This article is classified "Real"
The Arrival
===========
The Dutch tradition of "Sinterklaas" begins at the beginning of November,
even earlier if shop keepers have their way, and they mostly do [1]. The
shop windows start to fill up with all the Sinterklaas attributes:
gift-wrapped cardboard boxes, replicas of Sinterklaas and "Zwarte Piet"
(Black Pete), chocolate letters, pepernoten. Halfway through November there
is a big spectacle when the man arrives in the Netherlands. A television
crew awaits his arrival at one of the more photogenic ports where he docks
his steam boat full of presents, Zwarte Pieten, and his horse. They are
welcomed by a huge audience of parents and children.
Sinterklaas simultaneously arrives at every city or village in the
Netherlands. This is explained by way of the so-called "hulp-Sinterklazen"
(people who help Sinterklaas by dressing up like him), and certainly not by
some wild macroscopic quantum mechanical effect. The children who become
aware to the impossibility of simultaneous sightings are told that
Sinterklaas can indeed not be in every place at the same time, so people
help him. Children often discover they aren't dealing with the "real"
Sinterklaas on their own, when they recognize shoes, wrist-watches, rings
and glasses of local shopkeepers, or even daddies, on the old man.
Sinterklaas goes on a tour through the village accompanied by several Zwarte
Pieten, who throw different types of sweets around and on the ground for
children to get tetanus. You can see children squirming about like maggots,
trying to get hold of as much candy as their little hands can hold. The
smart children, who know how diseases come about, then resort to throwing it
back as hard as possible, causing multiple concussions to the Pieten.
Wisened by experience, the Pieten now only deposit candy straight into the
open hands of the weakest children.
After this day, Sinterklaas begins his assessment of all the children's
behaviour in the past year, and proceeds to hand out presents. It all
culminates on December 5th in the evening.
Sinterklaas Accessories
=======================
Sinterklaas, the legendary man, looks like an old wise bloke with long white
hair and similar beard. He is dressed like a bishop and has a golden
(shepherd) staff in his hand. He also carries a large leather bound book,
with gold print, in which it is written which children have been good and
which have not. In the "good old days" kids used to be threatened to be
whipped when they had been bad, with a bunch of twigs (a "roe"), after which
they would be put in a burlap bag to be shipped to Sinterklaas' residence in
Madrid, Spain. As parenting grew softer over the years, this valuable
tradition was lost, except in some of the Sinterklaas songs. Also, people
nowadays pay big money for holidays in Spain, and for whipping too for that
matter. The kids are smart enough to know that, so the effectiveness of the
punishment has decreased anyway.
Filling The Shoes
=================
So why does the old man bother to come to this soggy country when he could
be having a great time in the sunshine by his pool? Why, it's because of
his birthday! His birthday is actually on December 6th, but for some arcane
reason it is celebrated a day before [2].
Before this memorable occasion Sinterklaas climbs onto his "schimmel" [3]
and trots around on rooftops. How on Earth he gets there is never
explained, and how he keeps his balance on the sloping, slippery roofs is
even less understood. Assisted by his black henchmen [4] he now and then
throws presents down the chimneys (mostly sweets, suggesting a conspiracy of
dentists...), a practice which reduced whole cities to ashes, centuries ago.
This was prevented by the introduction of the central heating, with scores
of disappointed children as a side effect. Thanks to the parents this
hasn't yet resulted in a downfall of civilisation, as they assume the role
of Sinterklaas and put presents like chocolate letters and marzipan or sugar
animals in the shoes their offspring have put in front of the heating
element instead. These shoes have been prepared by putting hay and/or a
carrot in them, for the horse, though how this animal should get into the
room is unclear and not questioned by the children. Thankful that the
horrible vegetables are gone, the kids eat themselves silly on the sweets
next morning. This shoe business is the opportunity for the children to
give lists of all the presents they want to Sinterklaas.
The Origins Of The Tradition
============================
Sinterklaas is said to have originated from St. Nicolaus, the Bishop of
Mira, Turkey, who was a righteous dude and did good stuff for children. The
Santa Claus concept might also have originated from this guy. How it came
to be that Sinterklaas lives in Spain is a mystery. There could be a
connection with the Spanish inquisition or the Spanish domination over the
Netherlands, but your guess is as good as mine.
The roots of "Zwarte Piet" (Black Pete) are also somewhat unclear. Some say
these guys represent medieval Italian chimney sweeps. Their skin is pitch
black and they wear medieval yet shiny clothes, revealing that medieval
folks must have had mighty detergents, the recipe of which has been lost
since. The throwing of presents down chimneys seems to be evidence for the
"Italian chimney sweep" theory.
Every year there is a discussion about "Zwarte Piet" being a racist concept,
which is understandable when you notice how little Black Pete nowadays
resembles a chimney sweep. Children in school sometimes think their
coloured friends will in the future become a Zwarte Piet, and people
dressing up as Zwarte Piet pretend they're simple and speak Dutch as if they
just immigrated from a tropical country. A lot of confusion could be
avoided by going back to the roots and dressing Black Pete up as a real
chimney sweep.
More Presents
=============
On December 5th Sinterklaas brings the large presents, which are left in
large plastic trash-bags (the same ones that will be used to throw away all
the broken toys in the coming weeks) on the front porch. Sometimes the
parents hire a Sinterklaas from the "Sinterklaascentrale" (an organization
providing assistant Sinterklazen) to present the presents. They might even
dress up themselves, causing uncomfortable situations when the kids
recognize those shoes, wrist watches, rings and glasses mentioned before.
"Daddy is a transvestite" is a commonly heard and traumatising remark. The
old, wise man utters some very wise words such as "Are there any naughty
children here?" and "Have you been a good boy/girl this year?". Upon
receiving the respective replies of "noooo!" and "yeees!", Sinterklaas
proceeds to explain why that reply is incorrect. Loads of children are
traumatised by Sinterklaas every year, especially when they are forced to
sit on his lap and sing a Sinterklaas song.
Sinterklaas for grown-ups means a party of giving and receiving gifts, much
like on Christmas, but now the presents are called "surprises" (pronounce as
"sir-preeze-us"). A surprise is a gift hidden within a product of
tinkering, aimed at giving the gift the appearance of something completely
different, accompanied by a poem. It serves to embarrass the addressee by
reminding him/her of some embarrassing moments in the past year, or to point
out a general failure of character in a mocking way. It is the day to get
even with anybody for anything, but it is mostly played with family and/or
friends. The most cliched surprises are a gift:
1) in a bucket of shit [5];
2) wrapped in five thousand kilometres of sticky tape; or
3) which is only an empty box.
A fun tradition, no?
[1] I've seen Sinterklaas stuff in shops as early as mid October.
[2] Maybe the fact that Sinterklaas is supposed to be several centuries old
has led people to believe it is highly probable for him to die any
minute, so to be sure that they receive the presents anyway, they
celebrate his birthday a day in advance. Seeing what tricks he gets up
to during his stay, this really isn't such a strange thought!
[3] Schimmel, n. 1. Grey horse. 2. Mould.
[4] Women too; children often notice the suspicious bumps on the chest, and
are not fooled by the low voices they use.
[5] Unfortunately not many people dare to use real dung, but mock it by
mixing some kind of cake ("ontbijtkoek") with water.
Attached documents:
A picture of Sinterklaas
