CHRISTMAS IN THAILAND

I'm back from such a very busy Christmas English program in the school....since it's my first time to celebrate Christmas outside my country, I was sad and lonely being away from friends and kins on holidays. I was worried that while living in a Buddhist country, I would not be able to enjoy anything of Christmas other than in my own little living space. I was WRONG!!! There are 4 foreign Christians living in the place where I am staying and they actively celebrate the birth of Jesus. And, although I could be very wrong in this thought, everyone believes in Santa! Three of them are Protestant missionaries from New Zealand and Uk, and there were two young ladies who just joined us coming from England and Wales serving as missionaries in a nearby city. On the 25th day of December, we grouped together just as a family in a foreign land with purely European traditional foods, of course, my co-Pinoy teacher prepared something in the Pinoy style as well. From the day I arrived in Thailand, I saw evidence of the approaching Christmas season just as big malls around Bangkok filled with decorations and ornaments of Christmas...but then it didn't give me hope because I was enveloped with homesickness. Many of the malls had huge Christmas tree displays with full-sized colorful wreaths...that brought so much sadness to my face as I was thinking of the biggest Christmas celebrations in the Philippines while the cool breeze of December caressing your face. Faces of friends and family were the first pictures that I remembered, flashing back how the Filipinos busy rushing about the Christmas shopping and the Christmas carols in the air played always.