Carols - around the city on, wait for it, a lorry!

It's that time of the year when people suddenly begin to harbor a rather wierd affection for a fat old man in a red er... suit, even if the beard is fake, the wobbly belly is a pillow, etc, etc. And as is usual, this is the time of the year when people go around singing (or trying to, in any case). It's the accepted norm and people don't do much to change it. Or do they?


The idea was making the whole going on rounds singing carols more unconventional, while at the same time making sure we didn't have to get into each and every house*; The ever-green (or red) Santa with the fake beard and pillowed tummy present with bags of toffees; And to make sure the carols rang in the ears of a whole bunch of people wherever we went... Recipe for ear-ache? We were thinking more along the lines of the angels singing for the shepherds out in the cold** but you get the idea. 

What followed was sheer genius, and some rather interesting (if a trifle pointless) observations. We got ourselves a mini-lorry, and decked it with an amplifier, a pair of loudspeakers, a few boughs of a fir-tree, lots of fluorescent tubes and serial lights, some 10 chairs, a keyboard (handled by yours truly), and in a nod to technology, an ipod playing Boney M's Christmas album***, all packaged with nearly a dozen men and women, and a whole lot of balloons. 

... which eventually led to a lot of fun. Observation no. 1 was how little by way of suspension a lorry's deck has - I had to hold on to the keyboard throughout the trip, which went on a little over three hours - made me wonder about what exactly those leaf springs in the lorry do, and observation no. 2 revolved around getting into tiny little roads and finding buses there! Who er... honked a lot because the roads were barely enough for two Revas (or G Wiz to international readers) to go side-by-side comfortably. 

To make matters more interesting, the amazing suspension soon became too much for our amplifier, which shorted it's auxillary circuits, after which, trying to get the keyboards sounding through the microphone input was painful, to say the least. Obviously, we didn't stop and try getting it fixed. 

On the whole though, it was a very nice experience. Everywhere we stopped (and we stopped a lot!) a crowd came around to listen. Observation no. 3 - while you'd naturally expect Santa to be a hit with kids, youth and grown-ups seem to take a more than passing interest - more than you expect anyways. So we had people, young and old, asking Santa to pray for them, bless them, etc. I'll be posting the pictures from it soon. Keep watching this space.

* I know some of you are affronted at going through all that trouble and not getting a bite to eat at every house, but considering the sheer number of houses that would be visited, the modern human male and female prefer eating less to becoming Santa Claus. It's actually true.



** In Madurai, where snowflakes are seen during every Christmas since '97 in homes watching Cartoon Network and the HBO. 


*** Is it just me, or are Jingle Bells and Feliz Navidad of the said Boney M's christmas album the most widely known and heard Christmas songs in India? 
 

Christmas - Good news!

Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you tidings of great joy which will be to all people.

“For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

Luke 2:10,11 (NKJV)

Good news – What?

Christmas. The word today has come to mean so many different things to different people. Presents? Christmas trees? Lights? Decorations? Stars? But what is Christmas? We have all come to identify Christmas as a festival celebrating the birth of Jesus. Looking at the passage given here, the angel announcing the birth of Jesus called it good news, which is rather interesting to note, because, as we have come to expect in today’s world, no news is good news! Interestingly enough, it was pretty much the same in those days too (as we shall soon see) and what was good news over two thousand years ago is good news ‘which will be to all people’ even today. 

Good news – Why?

To understand this properly, a quick history lesson is in order. The people of Israel had been attacked left, right and center by every nation around them, defeated again and again, and had so many different masters that it looked like a different world power ruled them every few years. What kept them going were prophesies from over 700 years ago by prophets Isaiah and Micah that proclaimed that the Messiah would come, who they believed, would deliver them from their political (that he would establish a kingdom), economic (they would become prosperous again)(there had been absolutely no word from God for the last 400 years) problems. and religious

Good news – How?

Do not be afraid!

In a time and age governed by fear, here came a super-natural being who proclaimed that the Savior was born, and he told people to not fear. The wait was finally over! They did not have to fear anymore. The advent of Christmas reminds us every year, to not be afraid. 

Great joy!

The birth of Jesus brought great joy in the hearts of the people of Israel back then, and it continues even today; when people accept Christ as their Savior, He is born in their hearts, and the joy of finally having your sins forgiven is unspeakable. Why? True happiness does not depend on whether India wins the World 20-20. It has its roots in contentment, in peace, which comes from reconciliation with God. Think about it. If you have wronged someone, there is always a part of you which will continue to feel guilt until you have been forgiven. It is the same here. We were created by a sinless God, who naturally expects us to follow in His footsteps. We, on the other hand, have been born in sin, and live in sin. Though we do not realize it for most part, there is a huge wall of guilt that keeps us from being joyful. Christ came to break down that wall; so that you and I can be joyful.

Have a wonderful Christmas!

Watch this space!

It never fails to impress me how life keeps going on and on, whether we have a say in it or not. It may be our own lives, or any one else's, but day after day happens with machine-gun precision, almost as if life is a war, and we're forced to march forward relentlessly or... be gunned down?

The more I think about, the more it seems to make sense; that life is war. It's not just a single battle, and to make matters worse, it's not really simple either - honestly, if you think about it, a lot of times, we don't really know if we are on our own side!

Now, if indeed we are at war, and for most part do not know who or what we're fighting, this raises more than a few complications, not the least of which is whether we are capable of fighting this war at all, let alone winning it. This blog, then. is just my attempt at chronicling just about everything that fits in here - events, lessons learnt, rants, rambles, humor, in the hopes that you, the reader might find something useful... or I'm probably just writing this because I feel like it, in which case, enjoy yourselves, and if you do, you're always welcome to let me know :)