FOR Christians worldwide, Christmas is the time when they celebrate the birth of Jesus, their spiritual leader.

It is also the time of year in some cultures, when the heaviest economic activitiy takes place.

Jamaicans, like millions of others, celebrate the season, often spending significant sums of money on goods and services they do not need.

Traditionally and still today, it is the season for concerts, church rallies and fairs, and a time for youngsters and their families to welcome their extended families to their homes – even for the day.

It is also the time of parties, ‘dressing up’, receiving goodies from the Christmas barrels, along with visits from overseas-based relatives coming in mainly from Britain, Canada and the United States.

However, in recent times, there has been a shift from the traditional Christmas caroling, family get-togethers and enjoying a home-cooked Christmas dinner, of course with a cold glass of home-made sorrel.

“Fast foods have robbed Christmas of a lot of the fun of preparing, and serving foods for Christmas,” lamented Norma Banghiat, author of Traditional Jamaican Cooking, a cook-book depicting the origin, influences and recipes for Jamaican foods.

“It’s a fast growing addiction, and is often the reason for the growing obesity problems we have here,” she said.

However, she said some old Jamaican Christmas customs have lived on. “Christmas is still the time for families. They really try to put their differences aside and celebrate together.”

She recalled that, traditionally, roast beef, chicken, rice and peas, and sorrel were the foods and drink of choice, along with the Christmas puddings.

But she said “the chicken of yesteryears were nice juicy and had a beautiful taste. It is nothing like the battery chicken, and other genetically modified foods that are so heavily used today.”

For Governor General Sir Howard Cooke, celebrating Christmas in rural Jamaica, as a boy, was a time for families to come together.

“I remember how members of the community would go caroling in their district and adjoining communities and sing carols right up to Christmas Eve,” said Sir Howard, who grew up in the rural district of Goodwill, a community on the border of St James and Trelawny.

“Communities would be cleaned up. The roads would be weeded, stones and the trunks of trees would be white washed, repairs would be effected to homes, but the most popular event was the Christmas dinner,” said the governor-general in an interview with the Observer.

Christmas dinner, he said, consisted of roast pork, chicken, rice and peas and huge amounts of sorrel – a traditional Christmas drink.

This, he said, is one tradition that has remained today.

He recalled that families provided their own entertainment, singing Christmas carols, especially on Christmas Day. Families also had prayer meetings on Christmas morning after which it would be time for food.

Sir Howard said concerts, games and cricket competitions between communities were events which brought communities together.

“It was quite a bit of excitement, because everybody would come out and see it and there would be so much food,” he said.

“The sound of the fi-fi’s, balloons, and toy horns, were the popular sounds of Christmas Day, with children running round trying to out blow each other,” he added.

More than 70 years later, with his status now elevated to governor-general, a far cry from the boy in rural Jamaica, Sir Howard said, much of the community spirit is no longer there, and traditions such as caroling, no longer exist.

“It is so disheartening that a tradition, such as caroling no longer exists. This is due in part largely to the violence, and many persons, no longer go caroling because of fear for their safety.”

School teacher Claudette Barrett said she recalled as a child growing up in St Mary that it was a time when “children got their own bottles of soda”.

She said, much of the food would be prepared overnight, leaving the meat to be done on Christmas Day.

“The pudding, sorrel, chicken, pork, rice and peas, ackee and salt fish, pork leg, there was so much food. Mark you, it would not go to waste, because there were so many children to clean it up, so nothing went to waste,” she said.

Barrett said the tradition of the feast of foods, has largely remained, but pointed out that, “while the families overseas used to make the trip home, it is Jamaicans that are now going overseas for holidays”.

Barrett said that modernity, in that sense, has “opened the eyes of Jamaicans, with many travelling overseas and returning to make adaptations to how Christmas is celebrated locally”.

While embracing modernity, she said that she holds fast to traditions such as her family reunion and the sorrel drink.

Former television producer, Alphanso Walker, also had concerns about the effects of modern Christmas celebrations, especially on the entertainment industry.

Christmas was the time for the dances, fairs and going to the movies in the Corporate Area, and there was much anticipation for the season.

“The best thing was for a guy to take his girl to the movies and make the long walk back after the show. That was the fun part,” he said.

Now, crime has put a stop to all of that, he lamented.

According to Walker, there was a time when buses used to drive through Victoria Park in downtown Kingston, and entertainment for many was simply going to sit by the fountain and feed the fish.

“Years ago, on Christmas and Boxing Day, the theatres used to put on stage shows and often the artistes on one show used to appear on another. So they would perform at one show and run from one theatre to the other,” he said.

Now, that has stopped and what you have is ‘Sting’ where all the artistes come on one show.

“That make sense, but then, whereas everybody would get to see them at the theatre, not everybody can go to Sting,” he said.

During Christmas celebrations in downtown Kingston, he said, “there used to be dances in different communities, different avenues, and many uptown girls would come to the dances. We could get to dance with them, because we knew the moves.”

He said, too, that movies were shown at the Ward Theatre on Christmas Day, but support waned largely because of the violence in the downtown area.

The violence started because of politics, and it was that “climate that put a stop to most of the entertainment of Christmas. People can’t go freely where they wanted to go.”

He said that with the violence spreading, Jamaicans have been robbed of the chance to enjoy activities which did not cost much, and which helped to spread the Christmas cheer between citizens of all colour and classes.