How Is Christmas in Jamaica Celebrated?
Christmas in Jamaica is celebrated in almost all parts of the island. The residents celebrate it with so much vigor and festivity that it relentlessly attracts guests every year.
Throughout the Christmas season, most places in Jamaica are mostly adorned with vibrant banners, colorful balloons, accordion-style bells, tinsels, traditional wreaths Christmas costumes and colorful Christmas lights. Homes are festooned with the newest tablecloths and curtains. Families spend Christmas together in big, festive reunions and gatherings.
Restaurants and food places are also memorable with the special foods and drinks served during the Christmas festivities. The unique-tasting ackee with salted fish, sumptuous roasted duck or chicken, tangy goat curry, appealing rice and gungo peas and mouth-watering stewed ox tail are a few of the usual meals served in the island during Christmas. Plus, these meals are mostly accompanied by the delectable sorrel – Jamaica’s special Christmas drink made of cinnamon, rum, sorrel sepal, sugar and orange peel.
Store places, especially the Grand Market, are also filled with jubilance of Christmas. All are characterized by the galore of scrumptious food, holiday crafts, energetic street dancing and strongly accentuated offbeat Christmas music. Accessories, small things and various gift items are also sold in many kiosks in the market. They are all set up with toys, balloons, firecrackers, cakes like the grater cakes, sweets like the pinda and peppermint sticks. Fruit cakes made of mixed fruits, rum and wine are sold in almost all corners of market places. People come dressed in fancy clothes, most wearing bright hats or exclusively-made costumes for Christmas. They celebrate the holiday even until dawn.
The streets in Jamaica during Christmastime are filled with merrymakers dressed in amusing masquerade costumes. This is Jamaica’s traditional way of celebrating the holiday, also known as the Junkanoo. During the Junkanoo, male revelers often wore huge masks adorned with marks, images or ornaments of cow heads, horse heads, devils, wild Indians and a lot more. Festivities are all replete with the smell of traditional foods that waft in the air and no day goes by without mysterious bands in gigantic costumes marching in cultural events.
Public places are decked with elaborate holiday ornaments. They are packed with seemingly never-ending concerts and parties during the season. Despite the fact that its natives have never seen snow, Santa Claus, giving gifts and Christmas carols are very present during this time of the year. Even ever popular Christmas songs Silent Night and Holy Night can be heard in all parts of the island. They are both played in its classical and reggae versions, together with the other all-time favorite songs during Christmastime.
Indeed, from the private homes to the streets and public places of this far, secluded Caribbean island, Christmas is nothing but a scintillating experience. It is marked with glee and excitement; it is filled with non-stop feasting, celebrations, parties, special treats, happy gatherings, entertainment and colorful parades; and it is never complete without Christmas ornaments and Christmas music in reggae. So as the song Christmas in Jamaica goes, Christmas in the island is nonetheless a perfect holiday.