Christmas (or not) in Panama

Forgive me if I have said all this before, but one of the things I really like about life as an expat is much-reduced pressure to conform to social norms.  It happens in the day-to-day sphere, where I don't bother to wear make-up (would not have been seen dead without it in London!) on the basis that most Panamanians would see me as just "a white lady" no matter what I was wearing and how made up my face was.  So what's the point in making an effort?

It is of even greater benefit when it comes to big days on the calendar, however - especially Christmas.  I've never been a fan of Christmas, and relish the freedom here to totally avoid tinsel, cards, turkey and brussels sprouts, etc.  Of course the locals do celebrate Christmas, with it being a Catholic country, but they are less insistent on knowing what I, as a foreigner, am doing, so it's much easier to do nothing at all than it was in the UK where that was seen as making some kind of statement.

However, this year the Panama City authorities have gone all out with the Christmas decorations, with the trees in every park lined and dripping with silver lights, and light sculptures of reindeer and Christmas trees and other random stuff placed between them.  It's impossible to avoid but I have to admit they have done a good job and the decorations are very pretty.

Not quite so good were the so-called "Carols by Candlelight" held on Saturday evening.  I've managed to avoid them all the other years I've lived here, but this Saturday I was just walking home and there they were, people gathered round an outdoor auditorium, ready to start.  So I sat down for the first song - which turned out to be the last, for me.  A bunch of seven-year-old schoolkids singing "Deck the Hall with Boughs of Holly" (in Spanish), slowly, tunelessly, and accompanied by two electric guitars... it was one of the most dire renditions I have ever heard, and I was grateful to be able to escape back to my totally un-Christmassy apartment.