This Man Santa Claus

Let us not pretend. In my village, we grew up never knowing about this character called Santa Claus. It is very much later when through benefit of education that I came to hear about him. You should really forgive me for my ignorance because all that we knew was that during Christmas we went to church, followed the hilarious role-play of the birth of Jesus then proceeded home to have goat-meat, chapati and rice.

And that was pretty much what he had on christmas. Of course, there were small incidents of constipation but which were treated by quick administration of herbs. But all in all, Christmas was a day of celebration and that was it.

You can imagine my bewilderment, then, when upon joining the university I casually hear of Santa Claus sometimes in November. My gut instincts tell me that Santa Claus must of course be some new lecturer to take up a slot of Communications Skills after it was left vacant due to a small fight that occurred between the lecturer and the university messenger. In my mind I imagine how he ( I am talking about Santa, not that pugilist of a lecturer) will introduce himself in class: Morning Class, my name is Santa...Santa Claus and from now on I will be taking you Communications Skills. Rules of operation, one, by this time you should have known the difference between an adverbial and adjectival clauses, subject-verb agreements....

Out of curiosity, I try to find out what Santa means. That curiosity thing is in me. I can even wake up one bright morning and ask you whether your family line has some history of witchcraft. Or I might ask you what it means if an owl tu-whits at night. You see, it is an in-thing. If I were in the village, I would have asked some old man the clan, the totem, the genealogy of this person called Santa. I will even ask whether he descends from a good blood of warriors or cowards or whether his great great grandfather had one wife or many.

But here, in academic prison, if you have a question and there are no old men you just ask the lecturer or ask a computer. This is just crazy, I mean, in all wisdom, how could it have been possible to ask a machine to tell you an answer to questions? If I whispered this to an old man in my village, he will throw away his snuff bottle, spit and say: " Lorot, Son of Lokwang'ole, you can't lie to me!" While saying this he will brandish his forefinger in preparation for a curse.

So I type out Santa Claus and hit enter. Search results reveal to me that he doesn't even exist. I mean, I wanted to know who his father is, whether he is married or not, where he stays, whether he has problems with the wind that blow to people's faces. And what do I read? "legendary" "mythological". In all honesty, how does it help me to know that he is from North America? I thought this Santa Claus should have had roots in my village too. I give up and leave the computer in a huff. Well, not a huff exactly but in disappointment. There are many characters who are not "mythological" that could easily make meaning in my village. The chief, for example. He could wear a leopard skin and an ostrich-feather headgear and lurk behind shrubs not distributing candy but traditional fruits like angalalio and among'oo.

This Santa Claus could also be given a local name like Lotulia or a corrupted version of Santa Claus, Sandak Po Clas.

Whatever the apparel, please, Santa Claus should never ever wear red because we have had so many incidents of people who have been dispatched to their Makers early after lightning struck them. Wearing red is a bad omen. I hear you Santa Claus are a good man, so wear any colour but not red and you will never stir the wrath of lightning. And please, that small bit of stealing can't work here. Chasing you around in the village for stealing a box of biscuits will not be a good idea. Certainly it will spoil Christmas for you and us.