Christmas on Ascension

Christmas on Ascension:

Christmas festivities on Ascension started the first week of December when the Georgetown Christmas Decorations appeared in the main square. 

Carols at the residency

On 07/12/22 We attended the first of the Ascension Christmas Traditions, the first celebrations of the Christmas festivities; the Christmas carols at the residency (the house of the administrator), which is located just under halfway up green mountain. Anna and I had spent the day clearing pierhead beach of weeds for the turtle season and then returned home after work to get ready for the carols. Ed picked us and Chrisna up around 17:00 and we headed to two boats for the minibus shuttle up the mountain. When we arrived at the residency we were greeted with mulled wine and eggnog as well as an open bar! The carols started at around 19:00 with a food break in the middle. We sung 20 carols in total, and it was quite amusing because there was not even a 10 second pause in between each carol, it was quick fire singing! We were each given a handout with the lyrics and carols inside but there was also a karaoke style screen at the front of the lawn with the lyrics also shown on. The food was quite nice, good veggie options mostly party buffet food. Once the carols were all sung it then turned into Christmas Karaoke with different people at varying levels of soberness to drunkness taking over the microphone. Overall, it was a really fun night, and a nice way to start off the festivities. It was a little surreal singing Christmas carols on the lawn of the residency overlooking the view of the island with the beaches in view but it’s a Christmas carol concert I’ll never forget! 

AIG Christmas Party 

Friday 9th December was the Ascension Island Government Christmas Party which was Jungle themed. Anna and I joined Dee, Jonny and Sunitha up the mountain in the morning to collect foliage such as banana leaves, ginger flowers and stems as well as palm leaves etc. that we were going to use to decorate the obsidian guest house where the party was being hosted. We then spent the afternoon with Chrisna, Toby, Sunitha and Jonny decorating and arranging all of the leaves etc ready for the party. The party started at 19:30 and a full roast dinner was provided for food. The veggie options were pretty good, some nice rice and potato dish and butternut squash on offer. I decided to wear my orange jumpsuit and printed an orangutan face to use if anyone asked how I was jungle themed with my limited wardrobe but I didn’t end up needing the mask. Some people were really themed and dressed up and others not so much so I didn’t look out of place. We had a really fun night dancing, but it was weird thinking it was a Christmas party as it was so hot! 

VC Christmas Party 

In the morning on the 10th December Saints Club was hosting a town table top sale which was a bit like a Christmas school fayre with tables selling different things. I bought some Christmas baubles for our tree at home. In the evening Ed had invited Anna and I to the wolf creek Christmas party on the US base. It was starting to become a busy week of Christmas festivities! Anna and I decided to wear dresses we got from the charity shop on island and we joined Ed with Chrisna at around 18:00 and went straight for the food first. The veggie options were a little disappointing, but I enjoyed the potatoes and sweetcorn on offer. We watched the England world cup match on the TV and then hit the dance floor for the night. People seemed a little reluctant to dance but we had a nice night anyway. 

Conservation Christmas Party 

Our Conservation Christmas party was on the 22nd December. We were all given a criteria of a dish to take with us. Anna was assigned Sweet Vegan, Abi (the new intern) was assigned Omnivorous Sweet and I was assigned Savoury Omnivorous. I made a cheese and tomato pizza and a veggie pizza to take, Anna made chocolate orange flapjacks and Abi made Banoffee pie. Anna, Abi and I had turtle work in the morning and then joined the rest of the department up green mountain where we spent the morning team cutting down ginger to clear the paths and roads up towards dew pond. A few of us started a game of ginger javelin where we were seeing how far we could throw the ginger stalks when moving them off the path and throwing them over the top which was fun. At lunch we then headed down to garden cottage which is near red lion (halfway up the mountain) to take part in Christmas games and eat the food we had all brought. First we ate out food and then we played ‘guess the toddler’ where we had to match names to toddler photos we had all submitted which was funny. We then all joined in on playing Christmas songs on bells before playing our White Elephant/Dirty Santa which is a different version of secret Santa. It’s a version where we where we all took a gift with us which we had wrapped and put them all on one table, we then took numbers to determine the order we got to choose gifts in. The first person picked a gift to open and then the second person could either decide to unwrap a new gift or steal someone else’s which was unwrapped. An item could only be stolen 3 times before it was locked in and a person could only be stolen from 3 times before their item was locked in. I ended up getting a kimono and cork lights for glass bottles which I was very happy with. After bells and secret Santa we then participated in some Ceilidh dancing which was lead by Dee. It was very funny and very fast! 

Christmas Eve Floats

When we first arrived on Ascension on of the first things we were told about was the Christmas eve floats and how much fun they are so we were very excited. Each organisation on the island had their own float which is like a carnival float on the back of the lorry which head around the island playing music. The AIG float we were on was Reggae themed. We weren’t too sure what to wear so we decided to lean more towards Christmas and wear Santa Hats instead of Reggae. The floats left Georgetown at around 15:00 and headed towards Two Boats where we had our first stop. We stopped at Two Boats for around half an hour before heading round to Travellers Hill where the RAF base is. We had lots of fun dancing on the float as it drove round the island but it was one of the craziest experiences ever! We then headed from Travellers to the American base and stopped outside the VC where we saw Ed who let Anna and I have a go at sitting on top of the US fire truck. Herby from Sea Rescue also let Anna and I ride on the JetRib back from the VC to Saints where we ended the float journey. We had lots of fun singing and dancing sitting on the JetRib. We arrived back to Saints where the floats had begun at around 8pm where we had a few drinks and a short dance before heading back to our bungalow to play Mario Kart before bed.

Christmas Day 

 I got up early, at around 5:30am Christmas morning and made my way down to long beach to watch the sunrise and try and catch an early morning nesting turtle. I didn’t manage to see any turtles nesting but I sat for two hours watching the turtles that were swimming and mating in the shallow water. Toby, Mel, Lorna and Emily also met me on the beach just after half 6 and it was a really peaceful and surreal way to spend the morning. At around 8am I headed to the work office to use the internet before heading back to the bungalow. Anna, Abi and I had decided we were going to make a veggie toad in the hole with roasted carrots, potatoes, Brussel sprouts and gravy for our Christmas dinner. None of us had made homemade Yorkshires before and I was a little worried our toad in the hole wouldn’t rise properly because we don’t have an electric whisk but it actually rose really well! It took us only one hour to make our dinner and everything turned out perfectly which was a nice result! After our lunch Anna and I went for a walk on the beach and rockpooling at deadmans beach and it actually rained a little bit which made it feel slightly more like Christmas in the UK but it was a really different way to spend the day. In the evening Hayes house invited us over to theirs and we did Karaoke for the evening. It was a very alternative Christmas day, and it was definitely weird being away but I did really enjoy it being so different for being away.

Boxing Day 

We decided to have a chilled boxing day morning, we had crumpets for breakfast and then Abi, Anna and I decided to go for a nice walk to Monty’s beach where we chilled and paddled in the water for the afternoon. We found a nice rockpool area where we could sit in the water and some Sargent major fish were nibbling at our feet and legs which was a funny feeling. I enjoyed relaxing on the beach, swimming and rock pooling for the afternoon. 

New Year’s Eve 

In the morning Abi and I went to the Ascension Museum where I watched the Ascension DVD and we explored the fort which is next to the museum. In the afternoon I went camping with Toby, Adam, Marcos, Jonny, Jaco, Lorna, Mel and Emily. We went to Scouts Campsite which is next to green mountain and we had a BBQ on the campfire as well as went for a short walk and played games and danced round the campfire as we counted in the new year. It was a very chilled New Year but one that I’ll never forget either. 

New Years Day

I woke up early on New years day and Toby and I went for a short walk whilst we waited for the others to wake. We packed up the tents and headed back to Georgetown by around 10am where we then headed to the Pier where a few people were planning on doing a Pier jump into the sea. They checked for sharks before jumping. I decided not to jump from the top but had fun jumping from a lower ledge and swimming with the trigger fish. I was then invited to Hayes House for avocado on toast for breakfast and then Toby came over to the house for the afternoon to have a Star Trek marathon with Abi which I joined in on.