Christmas spirit wells over
FROM home-cooked meals, charitable feasts, outdoor picnics and church services, Tasmanians have celebrated Christmas Day in style.
About 300 people have tucked into turkey and popped crackers during Colony 47’s Community Christmas Day Lunch at North Hobart.
Colony 47, a not-for-profit organisation which aims to create a fairer community and improve the lives of disadvantaged Tasmanians, hosted its annual gathering at the Hellenic Hall yesterday.
Sara Karimi, originally from Afghanistan, moved to Tasmania about 10 years ago, and was attending her second Colony 47 Christmas lunch with grandchildren Millan Hassani and Leila Gholami yesterday.
“It’s very good, I enjoy it here,” Ms Karimi said.
“I’m so happy [that the] children are happy too.”
Colony 47 chief executive Danny Sutton said the charity had been organising the feast for about 30 years.
“It’s a great community event, and it really gives a chance for families, people on their own, or people that don’t have the opportunity to get together, to come together and have a big day,” he said.
Mr Sutton said volunteers were “critical” to the day’s success, with 170 helping out on the day.
“We wrap around 500 presents, we prepare food for at least a week prior, and a lot of it is donated,” he said.
Elsewhere around Hobart, the overcast weather saw fewer people enjoying the outdoors on Christmas Day than usual.
But the cloud didn’t deter a group of South Hobart Friends and Neighbours from their annual tradition of gathering at the Cascade Gardens for a picnic with games, bikes and plenty of homemade food.
South Hobart resident Greg Jordan said despite what he considered perfect weather for a garden picnic, there was barely anyone else out and about.
“It’s been a funny year, we’ve been coming here a lot and most years there’s heaps of people but just this year there aren’t many at all,” he said.
The spread of homemade food and drinks was a particular highlight for the group.
“Raspberries out of the garden, cherries off the tree, whatever we decide we can make and, of course, a couple of bottles of bubbles,” Mr Jordan said.
And while presents and feasts were all the hype yesterday, traditional Christmas values didn’t get left behind, with church services drawing hundreds of people around Hobart.
The Archdiocese of Hobart held six Christmas services leading up to Christmas and on Christmas Day, with hundreds of people at each.
Visly Arnold, of Launceston, and her family and friends caught the first ferry from their holiday on Bruny Island to attend the Christmas mass at St Mary’s Cathedral.
“Traditionally, we never miss Christmas mass,” Mrs Arnold said.
“On Bruny, they don’t have a Christmas mass, so we got the first ferry in the morning and came up.”
Hobart Archbishop Julian Porteous said his sermon focused on humanity and how each one of us needed to be saved.
“We can’t go it alone, we can’t manage by ourselves, so I was talking about how God has seen the need in humanity and has come and entered into our human condition to save us,” he said.
The pews at St David’s Cathedral were also full yesterday morning with Anglican churchgoers.
The Dean of St David’s Cathedral, the Very Reverend Richard Humphrey, said more than 1000 people attended seven services in 28 hours over Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. However, as many people enjoyed the festival break safely, Tasmania Police still found a few going against the grain.
As of early yesterday, Tasmania Police had issued about 470 infringement notices as part of its Operation Crossroads holiday road blitz.
Of these, more than 380 were for speeding and 34 were for drink driving. More than 11,500 random drug and alcohol tests have been conducted.
Also, the Royal Hobart Hospital was relatively quiet yesterday and was operating at Level 1 of its four-stage escalation plan.
And as Christmas wraps up, Hobartians can look forward to some warm but showery weather heading into the Taste of Tasmania on Thursday and the Falls Festival on Friday.
Today is set to be another fine day, with the maximum temperature expected to reach 23C. It will be 29C and partly cloudy on Wednesday, 28C with a possible shower on Thursday and 27C with rain at times on Friday.
New Year’s Eve is expected reach 23C and on January 1 a top of 22C is forecast.
It’s a great community event, and it really gives a chance for … people that don’t have the opportunity to get together to… have a big day
Colony 47 chief executive DANNY SUTTON