NO MORE CHRISTMAS SONGS AT CHRISTMAS

By Eme Arthur – Oso

We’re a few days away from most colourful celebration in the Church history the world over known for centuries as Christmas, a season for lavish celebration by Christians in commemoration of Christ holy birth at Bethlehem in AD… yet the beautiful, heavenly blissful Christmas Songs heralding the season seems to have disappeared from the atmosphere. How sad things have suddenly turned in this century.

Christmas season has always been awoken by those sweet tones of numbers like, “I’ll be home for Christmas, “, Jingle Bell, jingle Bell, jingle all the way and other several tunes. At bus stops, shopping arenas, radios and TV shows, everywhere you turn in towns and cities, these songs were dominant songs, creating more excitements for the approaching Christmas holidays.

But this seems to all gone, as passing through several bus stops in the city, everywhere is bustling with shoulder-pushing passerbys, anxiously shopping, while others rush up to catch buses back to their destinations.
At Uyo’s popular Ibom plaza that hosts a couple of Christian songs stores, the airwaves remain dry, and no more sound of music, either promoting Christmas Songs for intended buyers or for entertainment purposes.
Uyo plays host to many radio stations but none of them seems interested in devoting a segment yet for Christmas lullabies, except few commercials to target Christmas sales.
Before now Churches too were generously decorating their exterior and interior ambiance with colorful Christmas ribbons, designs and Christmas trees, but such memorabilia appears gone.

What we now see on the streets are State funded decorations in parts of Uyo, while extensive commercial to draw attention of people to the Christmas village built for business and entertainment rendezvous has been on, yet only those with business interests seem to know what is going on.
In some climes, many other religions are fighting hard to drown and erase Christmas off the calendar of events. But this isn’t the case with us in the Christian dominated environment. What else could be responsible for low response to Christmas?

Hard Times
For many, the weight of financial strain has dimmed the spirit of Christmas.
Faced with hard times, many seem to care less about the buzz of Christmas and focus how they can put food on their tables. Tough times too has killed many small stores that were stocking Christmas Songs, while few surviving ones cannot afford to fuel their generators to power their music set to play songs to attract buyers. One bookstore at Udo Umana Street near popular Akpan Andem market, Uyo, has not turned on its stereo set for months as they are covered with dust.

The store operator complained of high cost of fueling the generator, as public power supply remains an illusion. A private radio station manager too complained of high cost of operation, particularly the cost of buying diesel to operate the station 24/7.

To stay in business, the station has cut off some entertainment segments that attracted no sponsorship and Christmas songs segment is affected by this decision.
At homes, parents now scramble from morning till night to provide food, school fees for their children and wards, caring less about the fuzz of Christmas. High cost of subscription to DStv has forced many homes to cut off renewal of their subscription. DStv or GOtv subscription last year Christmas was significantly lower compared to current subscription costs of up to 50% more, depending on which choice of subscription you might make.

Hard times have dealt deadly blows on many, killing their moments of relaxation at home with music or sing-along beautiful Christmas Songs.
Christmas has become our tradition, like Easter season, Christians all over must endeavour to keep faith with these seasons, as illustrated by our youthful zeal. Just as the angels sang sweet choruses to herald Christ birth and his resurrection, we mortals cannot keep quiet, and wish away these seasons, just because of temporary pains we go through in our nation.

Let’s make Christmas, Christmas! Let’s paint our environment red with Christmas decorations and songs. We cannot let our heritage fizzle out because of hardship. We are encouraged in scriptures to hold fast what was given to us without wavering (Hebrews 10:23).

Christmas and Easter are choice sessions of the year we must wake up to in our thoughts and deeds. With the remaining days ahead of Christmas and Easter, let’s put back the songs that celebrate Christ and remind us of God’s magnanimous grace for us all. Let the world hear once more the melodies of hope, joy, and peace that define this season. Merry Christmas!