By Nina Moller
The SSS Christmas Bazaar this year was held at the Swedish Church Sukhumvit 33, where Scandinavians enjoyed the spiritual first of advent service with some Christmas carols by the Swedish community, great Scandinavian foods with lots of activities for the young children, faces of their old friends while committing to their last minute Christmas shopping in the Church’s garden.
The atmosphere this year was cosy, warm, and welcoming. Around 12.00am Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes started entering the Church’s garden for the appointment of the first of advent service promised by the Swedish Priest, Miss Lovisa Möller.
The candles were lid up to mark the tradition before the Swedish chorus began their Christmas carols. This certainly lid everybody up in their Christmas spirit, especially the Swedish. After a wonderful chorus singing, the children and adults alike enjoyed the Christmas lunch in the garden with all the traditional Christmas and Scandinavian food including, open sandwiches with leverpostej and flæskestej, hotdogs with ristede løg, æbleskiver, and naturally glög. Pevernødder cookies were also offered with coffee while adults enjoyed catching up with old friends and children gathered in the backyard with treats of fun activities such as ‘Baking gingerbread cookies’, organized by the Danish Women’s Network. Around 3.00pm where the children got to make five wishes for the Santa Claus who appears alive at the Bazaar with candies and lots of treats. Many Scandinavian food items such as homemade marzipan, Swedish cheese, wines, and much more, as well as a good variety of Christmas decorative products like festive cards with ‘God Jul’ wishes were all available on the grass field for everybody’s last Christmas shopping.
Tove Wihlborg-Andersen, the Consulate at the Danish Embassy, was one of the many Danes who traditionally attend this Christmas Bazaar event every year with her family:
“This is the extraordinary cosy event that I never miss. We all know that no matter how diverse our lifestyles and work obligation drift us apart, we will always get to feel at home in this warm gathering to meet the old friends at this Christmas Bazaar each year,” she said.
Tove was at the Bazaar with her husband while her son Alan is now completing his university exam in England and will be returning next month to celebrate Christmas in Bangkok with his family. Tove also mentioned the positive effort that was done at the event to entertain the children: “It is nice to see the children running around and also become lighten up with the Christmas spirit at the Bazaar this year. A lot of effort was done to ensure a variety of children’s activities around the playground area, and it was just cosy to see everybody including the young ones to having something to enjoy.”
Around 4.30pm, after everybody had finished their Christmas shopping in the grass lane, it was time to pack up. Many were still gathering in small groups chatting with shopping bags and children were starting to fall asleep on their parent’s shoulders. The SSS Christmas Bazaar simply ended around 5.00pm and everybody certainly had a very special afternoon with a mix of religious tradition, great Scandinavian food, and good Christmas shopping for their families. However, what really makes the event special every year is the way that all Scandinavian members have simply taken this Christmas Bazaar as such a tradition, everybody looks so much forward to, and this positive expectation from all simply translates itself into a gathering filled with great warmth and cosiness each and every year.
