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An alternative Christmas

“Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits
of good put together that overwhelm the world.” –

Archbishop Desmond Mpilo Tutu

Christmas is coming. Our alternative tree is out, bought from a guy who sits on a street corner and twists the wire by hand. I’d rather buy from him than a high street store. We’ve used this tree for many years. Some of the decorations are up-cycled tin cans, bits of washed up flip flops and odd bits of fabric.

As usual, we will not be buying into the giving of gifts. We are neither religious, nor wise kings. The flurry of buying at this time of year, represents everything that we have tried to reject. Christmas is a time of mass over-consumption.

But it doesn’t have to be.

We’re not being ‘Bah Hambug’ about the whole thing. We will definitely celebrate. But we just can’t see the point of buying a tonne of pointless presents for people who have plenty. Do you know how many gifts get thrown away? Many of us don’t need more. We need less.

We try to be conscious consumers. Year round we buy local, ‘local is lekker right?’ As much as possible we shop responsibly, try to make ethical choices, things like fair-trade coffee and chocolate. We try to support independent businesses. We avoid the corporate chains and big online retailers, who typically exploit their staff in the name of profit. And we have both committed to consume less, recycle more and get a bit closer to zero waste.

So why not do Christmas differently?

We talked about Christmas and decided that we would buy each other experiences, not stuff. You can read more about that in the new year. We opted to buy just one gift this year, for someone who truly needs it.

We’ve been buying The Big Issue from a young man called Sive for the last couple of years. For those who have never seen it, THE BIG ISSUE is a magazine, produced by an organisation that works to promote, encourage and support entrepreneurship. Their monthly magazine is purchased by individuals who might otherwise be unemployed. They sell the magazines at traffic lights, to generate an income.

Sive always greets me wearing his bright red hat and a “Hellllllllloooo”. Like us, he moved away for a better life. He headed to the Mother City from the Eastern Cape and fell on tough times. He’s probably faced challenges that many of us can’t imagine and yet he always flashes this fantastic smile whenever we see him. So this is the one gift we will give this year. We got a small backpack and we filled it with rice, oil, coffee, biscuits, popcorn and toiletries. We stopped to present his gift to him at the traffic lights. And Sive was delighted.

There are so many problems in our world. We cannot find sustainable solutions to them over night and sadly many world leaders, with the power to effect real change don’t care to do so. But we all have the power to make some small difference to someone this Christmas.

Around the world billions of dollars will be spent on stuff that no one needs, so called ‘stocking fillers’ and cheap plastic novelty items, destined for landfill. Will you waste your money like this?

Join us if you will, to have an alternative Christmas. Spare a thought for someone who really needs something. Give something that matters.

How will you do things a little differently this Christmas?

© Maggie M / Mother City Time