November is a fun month for the kiddies and the young at heart. Around the middle of the month Sinterklaas comes to The Netherlands to celebrate his birthday on Dec.5. This year he arrived on Nov 17.
Sint (as we call him) travels with his "Zwarte Piets" by steam boat from Turkey. His arrival is a very big event and he is always welcomed with a parade and lots of singing. He brings a big book of names of all the boys and girls and can look in that book to see what they have been up to all year. One year the Piets lost the book!! It was almost a disaster, but they found it just in the nick of time.
After getting off the boat Sint rides around Holland on his beautiful white horse "Amerigo" and the Piets walk along with him, taking care of all of The Good Sints needs. They are pretty much his personal assistants. The Piets also give candy and "pepernoten" (a very small nut formed ginger cookie) to everyone they see. I wouldnt want to act bad in fron of a Piet though, as you are likely to end up stuffed in a bag and taken kicking and screaming back to Turkey to learn how to be good! Sint arrived in my city today. He first went to the shopping center and talked to and sang songs with the childeren. He also did a question and answer session. I didnt stay long as I needed to get to work and it was very busy in the shopping center. I did stay long enough to hear one very adorable question from a child......
"Sinterklaas, how old are you"?
Sint couldnt really answer with a year number but he told us that he is older than "ALL the grandmothers". I imagine that is pretty dang old considering that all grandmothers also had grandmothers who also had grandmothers and so forth. WOW, that is one old, still going strong dude!! The Piets pretty much thought the same thing!
Obivously not every child and their parents can fit into the shopping center so Sint also comes to Markt 15, where I work, to have a little get together there. The childeren all sit on the floor in front of him and you wouldnt believe the looks of amazement on their faces. He then calls a child up and pulls him/her onto his lap and talks with them. He always asks the child what song they want to sing and all the childeren sing along. It is just too cute. Today he called Jerome, age 5 (a child of one of my co-workers) and told him how he had seen him swimming on Wednesday and how very proud he was of his swimming. The only thing Jerome could say was "Ja" (yes). Too stinkin adorable. The Piets generally pick childeren at random but Sint called Jerome out by name. I think that will be a cherished memory for him for years to come.
Sint couldnt really answer with a year number but he told us that he is older than "ALL the grandmothers". I imagine that is pretty dang old considering that all grandmothers also had grandmothers who also had grandmothers and so forth. WOW, that is one old, still going strong dude!! The Piets pretty much thought the same thing!
Obivously not every child and their parents can fit into the shopping center so Sint also comes to Markt 15, where I work, to have a little get together there. The childeren all sit on the floor in front of him and you wouldnt believe the looks of amazement on their faces. He then calls a child up and pulls him/her onto his lap and talks with them. He always asks the child what song they want to sing and all the childeren sing along. It is just too cute. Today he called Jerome, age 5 (a child of one of my co-workers) and told him how he had seen him swimming on Wednesday and how very proud he was of his swimming. The only thing Jerome could say was "Ja" (yes). Too stinkin adorable. The Piets generally pick childeren at random but Sint called Jerome out by name. I think that will be a cherished memory for him for years to come.
Jerome and Sinterklaas
The childeren had a wonderful time today and will be waiting for Sinterklaas's birthday Dec.5 when they set their shoes out and the Zwarte Piets fill them with treats.
You see, Christmas here is Jesus birthday and a very religious holiday. The Dutch do not generally do the gift under the tree thing. Instead on December 5, we all get together, have hot chocolate and lots of sweet treats and do what we call "pakjesavond" or little gift evening. It sometimes includes a couple of big gifts or a whole bunch of small ones. It usually always includes a poem about the gift and what the meaning behind it is. The gifts are officially from Sint and the Piets but you can usually guess where they really came from.
Here is a link to the Englishhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas page of Wikipedia on Sinterklass
