The crib was on display in all its glory. Many figures, literally dozens of sheep in all shapes and sizes and even the three wise men topped by flashing fairy lights in sync with ‘jingle bells’ music.
According to local tradition the infant was on the altar ready to be placed in the crib after Mass.
As the crowd gathered so did the number of infants, they were also placed all around the altar awaiting Leo’s blessing. An unbelievable array of sizes and attires, one tiny figure even was wearing a minute cloth nappy!
All the bottles of water in front of the altar will be used to liberally splash over both the infant figures and the congregation.
By 9.00 a large crowd had gathered and Mass proceeded without a hitch, although the incessant exploding of fireworks imposed a fairly serious distraction mainly because the term ‘bomb’ could be a better used to describe the fireworks. The noise must play havoc with the canine population of Lima!
The traffic back to the Center House was far worse as people were going in all directions, rushing to get home to prepare their Christmas meal, this begins at midnight. We even saw a few collecting their roast turkeys from the bakeries as we drove. Charles Dickens’s ‘Christmas Carol’ readily sprang to mind.
If we thought the fireworks were loud during Mass, as we approached midnight they assumed battle ground proportions.
Christmas day dawned bright and hot and after breakfast we all pitched in to prepare the Center for the expected crowd of visitors, approximately sixty. Tables were set all around the grounds, food cooked and fridges stocked. As expected the meal consisted of all the traditional Christmas meats of turkey, chicken and ham, different roast vegetables with homemade plum pudding to finish off.
It was a wonderful lunch and we caught up with many of our old friends, in fact we were still sitting around after dark sharing stories and nibbling on toast and cold meat.
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