In response to that crucial seasonal question – where do I buy Christmas decorations in Colombo? Here’s a slightly more interesting answer than Arpico – China Street.
Towards the sea-side, off Pettah’s main street China Street’s dozen or so traders specialize in glass wear and beads but for the Christmas Season they stock piles of plastic Santa’s, brightly colored baubles, fairy lights and Xmas tree tinsel in all the colors of the rainbow. The selection is vast and you can find everything you need to turn your house into a technicolor, tropical, winter-wonderland. It goes without saying that the selection tends towards the shiny and the bright – but was x-mas ever about subtle good taste?
Here everything is colorful and cheap – packets of Santas, little reindeer and holly wreaths for Rs. 40, streamers for Rs 100. Midst such a bounty of Xmas tack if you dig for long enough you’re sure to find bits of well-crafted treasure (lovely paper-mache stars Rs 200). There’s also something important and timeless about making a trip down to Pettah for the season, Colombars have been making the yuletide pilgrimage to the city’s ultimate shopping district for over a century… And while you’re browsing the stacks of white fairy-lit x-mas trees, and choosing between fairly lights that play jingle bells and those that don’t, you can also ponder the fact that the enthusiastic vendors of this Christian festival paraphernalia are almost exclusively Muslim. Surely an uplifting, coexistence based thought for the x-mas season.
Pics by Chatrini Weeratunge
