Happy Christmas

A time for presents, family, food and cheer . . . too excess! I am unfortunately one of these people who doesn’t find Christmas the most enjoyable time of year. That is not to say that I would like everyone else to have a thoroughly miserable Christmas. Far from it I hope everyone has a brilliant Christmas full of joyfulness and frivolity. It is just that I would prefer to be left in a corner with a bottle of champagne drowning my Christmas cheer. Christmas for translators is not a busy time of year as everyone is on holiday enjoying the various goodies that go with it. I will keep this post brief for that very reason.

Christmas in Christian countries is technically the celebration of Christ. Etymologically speaking the word Christmas comes from Christ’s Mass. This was first recorded in 1038 and is still used today but it hasn’t always meant the same thing. In this day and age for most people it means a chance for businesses to make a hell of a lot of money, this is if one is being cynical of course. If one is not being cynical then it is a time for family and fun. Christmas has transcended the limits of just the Christian world and is now celebrated throughout the world. It has surpassed language barriers everywhere and has come to rest as one of the top holidays . . . for most people anyway. There are songs, movies and plays all dedicated to this special event. All of them available in a multitude of different languages. Take the traditional Christmas song Silent Night which has been translated into over 44 languages and it has been around since 1816 when it was made up. Songs are interesting things around Christmas as it seems that almost every shop, department store, supermarket, etc seems to play Christmas songs around the clock. You walk into a shop to hear the first notes of a Christmas song and go into another just to hear the end of the same song. Around Christmas it is highly likely that you will hear all I want for Christmas at least a million times. Usually before this point I have to escape to some deserted island on which is a solitary cave in which I have hidden myself. However, even if you have taken these drastic measures to escape you will never truly get the damn song out of your head. If you have taken the extraordinary measures mentioned above then you will probably drive yourself crazy as with all these kinds of things you will only ever be able to remember one line of the song and so you will be trapped on your island just repeating that same line over and over again until the pixies start appearing. Once this happens I suggest that you should go ahead and talk to the foliage as you are officially crazy.

Anyway on a more festive note from the whole team here at LinguaSpirit and FreeSpirit we would like to wish everyone a very happy Christmas, may all your dreams come true.