Bhubaneswar: After the month-long excitement of the Odsha Hockey World Cup and the recently-concluded Bhubaneswar City Festival (.Fest), the Capital city is ready for Christmas celebrations. Despite a drastic fall in temperature, people here are venturing outdoors with enthusiasm for purchasing new dresses and Christmas gifts and items from the temporary Christmas markets set up in different parts of the city like Unit-1, Jayadev Vihar, Saheed Nagar and others.
So long, the Traffic department had withheld permission to open these Christmas markets due to the Odisha Hockey World Cup. However, this did not go down well with the vendors who open makeshift shops in the city to sell their Christmas offerings every year.
Manas Sahoo, a shopkeeper in Unit 1 area, said, “Earlier, we usually put up shops from December 10, but this year we had to wait till December 17 for the World Cup to end. As a result, business has been slow so far. However, we hope business will pick up in the next few days.”
Another shopkeeper, Jyoti Prakash Moharana said, “This time we received permission to set up shops very late. This has affected the sale a little bit, but we are confident that the business will pick up before the Christmas and New Year.”
Nevertheless, after the initial lull, now people are crowding these markets to buy Christmas trees and decoration items such as colour balls, stars, bells etc. Especially, children are excited about Santa Claus’ arrival and are seemingly busy preparing their wish list for Santa on the Christmas Eve.
Hansika Das, a Class VII student, said that she will ask for toys and dolls from Santa. At the same time, she plans to gift clothes to poor children on Christmas with her parents.
Meanwhile, Asish Das, a city resident, said Christmas he will begin celebrating Christmas by visiting the church along with his family. He said that he had brought a Christmas tree which he will design with his family members.
For Subhrajyoti Das Nayak, Christmas is a festival of joy and they will share the joy of Christmas with the poor and orphaned children. They have already bought Christmas trees, Santa Claus caps and toys for the underprivileged children.
All the churches in the city are also ready for Christmas celebrations. Churches across the state, including the St Vincent’s Catholic Church at Janpath in Bhubaneswar, have made elaborate arrangements for the midnight mass on Christmas Eve. All the churches are decked up with fairy lights and are beautifully-decorated Christmas trees.
Shruti Prabha Dung Dung, a member of a city church, said that the celebration has already started in her church with Christmas carol and dance practice for the big day. The Christmas tree decoration is in process. All preparations will be complete by December 23, she said.
Many hotels in the Capital are offering special cakes for Christmas. They are also offering special buffets and dinners for this special occasion.
Some leading hotels have been organising their annual cake mixing rituals wherein they mixed cakes with dry fruits such as nuts, apricot, dates, prunes, cherries, raisins, blackcurrant, fig and many others in order to zest it up. The contents of this cake will be kept in a container to mature for a month. By the time it is Christmas, all the ingredients will be blended together to release a rich aroma.
Many hotels have even started offering huge discounts for Christmas and New Year celebrations, which will continue well into 2019.
Arindam Ganguly, OP
