A long way to come to avoid Cliff Richard

Let’s face it, “Misteltoe and Wine” is the worst Christmas song ever. Funnily enough, you don’t hear it much here. Nor any of the other dozen or so tunes that take over the British airwaves before the big day. That’s not to say it’s a Xmas free zone though; I heard stores pipe carols like “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” to the heaving hordes of shoppers (rather memorably back-to-back with “Small Dick Man”). Some make no effort at all; others dress their windows elaborately. Department stores, tea houses, karaoke bars – I’ve seen them all with the same, curious, fifties-style happy Santa face and Merry Christmas script swathed in pretty raggedy bits of tinsel.

However, there’s no official Christmas holiday; my school doesn’t mark it and, perhaps, frowns a little on too much being said about it at all. In general, it’s just an excuse to spend lots of money for no good reason (sounds familiar, huh?). Similarly – for no good reason – the thing to do at Christmas is buy an inflatable hammer and hit people with it on Christmas Eve. I’ve asked and asked but NOBODY knows the significance beyond the assertion “It’s fun” (which is also debatable).

We were given Christmas Day off by the school (only, I think, because we asked for it) and tried to make the most of what we had: duck legs instead of turkey and a melange of winter vegetables expertly cooked up by Rachel in her tiny kitchen. Wine, beer, presents and an afternoon of playing cards followed. Perhaps it was the hangover from the previous night’s session or perhaps it was just inevitable given our situation but an air of gentle melancholy had sunken upon us by the time we parted. We were back to work the next day.

Some of the kids had marked Christmas at home in the weekend (by “marked” I mean they got some presents). But I noticed no real excitement about the whole business either in the run up or in the aftermath and I decided not to devote too much time to it in lessons. Rachel set aside no less than four weeks for it up to the 25th culminating in cutting out snowflakes which the kids got to stick on the windows of their classrooms.

Said snowflakes were torn down, however, along with the cut-out Christmas tree posters. The teachers felt she’d overstepped some invisible mark: even a pretty secular snowflake was too much apparently.

I did just one lesson on the subject (there was no way I could compete with snowflakes) and it was a lot less controversial. With my pedagogic hat on, I began with a quick discussion about Christmas to gauge, as much as anything, what they knew already: “Old Man Christmas”, “Christmas socks full of presents” and “Christmas postcards” was about the sum of it – along with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. So, with my Santa hat on instead, we played that old Christmas favourite Pass the Parcel (Yes, I know, I know…). Hours and hours I spent wrapping fourteen Christmas presents in layers and layers of festive paper (Note to self: NEVER do this again. EVER.) Bafflement reigned to begin with but slowly, and once I’d explained things more clearly, they got the idea so that in most cases the game was a hoot. And that even when I couldn’t find the ‘Xmas Tunes’ on my Walkman so we passed the parcel to George Thorogood and the Destroyers singing “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer”. All very Christmassy.

Or – it just had to happen, didn’t it – the power went off in one of my classes so, highly trained as I am, I improvised… by singing.

Those poor, poor kids, is all I can say.

Also unchristmassy, I was tempted to corruption by stopping the music when the best behaved kids (or the ones who’d given me Christmas cards) got the parcel. But, in the end, I did it fair and square. Invariably it was the class troublemaker, bully or loudmouth who won it that way every time. A lot like life really.

What other Christmas things could I do? How about getting them to listen to a seasonal song a couple of times and fill in the missing words? Brilliant! But carols? Too religious I’m afraid. Pop tunes? The lyrics are all way to complicated. So: something slow, simple, with clear lyrics and an unmistakable Christmas flavour.

Hmmmm, let me think.

I may have avoided Sir Cliff but this year, for eight times a day, every day for a week, there was no getting away from White Christmas and bloody Bing Crosby.