Warm December

By Marifi Jara

QUELIMANE, Mozambique–I have always loved December. I guess because that’s my birth month, and because of the holidays, the feasts, family get-togethers, the anticipation for a new year, and the nice cool evenings. Having been introduced (and grew up) within the Filipino “ber” months culture – which is looking at the onset of Septem”ber” as a prelude to the coming Christmas season in Decem”ber” and associating this whole period to cooler weather – it has been quite disorienting for me living here, a place somewhere below the equator.

Around here, the seasons are practically in reverse. The cold months are from May to around September (cold meaning between 18 to 22 degrees centigrade) and summer, or the warm months, sets in by October. Those living in Australia, New Zealand, most of the South American countries and other countries within the South African region would know what I mean. Nowadays it’s hot, hot hot in this small town on the edge of the Zambezi River and the afternoon breeze that blows in is always a refreshing relief. The air-conditioning in the rooms which we have not used since arriving here at the start of the second quarter here have been put to work at nights.

Days are longer now too. We have had to put up what I would call “reinforcement curtains” to keep the sun out which starts shining oh-so-brightly by 5 in the morning. At the mercado central (central market), which is a very spartan place really where traders set up basically temporary shops, I have noticed a declining number of vendors and I think that is partly because the sun is just too punishing by 9 a.m., never mind at noon to about 3 p.m.!

Also, there are now less agricultural goods to trade as the stock from the last harvests from the machambas begin to dwindle. A friend here told me that the crime rate usually goes up around December because with less food supply, more people become desperate and are driven to committing felonies. Well, I said, that’s interesting because crimes also traditionally increase around this period back in the Philippines, especially within the urban/city areas like Dagupan, but more because of all that burden of spending in what has become a quite commercialized Christmas celebration in the only Catholic country in Asia.

And speaking of Christmas, it is of course, just as in the rest of the world, also observed here where there is a good number of Catholics given their history of Portuguese colonization. But there are plenty of Muslims too, and I hear the new Christian sects are also growing, and many also remain religion-less (but not necessarily faithless). The communist links of the post-colonial ruling here (which remain very glaring as all streets most everywhere are communist-related – as in Avenida Mao Tse Tung, Vladimir Lenin, Karl Marx and significant dates in communist history) actually set December 25 as a public holiday in celebration of “Family Day”, which I think is a great compromise for everyone. A Catholic Mozambican who works for an international development agency, whom we had as a guest for one evening at home, said the Catholics have absolutely no problem about that because Christmas, after all, is indeed about celebrating that simple family in Bethlehem. And everyone, regardless of religion, would understand the basic human value of having a family.

It will be warm here in December, humid even we expect. But a different weather from what I am used to need not change the good things I associate with that time of the year.

(Readers may reach columnist at marifijara@gmail.com. For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/roots/
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