Holiday Season

Merry Christmas to you all, we hope you had a good one.

Remember that Christmas is not a holiday in this part of the world, however we have been lucky this year as the 40th National Day Celebrations have fallen around this time so S. has ended up with some extra days off announced just a few days before Xmas.

As a result a lot of people jet off to their home countries at the last minute braving the sky rocketing airline prices (and the unpredictable European weather) while we spent it with friends under the sun doing what normally one does over this holiday season: eating, drinking, eating, drinking, eating…and generally being merry.

For Christmas Eve we were at some friends’ house and we enjoyed a mix of international traditions from Italian starters to Argentinian BBQ to British extra alcoholic puddings not to be consumed before driving (and I mean in any country).

Amongst the most memorable moments was watching C. making a Brandy Sauce for a very delicious Christmas Pudding: on the claim that she could not taste the brandy and that “you cannot call this a Brandy Sauce”, she held the bottle up-side-down over the pan. Brilliant cook! Measures are for beginners: the lucky ones know that her puddings (and her cocktails) are legendary; and so was this one (and the Trifle too!!).

For Christmas Day we indulged in an extravagant buffet at the posh Al Bustan Palace Hotel, and then rolled for drinks to the beach bar. All in civilised style.

I admit that the concept of having a Christmas meal and pulling crackers while holiday makers paddle in the pool outside may seem a bit weird but then so is having a Christmas tree in the lounge when you roam around in t-shirt and flip-flops or turning on the Xmas Tree lights when you return from the beach with your hair full of sand (perform shrug here).

Now is the turn for New Year’s Eve (not before squeezing in a trip to the desert for what we expect to be a very unusual concert by a friend's band - the venue will be at least).

I don’t know what the fuss is about this NYE. It’s always the same dilemma: what to do to avoid that dreaded anti-climax feeling? With the extra days off we were really keen on jetting off somewhere nearby (we find that after 2 years living away from Europe “nearby” has acquired a completely new meaning). In a couple of days we travelled virtually to Lebanon, Istanbul, India and Sri Lanka and finally we got a quote for a 4-day safari in the Masai Maara in Kenya. We were really ready to book what would have probably been the most extravagant last-minute holiday that we could have not planned but we had to scrap everything when we realized that we needed a Yellow Fever jab which for me expired last year and that it was obvious I was not going to get over the National Holidays. Gutted! (by the way I am planning to get this done in the New Year and I am sure that the experience is going to be "interesting").

So here we are, left with celebrating NYE on a white beach along the coast somewhere, doing what we do best with our friends. As AZ always says: what a hard life!

Happy New Year to you all!