What if I just skipped Christmas?...

What if you can just say to everyone: 'Sorry, there'll be no Christmas cards from me this year, I won't buy any presents, I won't be putting up a Christmas tree and I won't spend Christmas Day with my family eating myself to death, so please just skip me this year!' True, you may miss on the office Christmas party but there'll be other occasions to drink like a fish and make a fool of yourself in front of Jane from HR and Tom from Finance by calling them 'lesbians'. Sure, everyone will think you've gone crazy and try and talk you out of it but only if you stand by your decision, maybe you can feel liberated by the fact that you don't have to become a victim of the Christmas season and follow all the other zombies sweating around Topshop in search for a present for your teeange cousin who you haven't seen since she was in diapers...

Ok, maybe I'm a bit harsh. After all I do have a family who I love spending Christmas with and I do love making a fool of myself at the office Christmas party. I also do like the lights on Oxford Street (though this year they are a bit disappointing - I mean umbrellas? really? what's that got to do with Christmas?...) and man I do like a nice Christmas turkey (or pork, if I'm in Romania, for that matter!). But what I hate about it is that Christmas has become an almost unbearable marketing pressure. To wear the best outfit, to buy the best presents, to get the perfect roast, the loveliest decorations, the best tree, the most prestigious looking Christmas cards, a boyfriend to visit eachother's families with etc etc. 


I don't remember when I stopped liking Christmas. Maybe during the only year my dad brought home a real Christmas tree and we decorated it like all the other families do. Because after that year I felt we ought to have Christmas like everyone else. Only it never happened again. My parents got divorced, we moved away, I grew up, left my country, spent many Christmases away from home, some of them working, some of them just alone in a London which gets eerily quiet on Christmas Day... I guess I spent too many Christmases that didn't match the marketing picture perfect I always thought Christmas should be to care anymore. I became numb to Christmas! But somehow, without realising, I kept trying. If only I tried harder with each passing year, if only I went home often enough and had my Mum put up a Christmas tree for my sake, if only I did a good deed on Christmas Day, if only, if only... But everytime something went missing. Either a cancelled flight, or a cold house, or a party I didn't belong to, or a guy I was waiting to get a call from... Somehow Christmas was always going wrong. 


But not this year. because I finally realised I don't care! I don't care about Christmas, because it is not me. Sure, I go along with it, but I don't feel it belongs to me. My life so far didn't have a lot of Christmas in it so this is me: somebody who'd rather run away to a hot place and sip on pina coladas while others are waiting for Santa and play in the snow. I'll let you in a little secret though: the moment I stopped caring, my life just filled up with all the Christmas in the world! Despite not planning to go home this year, a friend offered me the opportunity of a free plane ticket and it looks like I will, after all, spend Christmas with my Mum and perhaps the rest of my scattered, crazy but adorable family. Despite toying with the thought of being true to myself and skip this whole Christmas business, my lovely flatmate who is the most passionate supporter of the holiday season I've ever met, set up on a mission to get me all Christmassy and I find this very sweet. 

I think perhaps, besides it all, I am a Christmas person. Because it's not about the marketing of it, the decorations, the Christmas cards, the office party, the Christmas tree, the perfect setting and the perfect family affair etc, it's about the people in my life and yes, I can say it now, this is probably about the best Christmas I've ever had!

A healthy bit of sadness

Source: creattica.com

I wonder if sometimes we're not  meant to be a bit sad, if there isn't a healthy level of blues we just have to go through in order to function properly?... Have I been too busy keeping myself positive and energetic to the point that it is actually wearing me out? Am I too afraid of being sad?...

Ever since my teenage years. I've been a victim of my own mind, my own anguish, my own worries, my volatile self-esteem. Until now... Until about a year ago when I discovered that I have the power of controlling how I feel and I decided I would only feel good about things. And this is what's I've been dilligently doing: pumping my levels of positivity like an athlete getting ready for the Olympics, relentlessly, thruthfully, continously. Even when I ought to feel sad, I won't allow myself to be so anymore, because there is no way I would go back to feeling depressed and demoralised.

But when against my best intentions and my efforts, a diffuse sadness still creeps in, I wonder whether I shouldn't just let it happen. My body starts aching, my energy levels are low and yet I still refuse to surrender. I force myself to keep up with  my exercising schedule, to attend all the social events which holiday season forces upon us, until I realise my body is sending me signals. That perhaps I should stop. Just feel miserable for a little bit, feel the holiday blues, or anything of the sort. Yes, the nights are longer and the days are shorter and, yes, a little bit of sadness is okay.  And being tired of having to go out everyday for some social comittment or another is also okay.

Clearly one extreme won't compensate for the other, so as long as I don't allow too much sadness in my life, I'm sure that an okay bit of it would only do me a world of good. So maybe I should listen to my body, spend a day in bed, take in al the vitamins I can take and wallow in it as much as I can, because, tomorrow is another day and I know I will smile. After all, it's only a healthy bit of sadness...

What's so special about Goa

I've been meaning to write a post about my holidays in Goa for a long time now. First I had to get over my jetlag. I might have to blame it on the winter too, but I have to struggle to stay awake past 9.30pm these days. So most of all my blogging has been on hold.

I really wanted to write about Goa not because it is a wonderful exotic destination - which, despite its understated charm, hardly is - but because during this trip I've learned a few very valuable life lessons.

First of all, going to Goa and hoping to find the idyllic  beaches and hospitality of Thailand, is a huge mistake. A mistake which I made. A second mistake was trying to tell myself that I wanted the same thing from a holiday as my friend who I was travelling with...

Some people go on holidays to rest and reflect. I go on holidays to be active, try new experiences, new cultures and reflect, all at the same time. I know it's important to be able to allow yourself to stay still and become one with the Universe (call me a cliche, but this is what I thought I'd do in India!) but not when you've gotten into an exercising schedule and a comfortable routine, it's not ideal to let go. Unfortunately for me, apart of swimming there wasn't much to do in Goa...

What I learnt about myself two days into my holiday, in a very quiet and rural part of South Goa, Patnem, not being able to stay still and 'beach' myself the whole day long, was that my active nature needs to stay active, that I love my daily routine, my morning cup of coffe, my jogging by the Thames and the hustle and bustle of London. I learnt that I actually love my life!

What a shocking conclusion. I remember the times I used to go on holidays to run away from my life and instead of enjoying my days away I would fear the moment I had to go back. I would wrap myself in holidays blues for weeks and weeks after I'd gone back.

Anyway, so here I was, a few days already in Patnem wondering what was all the fuss about Goa. Not much, I thought... Not after you've been to Thailand... Despite its flocks of annoying tourists and increasingly even more annoying backpackers (the kind that bother you with questions such as 'Don't you wanna get shitfaced??'), Thailand's reputation is well deserved. Friendly locals, excellent food and out of this world beaches...

The other thing that makes Goa so different from Thailand is that local men seem to be particularly interested in European girls and will not make an effort to hide it. We've experienced local male attention from the owner of our resort and his brother, until it became clear that we had to leave. To be fair, for 2000 rupees a night (which is a lot for India) all we got was a dark and wet room which made it impossible to stay up after dark and where I showered on a few ocassions with a frog.

After a fleeting adventure in North Goa (assuming that all beaches were as nice as Palolem, we risked going up to Candolim beach), I became convinced that Goa wasn't really the land of beach hopping but more the land of stay where you feel safe. Candolim was a sight from Independence Day with people lounging on the beach while on the sea you could clearly see the profile of several huge oil tank ships. I would have taken a picture of that impossible sight if I wasn't too busy crying with frustration and disappointment. So back to Palolem we went. This time in a different beach huts resort serviced by Nepalese people - all in their best behaviour!

Sunset in Palolem Beach

My second week in Goa was as serene as this image. Because I finally let go of the frustration that there wasn't much to do, met some lovely people, learnt where the best places to eat where (believe it or not I couldn't wait to get back to London to have a nice curry), started a routine of swimming every morning, discovered the only place where you could get real coffee from and started appreciating that I was in fact in Goa.

What makes it so special then? The dolphins (the do exist and some lucky people even swam as close as 5 metres away from them), the silent parties, the English restaurant (Ourem88), the laughter with friends you've just made but feels as if you've known them all your life, the perfect weather, the two old toothless guys who sell pineapple and coconut, Sonia, the funniest and most gifted sales lady in Palolem, the guy from the corner shop who sold us cheaper water, the tuk-tuk driver and his dog Happy, the sunsets (oh the sunsets!), the lime and mint juices, the sound of the waves, the night sky adorned with palm trees tops, stars and a full moon.

What makes it so special is what you make of it. This is the most valuable lesson I've learned after Goa: that despite all the little annoyances one might encounter on holiday (and it is of course a valid lesson in everyday life too), it's really up to us in the end to see the silver lining and make the most of it! Don't be put off from going to Goa. You may discover your own life lessons...