In Argentina, it is the night before Christmas that is celebrated. Everybody gets together to enjoy the night with a large meal and times of reflection until midnight when we all take hold of our glass and toast to Christmas and celebrate this day. When the next day comes, most are either sleeping, or spend the day at the beach. Our Christmas celebrations in the YWAM Base in Puerto Madryn followed this pattern exactly.
Everybody outside at the tables, ready for Christmas dinner.
Miguel and Alejandra renewing their wedding vows.
On the evening of the 24th we were all busy preparing the meat and salads and foods for the evening. Before we all sat down outside for our big meal, a couple in the school wanted to renew their wedding vows and we chose this special night for them to be able to do so. Afterwards we all went outside and enjoyed a hearty meal of many salads, a lot of chicken and lamb, and other delicacies that people had prepared.
It was cold outside, but we all remained there until midnight when everybody rose up from the tables, the speeches stopped, and we moved in amongst each other, toasting to this special day of Christmas and wishing the other the best. Prayers, hugs, and lots of brotherly love flowed faster than the drinks during the next half hour.
Fireworks are a huge thing on Christmas Eve.
As this time ended, we then convened inside where it was warmer, for the next part of the night. This next part was called "secret friends" (similar to secret santa) where we each had a person that we bought a gift for, and upon receiving the gift that person had to guess who had given it to them. Whether they were right or not, the actual person would then go forward to give them a hug, and then would share with everybody a virtue, or something special that they appreciated about the person they had given the present to.
We then had an international dessert moment, where all of the different nations created some sort of desert related to their culture. Every single one of them was delicious and we all made short work of the food that remained. By the time we had finished our celebrations it was 2pm, and the clean up took almost an extra two hours. It was now time to sleep.
A time of honouring each other as they receive our secret gift that we gave them.
The next day the entire base staff and students headed out to enjoy the beach... returning very red and burned, but happy to have enjoyed the day together.