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The three December weekends so far have been of different shades and colours for me. It started with a black funeral where they served a buffet lunch and people danced to comforting gospel and other music. The following weekend was marked with a wedding ceremony. Last weekend was a triple dose of celebrations, an engagement ceremony, a birthday party and the opening of a beauty parlour. I regretfully had to miss one dinner dance due to the packed activities. So then, by these standards, I can confidently say that there has been a greater degree of merriment to usher in my Christmas and the New Year. But come to think of it, today is the 23rd day of December. Just a day away from Christmas Eve and two days to the much awaited day itself � Christmas. In my local Ashanti dialect, Christmas is called �Bronya�, my literal translation of that is: �for the white man�. If one is to reason for whoever gave the season that local name with no linkage to the birth of Christ, one is tempted to assume that the association with the white man is perhaps of the goodies that has come to be associated with the celebration � wrapped gifts, good clothes, partying, good food with good drinks, and lots of joyous moments. Is it not amazing the way all things bright and beautiful are always associated with the white man? Comparing the dullness in the Yuletide season these last few years to what some of us grew up to know, I am not sure whether to still call the season �Bronya� because the glitters of yester year�s Christmas seem to have evaporated. They have all gone. Those days, it was three days of continuous celebrations starting from Christmas Eve which ushers in the great celebration itself. People partied into December 25, then get dressed up in their best clothes for that Christmas day and ate big meals the following day which is Boxing Day, characterised with the exchange of gifts. The whole of last week I made it to some parts of town for one reason or the other. The question I asked myself each day I was out was, �where are all the glitters?� The only characteristic thing signifying the dawn of the season is the unusual traffic on our roads. Apart from that, I have not seen much of the glitters associated with the occasion. Cars are empty. One does not see any longer, those baskets of assorted hampers which normally would be bursting on the back seats of cars ready for distribution. That maybe is okay in a way. It is telling us that the days of recognising corporate support and for which people give �thank you� gifts at the end of the year is over. Some may choose to call it a show of custom or better still, corporate appreciation, but to others, they are simply bribes and should therefore not be encouraged. Hampers aside, I find it difficult to pin point what is actually going on. That we are in the season of our Lord�s birth and yet the mood of the moment is business as usual. Nothing extraordinary is in the air. When the signs of the joyous season evaporated last year, nobody went into denial. We all understood it. As a country, we were all tensed up. The preparations and the anxieties for the second round of the general elections did not afford anyone the appetite for feasting on chicken and turkeys or even reaching for the traditional gem biscuits. We were unsure of the way things were going to turn out for our dear nation. We were walking on a tight rope and dared loose our focus to merriment. We had sworn no to the happenings in Kenya in December 2007 and we were not ready to swallow any humble pie. Having sailed through it all in quiet and peace, one year on, one honestly expected a gleeful celebration. All those expectations seem to have dried up. The shops are half empty and so are shopping baskets. The usual advertisers are in the media selling their goods but coloured with a bit of rainbow to give them that slight shade to synchronise with the season that we find ourselves in. The catch phrase is: �offer last till December 31� from things as soft as home furnishing, through to furniture and electrical appliances to such hard items as vehicles. Even hotels are advertising lower room rates and meals to reflect the season�s celebrations. Even then, the mood is still sombre. I was at the Makola market last week looking for specific items as Christmas gifts for my household. It was like any other day. Nothing showed that we are a few days away from Christmas. The sellers are bitterly complaining of inactive selling. At the section for African prints, buying and selling was going on but this lady I spoke to told me it is her worse Christmas season for some time now in terms of Christmas sales. She could not assign any reason except to say that if there is very little cash going round, people would rather concentrate on food and second hand clothes. And indeed lately, so many are hooked to mobile phones they necessarily have to leave something in their budgets to cater for units for their phones too. It would be a shame to lose the merry in the season. Very often, our relations who live outside the country prefer to take their vacation this time of the year just so that they can celebrate a real Christmas at home with family and friends, just as we knew of years past. To them, it pays to exchange the kind of cold and quiet Christmas season out there for a warm, friendly and activity packed celebration at home with the extended family and friends. Regrettably, our jolly season is gradually turning into a cold one, business as usual kind of. Let us pray that fatigue is not setting in. That it should not be a case of people tired of spending and merry making. I pray that the good old times of a real celebration would come back into the Ghanaian Christmas. I am sure that in the heart of hearts, irrespective of the missing glitters many would make do with whatever they have and enjoy another blissful year for this is how far our Lord has brought us. I wish all my readers, particularly those who have been sending me e-mails of encouragement with every publication and even those who sometimes dish out bashes in my face for not singing their tunes, a very merry Christmas to you all. No, I certainly do not intend to lose the merry in my Christmas.