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A few years ago I was living in Ireland, now I'm here in Taiwan. It's the 24 of December and it's business as usual, tomorrow is Christmas day and I'll be working. I must admit it doesn't feel like Christmas ,day time temperatures are in the mid-twenties and the decorations are sparse, but occasionally you see the odd plastic tree or an electric Santa.
There are no real trees though, which is a plus. Hey I hope I'm not going to bore you to death but when I lived in County Cork I celebrated Christmas by digging up my own tree, not cutting it down. My house was situated on a scenic side of a mountain with lots of old farmland around, forestry lined land higher up the mountain slopes and that's where I used to go to dig up my tree. I usually planted it in a big bucket and it lived in my house for two weeks or so. After the new year I would return it to the mountain side.

You might think what a weird thing to do, why the hell is he writing about such things?
The article is about cutting trees down. Well for one thing the trees take about five or so years to grow to the convenient height for "Christmas trees" They are only in your house for two weeks and then they are thrown out. What a waste. I used to sometimes wander around on bare mountain slopes with my dog where clear felling had taken place. Total destruction of habitat, erosion and top soil loss and a general mess were what I usually found.
In today's world with environmental pollution, climate change, deforestation and population growth, my advice would be to get an artificial one or dig up a real one and get into "Bonsai" Otherwise we might not be celebrating too many Christmases in the future.

Learn more about this author, David Poulter.
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