Roisin Ingle talks to people for whom Christmas Day moves to a different beat
For most, Christmas follows a familiar pattern. After weeks of frantic gift buying and days of stockpiling groceries, alcohol and treats at the supermarket, we settle in front of a roaring fire for a day of presents, turkey, pudding and television. Specific family traditions may give your celebrations a unique twist, but the majority of the country will be celebrating with the usual levels of excitement and excess.
Christmas dinner in Mosney, however, will be a little different. It will be served in the large canteen where in the past holidaymakers would refuel before a night of bingo or cabaret. There will be dishes from all over the world, Nigerian stew and Halal lamb as well as the traditional turkey and ham.
Around 600 asylum-seekers call Mosney, the former holiday camp in Co Meath, home. It is where they will sit down to Christmas dinner and where they will celebrate the New Year.
Francoise Nkonzako (40), lives there with her husband and four of her 11 children. This is their second Christmas at Mosney and as the children hung decorations on the Christmas tree in the centre she reminisced about Christmas at home in the Congo.
"We would call everybody around," she said. "And have a barbecue with special meals made from chicken and lamb which we mix with peanuts. We grill plantain and have doughnuts for desert."
Francoise was forced to leave the Congo because her family were in danger. She said she was raped by soldiers and points to a bite mark on her cheek where they assaulted her. "Mosney is good but really we are in a prison here, we can go for a walk and we can go out, still it feels like you are trapped," she said. She would like to work, to have "a little job".
On Christmas Day she will eat in the canteen and go back to her chalet where the family will exchange gifts and try to recreate the delights of "grandfather's dish".
Hare Christmas
Praghosa Dasa, born Paul Murphy, runs the vegetarian restaurant Govinda on Aungier Street in Dublin and will celebrate Christmas on the island owned by the Hare Krishna community in Ireland on Lough Erne, Co Fermanagh. While the holiday is not part of his religion's spiritual calendar, most people are off work and so a large congregation is expected to travel to the house on the island for a feast. The day begins at 4.30 a.m. with the Mangol Arotik ceremony of worship in the temple which boasts golden statues of the deities Radha and Krishna shipped from India. The statues will be dressed in different outfits three times during the day and offered food as Hare Krishnas see God as a real person. After meditation, there will be philosophical discussions about ancient religious texts or how to develop a relationship with God. Because it is Christmas Day, there might be a discussion about the relationship between Jesus Christ and the Hare Krishna culture.
"The day will be completely relaxed and quite spontaneous," said Praghosa. "There is no chance of us sitting around and watching the Sound of Music but we might watch a video such as Brother Son, Sister Moon the life story of St Francis of Assisi".
A round of charades is also unlikely, but there may be a display or dancing or drama. At around 2 p.m., the group will sit down to a "mega-feast" with dishes such as paneer subji, a cheese and tomato sauce, spiced dahl and vegetable pakoras. A teetotal affair, this will all be washed down with lassie, a yoghurt-based drink. Unlike most of the country, "the closest we get to alcohol is really good honey mixed with sparkling water," said Praghosa.
Secular Christmas
As a humanist, Nicolas Johnson has no issues with Christmas which he says was a secular holiday before "it was taken over by Christians". It makes sense to celebrate at this time, he believes, when the seasons are turning and the weather is dark and gloomy. "It is just the religious parts that I don't find relevant to me. But most of the public displays of the season are secular anyway," he said. He would be more irritated by government endorsement of religion such as the Angelus.
"This means my tax-payer's money goes to advancing the cause of one religion," he complained.
Organic Yule
Caroline Robinson hasn't been to a supermarket in six years. So unlike the rest of us, every single item of food on the Christmas table at her home in Co Cork has been naturally made or grown. Even the mayonnaise is her own, while the children Dermot (12) Jack (9) and Gerald (7) made their own Christmas decorations and wrapped presents in newspaper.
Although the Robinson family have geese on the farm, they opted for turkey this year and got their organic bird from a local farmer "so we know exactly where it came from," Caroline explained.
Vegetables are all from their eight-acre farm. Organic parsnips, artichokes, celeriac, turnips, lumps of garlic, onion and potatoes will all be roasted together. There is no need to stock up on sliced pans because Caroline and her husband Eddie, formerly a "chemical farmer" from Kenya, make their own bread. The only shop-bought items in the house are things like toilet roll. "I don't like the power supermarkets have over people and I don't like the prices they pay farmers for goods," she said. "I think this Christmas a lot of people will be missing out on taste and freshness. I worry about the children's friends, their diet seems to be limited to baked beans, pasta and sausages."
A Christmas-free Christmas
Rabbi Golden, a mother of eight children, became a Muslim many years ago and says Christmas day can be a difficult one for those who left Catholicism behind to enter the faith. "It is hard for us because the day traditionally involves a lot of drinking which our religion forbids and we don't celebrate Christmas at all," she said.
The local mosque might organise an event to provide an escape for people who are under pressure from non-Muslim family members anxious for them to join the traditional celebrations. In Rabbi's house in Dublin there is no Christmas tree and no decorations.
"It's just another day," she says. "Like every one else we have to make sure there is enough food in the house because the shops are shut. But we will probably have spaghetti bolognese for dinner, it's just easy. We only celebrate things that have religious meaning for us. So we don't do Hallowe'en and we always told our children there is no such thing as Santa Clause. The only problem with that was when they started sharing that news with classmates which caused a few problems in the past," she laughed.
Christmas with no home to go to
Tom has only been homeless for four weeks but he is already feeling the strain. His two brothers and sister have been good to him, letting them sleep on the sofa or the floor but they have young families and he doesn't want to bother them too much over Christmas. Last month, he had to leave his flat in Dublin because the landlord sold the property.
He has been unable to work since a serious bronchial infection meant his right lung had to be removed. He is entitled to a social welfare rent rebate of €99 a week but the problem is that the rents on even the smallest bedsits are at least €130.
The authorities don't allow him to make up the difference with his basic social welfare payment. "I got an offer from a church who said they would pay the extra each week for me," he said. "But the rules don't allow it".
For the first time, Focus Ireland will be serving dinner on Christmas Day at their cafe on Eustace Street in Dublin. Tom will stay with his brother in a nearby flat on Christmas Eve and have his dinner with around 100 other homeless people at the cafe. Then he will go for a long walk out to his sister's house in Palmerstown.
Tom spends his days going door to door trying to get accommodation he can afford. "More than food, more than anything else I just want a roof over my head, somewhere I can lie down when I am not feeling well," he said. "Living like this, I will just get sicker and cost the Government more than the rent on a bedsit because of hospital bills.
For the first time in my life the thought of Christmas disgusts me. And I never thought I would say that."