simpler, more spiritual holiday season By Nancy Acton "Christmas was lovely. When you think back, everything was beautiful and quiet. Everybody knew each other, and there was always harmony among the boys and girls.'' So says Bermuda's popular early morning greeter, Johnny Barnes.

Now 76-years-old, the genial Bermudian whose friendly waves and "I love you's'' gives hundreds of commuters a cheery start to their working day was reflecting on the Christmases of his childhood and how they compare to today's celebrations.

Like all people of his generation, the deeply religious Mr. Barnes feels that the true meaning of Christmas has been almost lost in today's crass commercialisation of the festive season.

"People are forgetting what Christmas is all about. They are taking Christ out of Christmas, and when you do that you are missing the mark because when He is in it then you really can celebrate,'' the Seventh-Day Adventist stresses. "People work all year, and when Christmas comes they go to the bank and draw all their money out and spend it. In their glee and folly they forget that Christmas is Christ, not Santa Claus.'' As a child, Mr. Barnes remembers the modest celebrations at his Middletown home, where materialism was non-existent, the joys basic, and the incomparable closeness between the members of his immediate family (two brothers, a sister, and mum) created a loving bond which transcended all material wants.

With a mother who worked long hours at two jobs at the Hamilton and Windsor hotels, and a menagerie of animals to care for (goats, pigs, chickens, pigeons, and a dog), the Barnes' children had little time for tomfoolery, or even wishful thinking.

"Everyone had their chores to do,'' Mr. Barnes remembers. "Apart from looking after the animals, we had a well and we had to pump water by hand. It took a while but you got used to it. It was the only way to get water.'' House and yard work were other parts of the children's designated chores, but particularly at Christmas time everything had to be spick and span -- and woe betide the guilty ones if their mother returned home from a hard day's work to find her children had been fooling around at the expense of the "To do'' list! Part of the Christmas excitement was choosing a tree, but not from some fancy outlet. Rather, the Barnes' children would set off with their mother for nearby Prospect, there to spot the perfect cedar tree, which they would cut with a hand saw and drag home on foot.

"Oh, we really looked forward to that,'' the greeter chuckles.

But it was the much-loved cassava pie which extracted the most preparatory work during Christmas week. In the days before ready-to-go bags in supermarkets, the Barnes' family grew their own. It was young Johnny's job to dig up the woody roots and clean the soil off. They would then be soaked in water for a couple of days before the laborious peeling process began.

Since today's nifty little peelers were not yet invented, Mr. Barnes used either a piece of broken glass or the top off an opened tin to scrape away the tough brown skin.

"It took hours,'' he notes. "Then the grated cassava was rinsed and put into a cloth to squeeze out the milk. After that it was left to dry so that it became like farine.'' Preparations for the Christmas pudding were no less time-consuming, and again involved the children in its preparation. Apart from assembling the ingredients and gathering the wood for the fire over which it would be cooked, Mr. Barnes remembers holding the big bowl of mixture in his lap and beating the ingredients.

"It was a lot of work, and I licked my fingers in the dough,'' he laughs.

"Oh, I got many a spanking for that!'' Once ready, the pudding would be wrapped in cloth and boiled in a recycled kerosene tin (suitably cleaned up, of course) over an open fire in the back yard. It fell to Mr. Barnes and his siblings to keep the water in the tin at the proper level throughout the cooking process.

"We had to keep that fire going without let-up,'' the roundabout greeter remembers, "but oh, the aroma of that pudding cooking! I will never forget it. In fact, I wish I could have some of that pudding now.'' The centrepiece of the family's Christmas dinner was chosen from their available livestock: pork, duck, pigeon or goat, and Mr. Barnes -- as he did throughout his childhood -- was the one who had to kill the fowl or animal for the family feast. Today, he is a vegetarian.

Home-grown produce from the household's garden was picked and washed by Mr.

Barnes, ready for his mother to prepare.

Mauby, a drink derived from boiling up a tree bark, was made by his mother.

When it came to Chrismas decorations, again it was all hands to the task.

"We couldn't afford to buy decorations, so we made our own out of paper and different cloths. You'd be surprised what you can do when you don't have the real thing,'' he says cheerfully. "Today, it is amazing what people throw out.'' Looking back, Mr. Barnes dismisses any suggestion that the family's financial circumstances were synonymous with hard times, for they were rich in other ways.

"Oh no,'' he assures, "it was the working together to bring Christmas about that made it so special.'' Christmas shopping was always done at the Golden Gate, a mixed dry goods store that Mr. Barnes especially remembers for its stock of big toys. Indeed, while the Reid Street emporium was without pretension, Mr. Barnes remembers "it had everything'', and was extremely popular.

A seasonal side show in the streets included adults wearing large animal costumes, such as bears, lions and elephants, which also came from the Golden Gate, as well as Santa parading around in a horse and trolley driven by Mr.

Larry Trott.

As for all children, Christmas eve in the Barnes' household was a time of great excitement and anticipation, although their expectations were much more modest than today's youngsters would even comprehend.

"We didn't have stockings to hang up. Instead, we hung up recycled condensed milk tins, which we had cleaned and painted red and blue. We put a hole in the side and tied them to our beds with string,'' Mr. Barnes relates. "In the morning we would awake to find a thruppence and some peanuts. Beautiful -- we had the world!'' Noting the vast difference between the modest expectations of his childhood and the lavish and expensive gifts today's children demand and get, Mr. Barnes shakes his head in amazement.

"The spirit of Christmas is giving, not getting,'' he stresses. "Christ gave his life for us, so we must give our lives to Him. When we do that He will give us peace and joy in our hearts. If we don't have that how can we celebrate Christmas? Today, the system is set up so that all you see is the dollar. Money is not everything.'' On Boxing Day then, as now, the gombeys were awaited with great excitement, and Mr. Barnes and his siblings were permitted to follow their progress for a limited time before having to return home to complete their various chores.

"I still like that magic,'' he says, eyes twinkling. "There is something about hearing the gombeys at Christmas that you don't get at any other time.'' This year, Mr. Barnes and his wife Belvina, a librarian and former teacher, will spend Christmas "quietly and peacefully'' in their Paget home, enjoying a meal that will include fresh vegetables from their garden.

And because it is Christmas, the friendly face at the morning roundabout will take a rest from his labours.

"The good Lord and I don't go down there on weekends or holidays,'' he explains.

Mr. Barnes will, however, stick to his usual 8 p.m. bedtime, although he allows that, instead of rising in the wee, small hours of the morning to keep his date with the commuters, he will allow himself to sleep in -- "perhaps until 9 a.m.''.

With regard to all the millennium hype, the septuagenarian is dismissive.

"Instead of making a big fuss about the year 2000 people should be thinking about `Is my life in harmony with Jesus Christ's will?' God has everything in the palm of his hands, and he is bigger than the year 2000. He is the one we should be making a fuss about,'' he asserts.

Asked if he had a special message for the people of Bermuda, Mr. Barnes responded: "I love you. Love the Creator first, love one another, and your neighbour as yourself. That is our passport to heaven.''