14 DAY TRIAL // Stockton's residents were shocked by the worst Christmas tree ever to be exposed in a public square by the city's officials. The town center tree is a tradition and residents are planning on watching Christmas lights in another city this year, because their decorations are disgraceful.
The 15ft-tall (4.5 meters) tree became the laughing stock of the city after locals associated it with an “upside-down cornet dressed in white” or a “dunce's hat.” Stockton's residents were outraged after officials claimed to have spent thousands of dollars on Christmas decorations and all they see is an embarrassing tree.
“It is absolutely awful. How can anyone put a thing like that up and think it is OK to pass it off as a Christmas tree? The lights are God awful, and it is simply an embarrassment to the town... I will be taking my grandchildren to see the switching on of the lights somewhere else this year,” 64-year-old Anne Chivers told Daily Mail.
Residents posted one of the tree's photos on Facebook criticizing and complaining the joke-of-a-tree they have in the town's square. In an array of reactions, locals said that the tree “is a wigwam,” it's like they've “used an old dunce's hat for a Xmas tree,” and that the council shouldn't even have bothered with such rubbish.
In their defense, officials said that the street was facing redevelopment and a big tree, like the one they usually have, wouldn't have fit in the space available. The weird-looking snow-flake cone is just a temporary solution until the reconstruction project ends.
“We know that a traditional Christmas tree always makes a great centerpiece but there's so much more going on in Stockton throughout the Christmas period, including a 12-day Christmas market, ice sculpture, late night shopping and street theater with dance and musical performances. We would ask that our public bear with us this year,” one of Stockton Council's spokesmen told the press.
Sadly for Stockton's residents, they will have to accept the cone-like tree for this year's Christmas despite their attempts to persuade officials to change it. The only promise that the Council can make is that next year the traditional Stockton tree will return to make the town proud.