10 Jan 2008

saint nick as told by


i spent my holiday in seciu, a small village situated on a hill near Ploiesti. and it was a very relaxing holiday, mostly because it was filled with reading, watching movies, interacting with people who have a completely different lifestyle (also trying to adapt to their lifestyle) and exercising.


The main reason why i wanted to stay away from cities was the commercial holidays syndrome that drove me completely crazy. While i was really nostalgic about the nice recollections of cosy times of holidays beautifully spent together with my family and close friends, decorating, singing carols, being excited about the Xmas tree and Santa and all that. So i tried to recreate that holiday cheerful atmosphere.


And part of the attempt was reading this book called "The Autobiography of Santa Claus" and written by Jeff Guinn. I must admit i was completely fascinated by the contruction of the tale. The book combines lots of historical information with lots of fiction, and the result is a nice voyage through time, that explains each magical aspect related to Santa (that is, nearly all aspects that make his existance improbable) in a rational way. Well, kinda rational. In the sense in which you're willing to admit that Nicholas has used all opportunities history provided in order to team up with people such as Attila, Arthur, Leonardo da Vinci (in case you ever wondered who designed the flying sleigh) or Benjamin Franklin, with whom he now shares the North Pole headquarters. And that's just a glimpse of the story, which is obviously not delivered in a "theory of conspiration" manner, but rather in a "whatif" joyous manner. And since winter holidays have the gift of allowing imagination to drift as much as possible, this was a really relaxing read, especially accompanied by fresh orange tea and ginger biscuits :).

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