Some Like It Hot

In all the excitement of coming to Australia and being warm, it was very easy to forget that the Christmas season was upon me. Sure there were Christmas trees, tinsel and the like but there were also open air festivals and bikini clad beach goers. Very confusing indeed. I spent Christmas 2010 in Hanoi where outside of my Western Hostel Bubble they did not really celebrate Christmas - decorations are put up around the city but if you asked the Vietnamese what they were going to do on Christmas day the answer was not very much. But whilst hardly traditional, last year still managed to feel like Christmas thanks to the WHB and the weather being suitably grim (if only compared to the previous months).


Now I always enjoy the argument that a hot, sunny Christmas is the most traditional of all if you play the Christ in Christmas Card. Yes, the scene of the very first Christmas was essentially a desert aka hot and sunny. Fair enough. But do not champion this notion and then put polystyrene snowmen in the window and play Let It Snow! If you get to spend Christmas being warm and working on your tan it is unfair to simultaneously get in on the iconic aspects of a Northern Hemisphere Christmas. You, dear Australia, appear to be having your brandy pudding and eating it too. Besides, the surfboarding Santas in red tank tops and sunglasses are much more apt - even St. Nick needs a vacation.

The view from the Packard Coast House

Thankfully, I was whisked away from my Christmas confusion by Romy (a very dear friend from my Hanoi days in case you live in a cave and have never heard of the unstoppable force that is Romdom) to be treated to a traditional Aussie Christmas with her family on the coast in Guerilla Bay. Situated on a small peninsula, the house has access to not one, but two beautiful beaches and stunning views all around - pretty damn spectacular. The massive Packard Family considerately arrived in small groups to allow me to learn their names and were warm and welcoming without exception. Suddenly, despite the amazing weather, it was feeling a lot like Christmas.


The 25th itself got off to a concerning start when I was rocked awake about 9am by a grinning Romy who cheerfully announced that I had to get up because I was ruining Christmas. The family had started getting up at 6am, sweetly unable to shake off the Christmas excitement that so many of us lose over the years and Packard tradition is to wait until everyone (around 25 people) is up before opening even a single one of the presents in the ridiculously large pile. (Seriously, never seen anything like it. All of the presents could not be put under the tree until everyone was going to bed on Christmas Eve as the pile took up the majority of the living room). In my head this many people with this many presents was going to be pure mayhem but far from the standard Christmas morning picture of people frantically grabbing every Christmas present in sight and ripping it open, a lovely little ceremony took place. The oldest and youngest members of the family distributed the presents in a completely orderly fashion, calling out who each present is for and who it is from e.g. "To Dom, From Rom." I must ask, are other families this civilised on Christmas morning or am I just disgustingly greedy? Regardless, I loved it and will definitely take my time with presents from now on.


Then of course, we went to the beach. Access to the 'back beach' is only possible by practically abseiling down a dirt track/cliff, clinging to the ropes the family have put in place over the years. I made it down very slowly with much help and teacher-like encouragement from an amused Romy who could have made it down in a fraction of the time if she did not have to babysit my own descent. However, those "good job buddy!"s really helped and I felt victorious, if not exhausted, when I hit the ground. It is completely possible that no-one other than the Packards know about this little gravel beach which made it a particularly special place to spend Christmas Day as there was no-one on the beach other than us. Oh and seven dogs. I mean, OK, all seven dogs probably were not on the beach, but it seems as good of a time as any to mention the huge canine presence and allow you all to picture how on edge I was a lot of the time. 


And dogs certainly were not the only animals present during my Christmas. Some played in the sea with what was thought to be 'harmless, flat jellyfish' and actually turned out to be two mating stingrays. Bouncing on them probably was not the smartest move. (You understand that I took no part in this as the second 'jellyfish' was uttered, I swam for the safety of the shore). Never mind keeping your wits about you in case the local wobbegong showed up - do not be fooled into thinking that's a cute or silly name, as it is in fact a shark. But in the distance some spotted dolphins or whales or something cute like that. Back on land, despite numerous stickers on the windows on the decking, kamikaze birds managed to fly smack-bang into them on a daily basis. And these were not standard pigeons but beautiful lorikeets; colourful, parrot type things that we would have in an aviary for sure. They knocked themselves out so hard they would  pass out on the grass below barely moving for 20mins. Black cockatoos flew overhead regularly but managed to avoid the window. Then there were the goannas and possums supposedly scampering around the deck at night time. Just ridiculous amounts of wildlife fluttering around for a simple city girl like myself! 

The scene was set

But despite intrusions from the animal kingdom we had a completely lovely Christmas. Once back from the beach, everyone got cleaned up and stuck into dinner preparations. The strawberry on top of my Aussie Christmas (I don't like cherries) was seeing the giant (and mouthwatering) ham come in from outside....could I dare to dream that they had BBQ-ed it? Disappointment temporarily sank in when I was informed it had been done in the smoker but inspection determined that the smoker was in fact a small, charcoal BBQ! (All fancy gas BBQs in Oz). All my Aussie Christmas dreams came true in that very moment. Dinner was amazing, with a few additions I would not normally see on my plate such as rice stuffing and sweet potato but everything was insanely delicious and as always I ate until I was fit to explode. 


Dinner was followed up with flaming puddings and lashings of very brandiey brandy butter and people whipping out a guitar and a ukulele for some sing alongs. I was dragged into the entertainment after serious pressure for an Irish Jig. Yikes. While I have drunkenly 'treated' many a club with my 'Irish dancing' when they foolishly play Tell Me Ma or something by B*witched it is not something I do with remote seriousness since I am in fact incapable. But a few glasses of wine and Christmas cheer was sufficient enough for me to embarrass myself so up I got to drag up my vague memories of an Easy Reel. Ultimately, it was good fun and like Tinkerbell and Rachel Berry before me I got applause which I do in fact need to live so it worked out in the end. Then to wind down a wonderful day we played a number of different games and even though no-one wanted to be on my team because I did not know who Julia Gillard was (whoops!) I muddled through. 


Basically I had an amazing Aussie Christmas and I cannot thank the wonderful Packard family enough for taking me in. As long as you are with good people (and eat until you feel sick) where you are or what the weather is like is inconsequential. Besides, some people still had red noses - sure it was from sunburn rather than Jack Frost nipping at them but as long as we all look like Rudolph, it does not really matter.