Just like we have good days and bad days, we have all experienced great Christmases and well, there were some years we wished the world would have just skipped Christmas because it was just so awful.
Nonetheless, we survived that horrible Christmas to tell the tale and probably even laugh at it in retrospect. Every year the T&T Guardian asks random people to share their best and worst Christmas stories.
Below you will find some of the most hilarious, sweet and in some cases, sad stories that were recorded as the best and worst Christmases ever.
Michelle Borel
Radio announcer
"My best Christmas would definitely be when my third baby experienced her first Christmas. I had my three most valuable treasures with me and it was one in which everything was peaceful. It was also the first Christmas that I started selling items I baked myself. So, it was the best as I felt most accomplished, having treasure and talent all under one roof. Ain't that a sweet Christmas?
"When it comes to a worst Christmas, though, I truly cannot think of any. I am so much of an optimist it is rather hard to find a bad Christmas and therefore, I am unable to even have a worse one... I am thinking, thinking, thinking and I am still stomped, because my belief is all things work out for the greater good for those who love the Lord. So, hmm... Still can't think of a thing!"
Kay Kay
Accountant
"I shall start with the worst!!!
Last year all the wonderful Trini Christmas traditions going on down here and I was stuck in Canada, where there was an ice storm so is level cabin fever. Couldn't go anywhere or do anything. Just had to stay in the stupid house. I missed all my normal limes and my group Christmas dinner... everything!
The people we visited were Muslim, so no ham not even a 'lil' pastelle. Never me and Canada for Christmas again. If Trini Christmas is the best, Canada Christmas is the worst!!! Not even a 'lil' Home Alone on TV to watch!!!!
If I had to choose the very best Christmas, it would be 2005 when I first started working. I only took home $2,000 per month, but I bought lots of gifts for everyone. Seeing my sisters who were teens then, light up at the things I got them. It just warmed my heart. I mean no one in this world can pick out clothes and jewelry for you like your big sister. And you know how I know this? Because they've been stealing my clothes and accessories for years. Lol.
It was the year I grew up and became an adult in so many ways. I finally understood what it was like to be a parent at Christmas and find money to survive through January."
Caleb "Bravehart" Hart
Trinidad-born, Canada-based musician
My best Christmas was in Tobago, when all my family was together and we barely had any gifts but we had each other and that's what made it beautiful.
My worst Christmas was when I moved to Canada and spent Christmas alone in a cold and foreign new city."
Kenton Urial
Producer
Best and worst was last year. I spent Christmas with my mother for the first time in over 20 years in St Vincent, which was very special. But at the time there was also a major storm which caused much destruction and even took a few lives well.
But you want to know something? I'm in St Vincent right now to do it again."
Zuri Adams
My worst Christmas experience happened when I was about 13-year-old and I visited New York. I was very excited and looking forward to a white christmas and all that comes with one. I was so happy because I got to go ice skating at the Rockefeller centre at times square and a lot of other all tourist type stuff. At the end of the day we went Christmas shopping until we were beat and
stayed up wrapping gifts for the entire family. Everyone branched off and wrapped gifts and we stayed up late. Christmas morning low and behold, no one had thought to buy any gift for me and it just made me felt unloved and horrible.
My best experience was much later in life when I was able to return home from working in Japan and surprise my two sons. It was wonderful to see the look on their face and I remember that we all cried.It was vey heartbreaking and it brought us together in love as a family because I had been gone a while and I wasn't sure that I would have made it home.
Omare Asson
I could clearly recall my best Christmas it was the year I received my new ps2. I was only 13 years old at the time and for months I dreamt of having my own game console. It was a real joy to actually get one for Christmas. My worst Christmas however was just last year because it was the family's first Christmas without my cousin who died the October prior.
Clint Williams
I've never had a bad Christmas but the best one I had was the first time I heard parang live. I remember being a child and my uncle-in-law and his band came early a Christmas morning and I remember another one where I left home at midnight to parang with a group I joined.
Shirley Reid
My worst experience is easy to remember, it was my first Christmas in the US. It was cold and cold and snowing and cold and I realized it's not a holiday. I think all my Christmases when I was home in T&T were great. Even now I remember cleaning the house when I didn't want to but I wouldn't mind doing it now to parang and of course my favorite Christamas experience is eating sweetbread and ham. To this day it's the only thing I eat on Christmas morning.
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Kareema
Every Christmas is a good one for me becuase my family is very traditional. We are awakened on Christmas morning at 5am by the sound of parang and then we eat pastelles wrapped in the fig leaf, paime is also served and we wash it down with original boiled chocolate.