I never liked Christmas very much, but Christmas is the season for presents. And I always liked presents—getting them and offering them. Apparently, in Cataluña, the tradition is that the presents come from a log, the Caga Tiò. In the weeks before Christmas, the whole family takes care of that beloved log. Then, on Christmas Day, they all surround the Tiò and start brutally beating it until the poor log shits out the presents. While the beating is going on, everybody sings:

Caga tiò,
Caga torró,
Avellanes i mató,
Si no cagues bé
Et donaré un cop de bastó.
Caga tió!

Note that I didn’t take any literary liberty by using the word “shit.”

Although we didn’t fall as low as adopting the prosaic Nordic process of personally exchanging gifts, in my family there was no beating up a log. I wish it had been a log involved. The presents were—and are—brought by Papá Noel, Santa Claus, or the Reyes Magos, depending on the day they are given. In fact, what might be uncommon is that, since we always visited different parts of the family during the holidays, we often had several installments of the same ritual, just changing the name of the involved magical entity.

I’m not sure when I stopped believing in Papá Noel or in Los Reyes Magos, but at some point, I did. In spite of that, I still like the ritual. It is always the same. First, in the weeks prior to Christmas, somebody—my mother, my sister, me—is in charge of keeping the presents hidden somewhere. Then, on the eve of the arrival of, say, Los Reyes Magos, everybody is supposed to leave a shoe in the designated area—we were never very big on Christmas trees. When everybody has gone to bed, someone is in charge of distributing the presents, most likely the same person who kept them hidden. In the morning, nobody is allowed to enter the room with the presents before everybody is there and ready to go in. This invariably leads to some negotiations the night before, with kids lobbying for everybody to wake up early and others pushing for a late morning. In fact, before the fateful door is opened, the kids—and my mother—are going ballistic while some adults are refusing to get out of bed, need a coffee first, or have to do this or that thing right now. This was my father’s role. It is my role now. And one can always count on Christian. Anyways, at the same time, the more responsible adults—and my mother—are trying to negotiate between the kids threatening to tear down the door and the professional pains in the ass hiding under the bedsheets. Then the door is opened, everybody finds their shoe and starts opening presents, with some discreet discussion between adults about the possibility of exchanging something if it is the wrong size, or with some explanation about the origin of this or that. The kids are just too focused on opening their presents to give a fuck about such details. The adults also like getting presents, but the real joy is watching the kids open theirs.

By now, all the kids know that Los Reyes Magos are not real. I don’t know how my nephews figured it out, but it was me who, at some point, told the being. I guess I assumed that she knew, having older cousins and going to a school with many Muslim pupils who do not believe in nonsense like Papá Noel. She didn’t. There was a moment of shock. No unhappiness, but just shock. Her reaction, which I would have liked to have been able to film, was to say Vous—m’avez—menti, appalled, with big pauses where I put dashes. She is pretty legalistic, thinks that a deal is a deal—until she finds a loophole, that’s it—and it fits that what shocked her was not that Papá Noel didn’t exist, but rather that she had been the victim of a conspiracy. That she had been cheated into doing this or that with the lie that Papá Noel knew it all and would reward her good behavior. This reaction, the Vous—m’avez—menti, is typical of my daughter. What is also typical is that, even knowing that it is all a fairy tale, pretty much knowing what she is going to get, she is totally happy to play along as if it were all real, as if it had been Papá Noel who had read her most intimate desires, those she had only shared with evidently trustworthy people like her parents.

Now, this year she actually got an unexpected present. Unexpected by everybody, I must say. It was delivered neither by Papá Noel on a sleigh nor by Los Reyes Magos on camels, but rather more prosaically by the postman. More prosaic, but also much more magical. There was no sign of the sender. It was only clearly labeled for her. It was a Liverpool FC shirt.

My daughter is obsessed with soccer. Although in winter we keep the house—for environmental reasons—at a balmy 17–19°C and dress accordingly in layers upon layers of wool, she spends her life sitting on the couch wearing a short-sleeved Real Madrid shirt. She wears those shirts until they are unrecognizable. She knows which of Bayern München’s players is injured, who is said to transfer from here to there, when the games are, and this not only about the Spanish league but all over. At some point, I asked her, and she could name five teams in the Turkish league. Even if you like soccer, it is most likely that you can’t do that yourself. A soccer shirt made her really happy.

I also asked her at some point if she had a preferred team in the Premier League, and without doubt, she answered, “Aston Villa.” Aston Villa? How does she come to Aston Villa? No idea. I asked her, and there was no understandable explanation. Anyways, one could think that some mysterious, real-existing Reyes Magos really read her inner desires but got it wrong by about 100 miles. She was totally puzzled, and so was I.

But then I started to tie up loose ends and understood that it was all a conspiracy paid for by Big Pharma and American Tech. That the only similarities between these “Reyes Magos” and the real ones is that there are three of them. And that there is some vague, imprecise indication of some of them coming from the Orient. But these ones don’t travel on camels. They rather travel by plane, with a mythology built around pickup trucks and Peycans. It became clear to me that this was a conspiracy aimed at taking my daughter away from the right path. At removing my daughter from me. Aimed at creating inter-family war here, with me singing badly, and very loudly, Hala Madrid, and with her singing You’ll Never Walk Alone. Aimed at destroying those moments when we both suffer together in front of the TV because Madrid is again being disappointing. When we both agree that either the other player is simulating or that eso es falta, aquí y en China. A conspiracy aimed at creating one of those dysfunctional families—like Christians’—where the father has class and style and supports Juve while the son is an Interista. Knowing my daughter, knowing that she still remembers how I lied to her about Papá Noel, it pains me to say that this evil plan might have a chance of working.

My friends, you were the real Reyes Magos of the season.