So another festive season is nearly over and millions of us will dust down our gym kit and try to remember where the healthy food is found in the supermarket.
Friends and family disperse back to their homes (if they’ve been able to and wanted to travel) and the vast majority of us, several pounds lighter in the pocket and several pounds heavier around the waistline will trudge bleary eyed through the winter darkness back to the reality of life during a global pandemic.
There are more than a few people out there who will already be counting down the weeks and months until we can do it all over again. I’ve got no problem with those who love Christmas and everything that goes with it.
Despite the rather depressing introduction to this piece, I’m no Scrooge. I get genuine pleasure from catching up with friends and family and giving well thought out gifts.
But I’m not one of those people who just can’t wait until the tinsel goes back up. The weeks and weeks filled with shitty adverts, the same old music playing on a loop as we queue up waiting to pay for items that people on our televisions have told us to buy – it just isn’t my cup of tea.
Reasons not to be cheerful
You’re probably thinking that some childhood event may have triggered my disdain towards this time of year, but you’d be wrong.
Firstly, my beloved nanna died on Christmas Day in 2014, and since then I’ve felt that none of the commercial or religious aspects of Christmas really mean a great deal to me. I spent that Christmas morning switching between sobbing and trying to cook a beef wellington from scratch.
I’ve never been a religious person and I have no need or desire for ‘stuff’. I see Christmas more of a winter festival of thanks and reflection. I just want to hide away and keep warm.
Seeing family and friends and being healthy and happy are much more important to me than buying heaps of stuff we just don’t need.
But well before that particular Christmas, there was something else which may have influenced my thinking.
You see, for a few months in 1998, it really was Christmas everyday for me.
Tourism college
I left school in May 1997 and decided to continue my education by studying a BTEC National Diploma in Travel and Tourism. I had a misguided assumption that a career in this industry would bring me fortune whilst enabling me see the world for free.
Initially, my dreams were shot down in flames after undertaking some work experience in a local luxury travel agency. The most exciting it got was making mugs of tea for the staff and putting stickers on brochures for holidays I thought I’d never be able to afford.
Then, much to my delight, my college arranged for all the students to spend a summer working at various holiday resorts.
Things were looking up.
Or not, as it turned out.
Sweet Scottish summer
After a 9 hour coach journey, I found myself in the Scottish Highlands. I was to spend the summer of 1998 at Santa Claus Land.
Yes, you did read that correctly. Santa Claus Land was a children’s theme park which opened all year round.
Part of the decaying Aviemore Mountain Resort, the place was an utter mishmash.
Highlights included:
- a dinosaur ride
- an amusement arcade (including one of those old 90s virtual reality simulators)
- a go kart track
- a crazy golf course
- a petting zoo
- various props from an old episode of It’s A Knockout dotted around randomly
It needed a lick (well, a lake) of paint and most of the attractions probably wouldn’t get past the health and safety police these days.
On arrival I was allocated a cramped room in a dismal staff hostel. My roommate for the next few months was a perma-stoned kitchen porter from Glasgow called Donald. I often felt like I needed a fog light attaching to my arse when negotiating the small room, such was the hash-induced haze. He was actually quite good company when he wasn’t comatose underneath his grubby duvet, but it was hardly the sun soaked Spanish villa I had anticipated when I signed up for tourism college.
I worked as a Kids Club Co-ordinator and my main duties involved:
- organising games of rounders and football
- face painting sessions
- putting up with being bitten, kicked in the shins and punched in the bollocks
I also had to take my turn dressing up as the various park characters. Think what Disneyland would be like if it was taken over by Haven Holidays, and you’re along the right lines.
I can remember some details about a few of these:
Santa Claus
The head honcho in Christmasville. We had to wear a big fake Santa head and sit on a throne whilst someone else read stories to the little horrors – it was so hot and boring, we often dozed off hidden by the mask. A gentle nudge from the storyteller signified that snooze time was over.
Polar Postie
A polar bear dressed as a postal worker. Obviously.
Bertha Bigfoot
An enormous white fluffy monster which was probably supposed to be a Yeti (I understand there’s a difference – please correct me in the comments below cryptozoology fans) but I don’t think they couldn’t think of a good enough name.
Rudy Reindeer
A reindeer who had the biggest, heaviest false reindeer head you can possibly imagine.
Avid Merrion Christmas and a whiplashed New Year
After one rather hectic day dressed up as Rudy Reindeer and wearing his massive furry bonce, I retired to my narcotic-infused fleapit and woke up the next morning unable to move, let alone get out of bed.
I eventually managed to crawl to the local GP. Not many people can say they’ve been given whiplash by a reindeer, but I certainly can.
I spent the next week in a neck brace. With my ginger curly hair, I was surely the inspiration for the Leigh Francis character, Avid Merrion.
Be careful what you wish for
Gradually, Santa Claus Land sucked every last bit of Christmas spirit from me.
Christmas music played all day, every day but over a terrible tinny PA system. The park was falling to bits and some of the staff could hardly look after themselves, let alone a bunch of kids.
It really wasn’t the sort of place you’d actually like to spend any time in at Christmas. It’s now been bulldozed to make way for a redeveloped Aviemore resort. In some ways that makes me sad, but it was long overdue.
I made some great friends in Aviemore and I’ll always remember that summer. I grew up a hell of a lot, it prepared me in many ways for adulthood and it made me realise that travel and tourism wasn’t all infinity pools and cocktails.
Most importantly though, when I hear someone say they wish it could be Christmas everyday, I can tell them from my own painful experience that they really shouldn’t.