Well, they don't celebrate Thanksgiving here as far as I know, so the next big Christian holiday is Christmas.
And they've been getting ready for a while now. Decorations in the stores by mid-September, songs on the radio by mid-October. And now that all the spooky stuff has been disasse,bled, Christmas has taken over. Of course at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a smattering of Thanksgiving things around. There's a healthy American population still residing in the Philippines, largely leftover from when Clark Air Force Base was still up and running, and frozen turkeys aren't that hard to find.
I'm doing an exchange on a couple of internet boards, so this has actually worked out to my benefit. Bazaars packed with gifts and wrapping paper haven't been hard to come by at all, so we are prepared to mail our boxes this week and next to ensure timely arrival for the holidays.
Every weekend there are several bazaars going on, and this past weekend was the semi-annual USEC Bazaar at the World Trade Center here in town. Of course we went.
We almost finished our shopping there, with just a couple tail end items to pick up, but the kids came prepared with the money they have saved over the past 6 months from weekly allowances (plus 10% interest). Katherine purchased for everyone in the family, I was duly impressed with her willingness to part with her hard-earned cash, and her careful decisions about what to get for each person. Rebecca had spent a good chunk of money a couple months ago on some Filipino Barbies for herself, so she was down quite a bit, but still managed to buy gifts for everyone she wanted to. Even Nicholas brought his money and purchased a gift for a sibling (and a couple for himself).
It's still so early... and frustrating for the kids to be told time and again that Christmas is a long way off. Katherine wants to wrap her presents, Nicholas wants to open his, I want to decorate the house. It all has to wait.
I'm kind of getting into that spirit, though.
Sleigh bells ring, are you listening?
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