”. After a couple more attempts at putting my brain in order, which was silently screaming that something wasn’t quite right here, I gave up and continued with my shoppping, forgetting all about it.
It wasn’t until my second visit to the supermarket and I saw the same thing and had the same initial shock, that my brain finally put it all together. I realised that, yes, it’s October, and yes, Christmas is around the corner. In explanation: this will be my third Christmas living in the southern hemisphere in Australia but evidentally I still can’t get my head round it being in the Summer! My brain will not compute!
I don’t know if the fact I am a Pagan doesn’t help, being much more in tune with the seasons and relating them to the corresponding festivals. Afterall, in the northern hemisphere everyone will relate Christmas to Yuletide. The two just go hand in hand. But here in the southern hemishere we would celebrate Yule in July; a different time of year but still in Winter.
To me, celebrating Christmas in Summer is plain weird. The traditional Australian Christmas dinner isn’t roasted turkey with all the trimmings but fish; instead of spending the time huddled up all cosy inside one spends it out at the beach or in the garden topping up the tan; people put up Christmas decorations and lights but to appreciate the full effects one has to wait until after 9 o’clock in the evening for it to go dark.
If that’s not confusing enough there is similar confusion with Halloween. Non-Pagan folk are getting ready to celebrate this next weekend on the 31st October. However, as Halloween originates from one of the old Pagan festivals in the northern hemisphere, also known as Samhain, and these festivals were all tied in with the seasons, not specific dates, in the southern hemisphere Halloween should really be celebrated in Autumn around the 31st 30th [thank you Chris] April.
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I was going to mention Silently Screaming when I first read the post, but then I was too shocked to discover that Australia actually has different amounts of days in a month! 31 days in April?
PS Upgraded blog and your plugins
Thank you, lol. What’s the significance of Silently Screaming though? Ah, ok, just re read it and my brain was doing it in the first paragraph
Seriously?
It is my main alias online for forums etc.
If I can’t register that, you’ll find me as AntiSceptic, a nick I stole from my friend Gavin back in Uni days.
Ah, ok. I knew that. I thought there might have been something else funny about it that I wasn’t seeing. It’s really annoying when you can’t register the main one. Like me and Arwench. If that’s taken, which is rare fortunately, I use Alwench. In my mmorpg days and I had multiple characters I used to extend to Starwench and if I was something less attractive than the usual elf choice (like a firbolg in DAoC) I used Scarwench
Ahhh, them were the days. I still dream of Hibernia and the mystical city of Tir na Nog!
I’ve never been in a forum where someone else already nabbed mine, (though Shauna Bonnell seems to think she has my SilentlyScreaming gmail address), it is just that some places don’t allow a nick that long…
Alex, I can appreciate why it all feels so topsy turvy, coming from beliefs which are seemingly based on British/European seasons. Surely the Aborigines are – or maybe used to be – tuned in to the Australian climate, and their beliefs must reflect that?
Answers on a postcard
By the way, I’ve just added a few shots I took on the weekend in Westonbirt. Might make you a bit homesick. (Doubt that somehow!)
John, as far as the Aborigines go their culture is so separate from the westernised Australians that it has no bearing. I originally came here with naive beliefs that I would be able to learn about the Aboriginal spirituality and culture first hand but the native Australians very much keep themselves to themselves. I guess you could find ways if you tried hard but it’s certainly not a part of everyday life which I think is extremely sad.
And yes, I saw your photos of Westernbirt – beautiful. Of course it made me homesick. Australia is wonderful but there’s no place like home