Nothing out of the ordinary happens at New Year in Africa: no dancing around the baobab, no stewed hippopotamus on the festive table, or any such exoticism. In South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia, the main attraction of Christmas and New Year is that they fall at the height of summer. After all, on the other side of the equator, the seasons are reversed. December, January, February are the warmest months. However, even in winter (June-August) there is never any snow. After all, it's Africa.
There are no Christmas trees either. Only artificial ones are on sale. And for those who absolutely want to have a live tree at home, they have to make do with evergreen thujas. Geography makes adjustments to the celebration, but does not break the main thing: Christmas and New Year in Pretoria, Harare, Windhoek are celebrated in the European manner. In the quiet and respectable "white" neighborhoods, Christmas is celebrated almost the same as in London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt. Except that the festive table might be set outdoors somewhere by the pool. The descendants of English, Dutch, German settlers preserve the customs of their ancestors.
The black majority has borrowed the main traditions from the white community. But unlike Europeans, black South Africans celebrate Christmas and New Year more openly. Tribal and clan cohesion, where everything is done together, gives rise to a desire for broad socializing. In African neighborhoods, large groups of relatives, friends, and neighbors gather. The celebration spills out onto the street, which often serves as an extension of the home.
The refreshments, as everywhere in the world, depend on the thickness of the wallet. Delicacies are usually absent. Turkey, which most cannot afford, is often replaced by chicken with rice. Champagne is also rare on the table. More often beer, and often homemade, not very strong, but intoxicating. It is served directly in buckets, and everyone scoops it with their own mug. They party noisily and cheerfully.
At Christmas, a veritable migration of peoples takes place. A peculiarity of the labor structure of the states of the southern Black Continent is that most working men live in cities as bachelors, leaving their families in villages where it is easier to support them. At the end of the year, crowds of such workers rush home with gifts to see their loved ones. Many enterprises simply close for several weeks, granting all staff summer, also Christmas, leave. Trains are overcrowded. Long-distance buses are stormed, piling mountains of baskets, suitcases, and bundles on the roofs. The ever-pressing transport problem reaches crisis proportions.
The press habitually rails against this Babylonian pandemonium. The authorities each time promise to take measures and rectify the situation. And yet, the same picture repeats every year. But tens of thousands of people, despite the hardships, are in high spirits. Ahead is a reunion with family, rest at home.
True, there are also those who have no corner, no roof over their heads. Although the states of southern Africa are the most developed on the Black Continent, poverty is extremely widespread there. But unlike other countries in the region, where the fate of the poor touches no one, in South Africa at Christmas a massive campaign of collecting donations for the underprivileged unfolds. This campaign involves the authorities, private philanthropic organizations, and the church. In supermarkets and shopping centers, free gifts are distributed to children. And clutching a party popper in their little hand, a black toddler looks with delight at Santa Claus. For him, he is the most real one. And that he is black is absolutely normal. What other kind of Father Frost could there be in Africa?