Carols by candlelight
in the park.
Tickets were free.
But not just carols.
Coffee stall, candy floss
Ice cream vendors.
Six thousand people
Picnic blankets, baskets
Pizzas and chips
Santa hats and
Reindeer antlers.
Kids in pyjamas.
Friendly neighbours
Happy to chat
As dusk settled.
Then music
And candles
And coloured glow sticks.
Traditional carols,
Christmas songs,
Part concert and singalong.
I should have guessed
That it’d be different
It’s Christmas in summer.
Oh and a lovely Aussie version of “The 12 days of Christmas”.
RuthsArc 
Hi Ruth
We have a New Zealand version of The Twelve Days of Christmas. It goes like this:
On the twelfth day of Christmas
My true love gave to me
Twelve piupius swinging
Eleven haka lessons
Ten juicy fish heads
Nine sacks of pipis
Eight plants of puha
Seven eels a-swimming
Six pois a-twirling
Five – big – fat – pigs
Four huhu bugs
Three flax kits
Two kumera
And a pukeko in a pong tree
For a translation of the Maori words – piupiu – a traditional skirt made of flax originally, and worn in Maori cultural performances by women; haka – that war chant thing at the beginning of a rugby game; juicy fish heads – a delicacy in Maori cooking; pipi – a shellfish; puha – a green leafy plant that is boiled and usually eaten with pork; eels – long slippery fish with fins – also called tuna in Maori, but not the same tuna as the deep sea fish; poi – a ball that is swung either on a long or short string between the hands and is only used by women in cultural performance; pig – they like pig as a food source (think of hangi); huhu are a beetle that looks quite prehistoric, has a bit of a bite to it, long feelers, long body, and is brown in colour; flax kits – a commonly made handbag usually called a kite (keete); kumera – a sweet tasting root vegetable that I would spell kumara; pukeko – a red beaked and blue feathered bird that lives in swampy/marshy areas; ponga – a tree fern.
This version is attributed to Kingi Ihaka and was written in 1981.
There you go!
Kind regards
Den xx
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Love it Den. Thanks for sharing this.
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Like your 12 days of Christmas. 🙂
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Thanks Judy.
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Love your 12 Days of Christmas! Like it better than ours 🙂
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