It was a very special weekend in Antwerp: Sinterklaas arrived! Since we are from a land where Santa Claus rules this season, we had a bit of catching up to do to understand what the heck was going on. What follows is our interpretation of what we could piece together in our level 1 Dutch understanding and reading Wikipedia articles. We apologize for any inaccuracies.
So, Sinterklaas is the celebrated figure of the holidays in the Netherlands, Belgium, and northern France. Much like Santa Claus, his origins are based on Saint Nicolaas. However, Sinterklaas' modern day traditions are different in many fascinating ways. Sinterklaas is a Turkish bishop who lives in Madrid, Spain. We still don't know why, but hey, why not pick a nice place to live. He spends the year preparing to bring gifts to all the children that have behaved well. Just like Santa's elves, Sinterklaas has many helpers called Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). These black-face servants help Sinterklaas prepare for his annual gift-giving trip by making sweets, keeping the book on which children have been good or bad, and just generally helping keep the whole operation moving. Now, coming from a land where black-face is considered very offensive, it was quite shocking to see many folks running around as such. It seems there is a growing contingent of the population here that are rallying against further inclusion of Zwarte Piet in the traditions, but most folks seem just accept him as a non-offensive part of the lore. At any rate, Sinterklaas starts really gearing up at the start of November. In fact, they start a daily "news" show that documents his preparations, and they even coordinate activities in the schools to match the show. It seems Sinterklaas is kind of a forgetful old man and Zwarte Piet is always having to save him from himself. For example, this year the they went to start up the boat in Spain, but Sinterklaas couldn't find the boat keys. Then he got them lost in the fog on the ocean. Both times Zwarte Piet always helped the old guy get back on track. Finally, the big weekend is here, and Sinterklaas arrives to town. He pulls into the port and rides his white horse into town (the same white horse he rides when he delivers gifts). We were present at his arrival in Antwerp, and he drew quite the crowd. After pausing to chat with many children and hand out sweets, Sinterklaas made his way to the town hall to address the public. He opened his book and read many instances of children who had been very bad this year. Each time, Zwarte Piet would have to politely correct Sinterklaas on his misreading of a passage or tell him to read a bit further because in fact all of these examples were of children being GOOD not bad. In the end Sinterklaas came to the conclusion that "There are no naughty children this year!" Everyone cheered because that means that from now until December 5 (Sinterklaas' birthday), children can set their shoes by the window at night and Sinterklass/Zwarte Piet will leave them treats in their shoes. Now, if you have been a naughty child this year, instead of getting treats in your shoes, Zwarte Piet will stuff you in a sack while you sleep and kidnap you to Spain for the rest of the year (a bit harsher than coal in your stocking...).
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| Sinterklaas' crew dusting before he makes his appearance |
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| Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet! |
It is always such a pleasure to experience new cultural traditions. It was so wonderful to see that no matter the differences in the way we celebrate, we all have reason to enjoy getting together as family and watch the joy on children's faces at this time of year.
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