Last lap to Xmas

It is still hours away yet before the cash registers close on this year’s Christmas shopping, and the verdict is still out on whether it will be one of the busiest in recent years, what with the number of industrial agreements signed recently and the paying out of retroactive increases, or one of the more conservative.

A noticeable feature of this Christmas season has been that despite the relatively large crowds in downtown areas many persons appeared to have been either walking around from store to store because they had not yet made up their minds or simply there because of the excitement of being part of the Christmas scene. Some may have only received their Christmas salaries and/or bonuses this week.

Christmas Eve has traditionally brought out last minute shoppers in their numbers, and today may very well bear witness as in previous years to the constant humming of scores of cash registers and the opening and closing of cash pans around the country, as people get caught up in the final round fever of shopping for gifts for close relatives and friends. Or for persons for whom they had not catered, but who unexpectedly provided them with gifts. But shoppers converging on malls, stores and supermarkets today for last minute purchases as well as withdrawals of cash from ABMs should heed the warnings issued over the past several weeks to exercise caution and not allow pickpockets, purse snatchers and con men to spoil their Christmas.

Downtown areas of Port-of-Spain, San Fernando, Chaguanas, Arima, Point Fortin and Couva will be swarming with persons today, most of them genuine shoppers, and who should not allow their understandable excitement in purchasing gifts to make them less vigilant. Professional pickpockets will be on the look out for those who expose sums of money. In addition, bandits will be in the vicinity of and even within ABMs to see if they can relieve credit card holders of their withdrawals, or to get a glimpse of PIN numbers as they are punched in. It is their cynical idea of Christmas shopping!

At many homes persons will be adding final decorations to Christmas trees, blowing up balloons to hang in living rooms, dining rooms, porches and bedrooms; cloves will be stuck into baked or boiled hams, traditional black cake and sweetbread will be in the ovens, and so will the turkey, chicken and pork. Ginger beer and sorrel boiled days ago, and ponche de creme will be ready for the big day tomorrow; the new or freshly laundered curtains will add that needed finishing touch to the living and other rooms, and the several Christmas gifts will have been carefully laid out at the base of Christmas trees.

The final round of pre-Christmas office and other parties as well as gift exchanges will be held today. It is last lap to Christmas 2003, and a mere few hours away from what a songster once described as “....a most wonderful time of the year.”