Christmas Day at Brighton

Saturday, 25 th December 2010 was Christmas Day. As usual I came out of my flat at Brunswick Square, Hove, Brighton at 10.00 am and I was surprised to see everything was quiet. When I was walking on the main road -'Western Road' I was shocked to see the entire stretch was open and blank which is otherwise normally one of the busiest roads in Brighton. There was no public transport running. Brighton-Hove Bus Company runs city busses every day. But today, they had stopped operating and as a result Taxis on hire made a very good business.

I visited three churches viz. St. John's Church, St. Patrick's Church and St. Peter's Church. All these churches are on the main roads and are located in residential area. All these churches had displayed printed coloured paper announcing the Christmas eve midnight mass at 11.45pm and Christmas Mass at 10.30 am. I reached St. Patrick's Church at 10.15 am. The Church bell rang for fifteen minutes. A person from the church was waiting for the people near the main door.  Only one person from that residential area entered the church for silent prayer. At 10.30 am the main door of the church was closed and then the prayer must have started. Then I proceeded further. All shops, bars, cafes, shopping centres, super markets and cinema theatres were closed. At 11.30 am I reached the St. Peter's Church. At that moment I saw a few people coming out of the church after the mass. I wanted to interact with the Priest of the church but he closed and locked the door from inside.

However, in the evening I saw few people on the beach who had come for walk. But the number was comparatively less than the usual week end days or holidays. I was wondering how people must have enjoyed Christmas. On the Christmas day the weather was comparatively good though it was very cold (temperature was around freezing). It was sunny, bright, sky was blue and clear. But the cost of the Christmas tree was ranging from 30 pounds and above. People purchased and decorated the Christmas tree inside their houses. May be the weather conditions and architectural design of the houses and buildings do not permit them to do lighting and decorate their houses from outside. There was no sight of the Christmas Crib; instead there were boards outside the houses saying "Stop Santa here". I feel that everybody must be enjoying pre and post Christmas parties at their places with relatives and friends.

Next day Sunday, 26th December is a "Boxing Day". I was curious to know the significance of this day. So I asked one shop keeper about it. I learnt that in the past on the next day of Christmas,  all the  shop keepers were bringing down the prices of goods at rock bottom and as a result people used to enter the shops  in large number and used to fight (boxing) to grab the discounted goods. But now it is seen that a few shops are closed. A few shopkeepers have opened their shops and reduced the prices of the goods to 50%.   

                                                        St. John's Church

                                                          St. Patrick's Church

                                                           St. Peter's Church

                                                             En exception

                                                               Sea Front

                                                            Skating on Ice Rink