A wonderful, misty morning began as Mother Nature started her tunes. The clouds seemed to be hugging the sun, notifying all it was a special day, Christmas Eve. I was so excited about this day because of what I was about to witness in the upcoming hours. Yes, we were going to celebrate Christmas with the Grannies residing at Good Shepherd Home, Wattala. I could already tell the home was going to be completely filled with positive vibes. It was hidden in a huge garden at the heart of the urban city. This special day was arranged the day before we visited the lovely home.
As we entered the home, we saw a hall filled with neatly arranged chairs, a Christmas tree, and many beautiful decorations. Upon gazing at the beautiful hall, a sister called the beautiful Grannies to come in. It all started with a time of prayer following an explanation by the Father from the neighboring church, of what Christmas is really about. He said, “Christmas is a festival which we should celebrate by forgetting all our sadness”. He gave us valuable advice on communication. Using our mobile phones, we communicated with people in a neighboring city as well as in a whole different country. We always think we are social and communicative but have we ever thought about how long we spend time with our parents? Surely, the Father's advice that day made us realize how little time we actually do communicate with them throughout our lives. The core note from the Father was, “Spend more time with parents rather than on your mobile phones”. This message truly touched our hearts.
We then moved onto the carol session. To simply put in words, we only sang Sinhala carols. One of the grandmas who was excellent at singing as well as in knowing all the lyrics by memory, sang “We three kings” beautifully. We alongside joined her. Every one of the grandmas got a chance to express their talents, where most of them sang beautiful songs while others shared interesting stories to us from their childhood.
There were about two grandmas who knew only Tamil songs so they sang them from the bottom of their hearts. With all the singing, the day isn’t complete without a dance performance. My friends and I started singing wonderful songs and played some musical instruments. I still cannot recover from the shock of seeing everyone dance so well. They definitely surpassed my expectations. Some of us joined them too. I mean, how can we just let the Grannies have all the fun, am I right?
After all the singing and dancing, it was Santa's time! No matter how old we get, we always love gifts. Santa distributed the gifts we bought for them. To intensify the joy, we played pillow passing with them. Later on, some of the grandmas shared their life experiences with us which I have to say was very heartbreaking to hear. They were stories that added new meaning to our lives. Personally, I was thinking that I’ve gone through hard times and thought that I should no longer show my tears to the world anymore; but after this day, I realized that there is a lot more of life I need to go through. The most valuable thing I learned was that our tears are the most valuable symbol of our emotions. Being emotional makes us stronger so we should never ever hesitate to express our emotions as it is a way of feeling our soul.
As we brought the event to an end, the sister gave us a vote of thanks. We finally took a group photograph with everyone and returned home with many beautiful memories and lessons. It was truly an unforgettable Christmas Eve.
This wouldn’t have been a great success without Hansani Gamage and Mineshi Kanagaraja who chaired the project. Randila Withanarachchi (Vice president of community service) and Amaya Karawgoda (Director of community service) did a great job in making this event a success, as well. Last but not least, I would like to thank my brothers and sisters at Spectrum who helped a lot to make this event an unforgettable project.
Avinash Selvarathnam
EBH 2022