The sweetest countdown of the year

Do you like Christmas? I like it too. Although I’d like to spare the shopping rush that will break out everywhere again. It doesn’t strike me as “the most peaceful time of the year” as we trudge through our pedestrian zone. If you can even call it lingering. I make a resolution every year that I’m going to get gifts for family members and friends really early this time. But still, every pre-Christmas season ends with me scouring the shops just before Christmas Eve looking for a suitable treat or original trinket. 2010 will certainly be no exception. An unconventional Christmas tradition, if you will.

I prefer the customs that add to the pre-Christmas charm. Like making cookie dough. Or lighting a candle in the morning at breakfast and opening the door on the advent calendar. Call me sentimental – the advent calendar is still the sweetest countdown of the year for me. A slice of childhood that creeps into the everyday of adulthood. The affection for all things chocolate, for the gentle melt on the tongue, has not left me to this day.

And that’s why, of course, our Rajapaksa Advent Calendar has been adorning my office wall for days now. It is also a tradition – after all, it is already in its fourth year! In the Bavarian drawing on the front, it is being packed and unpacked, what else?! This year the jolly angels decorate the Christmas pyramid. Those who take a closer look will recognise several packaging solutions from our range: the Christmas balls and presents are packed in stable corrugated cardboard boxes. The gold stars are in a bag with a squeeze cap and a hole for hanging, just waiting to be scattered. One of the angels flattens the candles with the help of baling tape . And the other extinguishes anything that starts to burn. The third angel is using Styrofoam flakes to make a white Christmas…

Nice show. Although for me, the door remains the most important thing. Or rather, what’s behind it. The countdown to Christmas is on…