Christmas in Stafford *

2006-12-27 12:09 a.m.

My Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day finally saw me move away from the main city of Birmingham to a suburb called Stafford. One of the Pastors from Elim Church in Selly Oak invited me to spend Christmas with his family. So lugging a rather heavy bag, Pastor Tervor and his wife Chris to their home.

During the car ride, we exchanged various information and I learnt that they had traveled to Singapore at least three times. Well in fact, they had travelled much of the world. Along the way, more of the countryside was revealed and the buildings gave way to open plains, railway yards and stretches of motorways. You could even see sheep grazing in the fields but then again, as they mentioned, it was a rather mild winter. However, even if it wasn’t a white Christmas, it was going to be a lovely time with them.

“Welcome to the county of Stafford,” the sign said. Instantly, a mixture of Frankenberg and New Zealand appeared before my eyes. The road side was lined with light green shrubs or grass while the houses were almost all uniform in shape. Well not the Germanic/Bavarian shapes, but it’s always lovely to have a town seeting like that. They (the houses) were more scattered than those back in Birmingham and yes more greenery showed up. After a roundabout, Pastor Trevor pointed out an RAF base which he mentioned would be passed on to a Gurkha regiment. I caught a glimpse of a model of a Harrier jumptset as we passed it. Well, you know I’m always excited when I’m around/near military hardware. After enter a few more lanes, we reached their home with reminded me much of the suburbs in Sydney. It was even set of a sort of hillock.

Entering, their house immediately looked extremely cosy. Maybe it was more the spotlessness, a stark contrast from the entrance of my block back in Tennis Courts. I then met their younger son, Jonathan, who is a town planner in London. Not ong afterwards, he related his account of his travels around the whole—one to New Zealand, his skiing trips in Austria and his recent travel to the Philippines. Then, we retreated to the living room.

That’s when the rapid topic change conversation started. I’ve had several of these type of conversations before where you would suddenly jump from one topic to the next even though individuals hasn’t even completed all what they wanted to say. There’s nothing entirely wrong with such talks, although you must be quick to add in your say in the next topic. Notable memories of such rapid fire discussions were those in IDSS and a couple of times in debate meetings.

Here, we shifted from Uni life, to working life, to the culture of countries, English culture and lifestyle, work life in Singapore versus that of the UK and the political system of Singapore. We briefly touched on that when Chris called us for a late dinner. The dinner setting was that of a typical western meal setting, with cutlery and crockery placed on a table cloth with simple designs. Their dining room was rather small but the table could sit up to six persons and the cupboards and furniture sort of reflected that of a middle to higher class back ground. Paper napkins were used but they too were embroided with a rather nice design. I immediately recalled all that I learned about formal dining such as scooping soup away from you and tearing bread rolls apart (although we had garlic bread and focassia instead). So after soup and bread came pickled onions, slices of ham and beetroot followed. A far cry from Shackleton food and my own attempted cooking at home. I was beginning to realize what Ruth (the senior’s pastor’s wife) meant when she remarked that Chris was a great cook.

Back in the living room, the TV came on and I was introduced to Sky TV which I’ve never seen before. We watched a rather hilarious show where this guy pretended to be a Soviet and cracked joked at almost sentence. These included, “You fly to Russia on first class, second class or third class. We offer you to fly…no class!” “There are no clocks in your house…but when you hear a knock on the door…it’s 4 a.m!” After that show Chris brought down a Janga set and we played while listen to the Music channel that feature the top of the Christmas weeks for the last ten years. Janga the game is where you basically pull out wooden pieces from a rectangular structure placed them on top, attempting not to topple the structure.

I toppled the first two piles within thirty minutes while Chris went to check on the * kg (yes *kg) Turkey that was for tomorrow’s lunch. She returned a queried us on the how many kilograms was equal to one pound. I gave her the wrong conversion the first time and we spent sometime calculating how longthe bird should roast for.

Then came dinner where the first course was melon with orange slices and kiwi fruit attached using toothpicks. I made my first table etiquette mistake by using the fork and knife on the outside instead of the fork and spoon set above the plate. Or maybe there wasn’t any mistake. That was followed by keish with carrots, peas and other assortments. The keish was absolutely scrumptious, not too much cheese and the crust was just perfect. As we were finishing of, Pastor Trevor asked me my opinion of labour internationally and the economies of China and India. Uh I gave an answer but whether it was a justified one is another matter. Again, we moved back to the dining room in time for the X-Factor, UK’s improved version of it’s pop idol. It wasn’t an ordinary session of contestants singing but a review of 2006’s winner, Leona Lewis. Apparently, she was the crème de la crème of all singers and Simon Cowell, the well known critic with caustic comments had praised her every step of the way. As I listened to her sing Kelly Clarkson’s “A moment like this,” and Whitney Houston’s “I will always love you,” I could not help but agree with others. I suppose I would place her above American Idol winners like Kelly Clarkson or Diana Degarmo. Even still, nothing beats those singer-songwriters who can captivate audiences with the power of their voices and the depth of their own lyrics. Oh yes, sometime then or in the afternoon was this incredible music show called Duet: Impossible. Basically, current bands and artists perform imaginary duets with singers who died years ago. For example, Westlife did an imaginary duet with Roy Orbison singing “Pretty Woman” while Katie Melua did a version of “Somewhere over the rainbow” with a “live” Eva Cassiy. The show somehow managed to recapture the old video shots of these artists and merge them side by side in 3-D format or so next to the current artists so that they look as if they are performing together. That was absolutely incredible.

The rest of the evening was spent watching the film “Love actually”. I guess it’s featured since firstly it has the idea of Christmas in the background and secondly there are many British actors there. I retired upstairs before the show ended and attached some more of it before sleeping. Oh yes, I must tell you above the guest room I was it. It may have been the same side as my room in my Hall of Residence, but there were two beds, a small tell and an ensuite bathroom that could even rival the bathrooms of four star hotels. Everything that was spick and span.

I awoke at 0753 hours on Christmas Day. If it bathroom’s appearance was wonderful, the shower was like heaven although it took a while to get the temperature correct. Then grabbing the presents I bought for my hosts, I headed downstairs, greeting them. I don’t know whether it’s a western tradition or what, but Chris opened my card to them and showed it immediately to her husband. You know I’m terrible with Christmas Cards and worse with presents—you should have seen how I wrapped one of their presents. But I guess it worked out fine. My two gifts went under their tree where there were tons of boxes already.

After a breakfast of tea, cereal, juice and toast, the three men headed of the collect Chris’ mother who is a ninety year old lady and head off to church. Yes she is ninety years old andstill able to walk without any assistance. More about her later. We went to the local church since it was obviously nearer. The seeting again was that of a small room and around fifty or so worshippers, but after all it was Christmas morning. It was opened with “O come all Ye Faithful” and surprisingly the Pastor (or was he just a church leader) was also the guitarist. Then another song was sung, after we one familiar hillsong was also sung. Ther sermon was on babies which is pretty apt. Then even more surprising was that communion was held, but not before we sang “Here I Am to Worship.” As would alter be remarked, it is certainly strange to have communion on Christmas Day but I’m not exactly an expert on the subject of communion and since I have taken it for a long time, there was no reason to object.

After the service, I was introduced to several of the congregation members, who stopped to greet Pastor Tervor too. Oh, I forgot to mentioned, he was actually an old Pastor of this church and hence almost everyone recognized him. The Pastor/leader who lead the service came up to me and I discovered that his wife is Malaysian and has travelled to that country and Japan before. Wow, it seems like plenty of British people have ventured to my side of the world.

We then headed back and again another living room conversation was started. Alirght, more about Ruby, Chris’ mother. Yes, she is ninety this year but you wouldn’t believe that she was that age at all. I mean she hardly looks that on and can move about freely. In fact, I understand that she even lives by herself, cooks her own meals and even buys her own necessities. You would never expect a lady of say seventy back home to be able to reside and take care of her own self. This woman has lived through and witnessed two World Wars, the start and end of the Cold War, Faklands War, the coronation of tow monarchs, a handful of Prime Ministers, and almost everything in 20th Century English and International History. She’s practically travelled through out the whole of the Uk and recounted the stories of her hsband during the Second World War. Even up to now, she still keeps abreast with local and international developments and we spent some time discussing about Princes William and Harry and the future of the English Monarchy.

The mighty Christmas lunch came at around 1300hrs and we were joined by another guest, a Salvation Army officer named Violet. She was a long time friend of the Parkington’s and a long faithful worker of the Army. The table was really set with a Christmas theme with red candles set amongst artificial berries and the red and green embroidery on the table cloth was clearly visible as plates of high quality china were placed. For starters we had smoked salmon and assorted salad and the salmon would just slide down your mouth. Then came the famous turkey. I have had turkey before most notably every week or so in Shackleton and I’ll always love it when the breast meat isn’t that tough. This one definitely wasn’t and it was served with bread sauce, cranberry sauce, parsnips, carrots, roast and mashed potatos and cauliflower. Oh yes, stuffing too and small sausages wrapped in bacon. We took our time to finish and then proceed to the unwrap our presents. Everyone got a couple of presents with many heading towards Ruby. Pastor Trevor got plenty of gadgets like a Sky TV link to enable him to switch Sky Channels on in the upstairs TV, a 1 GB flash drive (what Singaporeans call a thumb drive), a light that could be attached to a book for reading in dark areas and other things. By the time the fun and all had finished, it was five o’clock and we flipped through more channels before tea was served.

It was basically an assortment of ham or tuna on bread, various cheeses, the pickled onions again and cakes. One was a traditional Christmas cake while the other a cake which was the type for Ruby’s 90th Birthday. Oh, yes Trifle was present too. It was pretty nice with really sweet raspberry or strawberry jam. Trifle is always a desert that few can master and Chris got it right. Oh yes, along with the fruit salad was some chocolaty-creamy balls which were like marshmallows but weren’t as mushy as marshmallows were.

Time passed quickly then and the new living room conversation focused on life in the Salvation Army and small debates on matters which I can’t exactly recall. Ruby and Violet then left around 2100 or so and afterwards we spent time flipping through channels. It seems like there were tons of documentaries on the Gospel of Judas, the “Secret life of Jesus family” ( I place the inverted commas) and other sorts of programmes along that nature. And the Da Vinci Code was being aired at different time slots. Certainly not the programmes for a Christmas day. We glanced at a bit of CSI and then some TV show before I turned in early, my last night in that super comfy bed and that cosy room.

Boxing day saw me rising up at around the same time and consume the same breakfast as before. My bag, although free of the presents I carried seem heavier than before. Pastor Maldwyn (the senior Pastor-in-charge of Elim Church) and his wifre Ruth came to pick me up. They stayed for a while sharing some more stories of their travel experiences (he too has popped by country). He’s off to Uganda this week as a part mission trip part trip to meet up with the church leaders there. Then after thanking my hosts profusely, I left.

On the journey back home, Pastor Malywyn told me the differences between Methodist churches in Asia and Africa versus that in the UK. That cleared up some misconceptions. Well, actually I’m still in the dark. I only remember that Methodism in Singapore takes after American Methodism. Or something like that. Got to look back at the notes Pastor Kenneth gave me when I return home.

It was certainly a marvellous time over there with scrumptious food, lively talk and the warmth you could hardly find anywhere else. God bless the Parkingtons.

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