Imagine not knowing what type of clothes you will be decked out in on Christmas night until you wake up on Christmas morning.

That was Christmas in a nutshell for 77-year-old Shirley DaCosta. But there was no disappointment. Perhaps because he wasn’t worried about getting the latest Nike, Reebok or Jordan shoes.

There was no shopping with his parents to pick the shoes or the pants that he wanted. When he was a child, he explained, Christmas clothes were the gifts he woke up to on December 25.

Interestingly, it was never a problem for him back then. Instead, it was a fun tradition that sent him to bed early on Christmas Eve, so he could wake up bright and early on Christmas. However, today, he marvels at how he was never disappointed.

“When you wake di morning, you get the clothes, enuh,” DaCosta recalled, leaning back on a grille with his arms folded.

“Dem [parents] buy it and put it dung fi yuh when yuh nah see it, and den dem put it under the Christmas tree, and when Christmas yuh get it. Yuh nuh know how it come, because dem nah tell yuh. Dem will all tell yuh seh a plane carry the clothes come fi yuh. At that time, yuh nuh know how it come. For Christmas dinner, we dress up in those clothes and we would go to our grandparents for food,” he added.

DaCosta told the Jamaica Observer that he continued that Christmas tradition with his four children — three boys and one girl.

“Mi do weh my father used to do back in the days when I was young. Mi give them a nice dinner, buy dem new clothes and things like dat. Mi nuh tell dem weh mi get the clothes. Mi tell dem seh a Santa Claus carry it come deh. Den dem dress up and come out Christmas day,” he related.

“For Christmas now, yuh get a good dinner. You get a very big dinner. No rice and peas… rice and gungo and sorrel drinks. Fish, pork, ham, all dem thing deh yuh get.”

But because his children are now adults and living on their own, he said most of those traditions have been put aside.

“Dem gone now. Dem turn big people now, so I don’t have to do those things anymore. Mi nuh have no young pickney. Three deh a America and one out yah. So, weh mi do is mi buy sorrel and soursop juice and make fi myself and any friend weh deh-deh. And we have rum and whisky.”