Thursday, December 06, 2007

Sankt Nikolaus Tag

When I lived in Germany as a child, we celebrated every year Sankt Nikolaus Tag. On the night of December 5, we would place our shoes outside the door. If we had been good that year, Sankt Nikolaus would leave chocolates, fruit, and other goodies in our shoes. If we had been bad, then we would find wood switches in our shoes the next morning. This was the commencement of the Christmas season which would last until Epiphanie (January 6). I hope you found goodies this morning!

2 comments:

Middle Ditch said...

Hi,

We did the same in Holland. That was called St Nikolaas dag or Sinterklaas dag. We used to put a shoe filled with a carrot by the fire and the next day we would find the carrot gone and a chocolate mouse put in it's place. On the evening of the fifth he would leave a big basket full of presents (or so we children thought) by the front door. It never ever occured to us that father always was mysteriously absent.

Wonderful memories.

Lee said...

Craig, as nice a man as you are today, I can't imagine you were ever the recipient of a switch.

On the other hand, I grew up with the same threat, and yet, no matter how bad I tried to be, I never got a bunch of 'em. :-)