Kozhikode: As fairy lights begin to glow across the country and the scent of warm cake and cinnamon curls through December air, the old, familiar magic of Christmas quietly returns.

It is the season when even grown-ups allow themselves a moment of softness, a flicker of belief, a whispered wish sent out into the world. And at the centre of this wish-making stands Santa Claus — timeless, impossibly generous, and forever entrusted with our most hopeful desires.

In conversation with young Indians this week, Mathrubhumi discovered that Gen Z’s Christmas wishlist to Santa is unlike anything the North Pole has likely handled before. Their wishes are tender, chaotic, philosophical, hilarious, exhausted, ambitious — and deeply revealing of the times they live in.

Some wishes reach far beyond pe

See Full Page