What's Next?: December 2010

We all need to have something to do at times when work is not as demanding. For some of us, it might be a distracting hobby in the evenings or a vacation once or twice a year. For others, there is an entire half of the year or more that there is just no work to do. Hockey players play golf in the summer. Football players gamble or get involved in charities in the winter.

Since Santa's first visit to children everywhere, magically accomplishing his mission in one night, haven't we all wondered what he does for the rest of the year?

Wonder no more.

One sunny afternoon in Antwerp, Belgium, we saw Santa on a little excursion. Though the styling is a little different from what we are accustomed to seeing him in, he is still loyal to the red cloak and hat. I think the T-shirt gives us a glimpse of his edgier side and though the untucked shirt screams casual, the hat and determined expression reminds us that he is all business. The wine glass is a great touch; leading edge accessorizing for the hard-core multi-tasker.

And then he stops. He looks around.

He has a seat on the artistically decorated bench behind the church.

Santa, what did you just pull out of your bag?

Is that a bottle of Good Cheer?

And a water bottle? Where's the wine glass that you were carrying with such determination only moments earlier?

Looking around. You never know when one of those little busy-bodied elves are going to show up and expect you to share.

Of course! The wine glass wasn't big enough. So obvious now.

Don't worry, Kiddies! This little series of chrono-photos was taken a few months ago. Plenty of time for drying out, rehab and re-entry into the workforce to make his whirlwind tour to a chimney near you! Be good!

In Canada, I am accustomed to the onslaught of Christmas commercialism within hours of the Halloween Jack-O-Lanterns witnessing the sunrise; streets and stores strewn with boughs and bobbles, repeat-play of Bing's White Christmas and Elvis' Blue Christmas from every speaker and, whipped cream and sparkles on the coffees that, only the day before, came with milk and sugar. This is normal. I know when Christmas day is from the advent calendars and I know that Santa Claus pitches up at the shopping malls somewhere around the end of November or the day of the US Macy's Parade. Normal for me.

In The Netherlands, mid-November on a Sunday, Sinterklaas arrives by steamboat from Spain with his helpers, the Zwarte Pieten. I know! I was a little freaked out, too.

Last year, I returned from a work mission to see these characters roaming the streets. Having just finished thirty hours of travel and definitely not in close control of my wits, I thought it would be better to walk briskly, make no stops and, for-God's-Sake, do NOT make eye contact.

Once safely in my second story flat, I reassessed the view of the market street out the window, much like one of those scary-jumping-spiders that hangs out above my doorway, watching, learning.

In addition to what I could only describe as black-impersonating-court-jesters smiling, dancing and singing in the streets, there were identical stuffed dolls as integral parts of the Christmas Sinterklaas window displays. Must be a trend of some sort if they have already made dolls fashioned after these guys.

The response that I got from another Expat who I asked about this invasion was, "I don't know, I'm just trying to figure out when it ends." Hmmmm.

Must Google.

As is the norm with the World Wide Web, there are as many stories about these guys as there are hits on the Web. So, following I will tell you my loose interpretation of these goings-ons.

Sinterklaas, like most of our interpretations of the Great Mid-Winter Bearer of Gifts, shows up from somewhere else and makes good on the parental threats of naughty and nice. I have to say that it's a little more disturbing than my childhood memories where the big risk was getting a lump of coal in my stocking if I didn't Stop Tormenting my Brother. Dutch kids are risking a public "birching" if they have been slightly naughty and, if they have been a real pain in the ass to their parents, they will just get thrown into a burlap sack and taken back to Spain to be dealt with there.... quickly and quietly... never to be seen again. Bloody Hell! Nice way to kick off the season!

Enough of that, back to these guys, the Zwarte Pieten (Black Petes). The nice version that contemporary Dutch like to pitch is that they are Sint's "helpers" and they are black from traveling down the chimneys to fill the children's clogs with gifts. Oh yeah? Then why are there suits so brightly coloured still? How do they keep their whites so white and their colours so bright?

Anyway, friendly bunch though their true history stems from anywhere from Satan himself being captured and forced to work for the Big Man, to Moorish slaves well... being captured and forced to work for the Big Man. Either one makes total sense to me but, I have to say, though the Satan one seems to be a little more in tune with the season with ridding the world of evil and all, the slavery story is more in keeping with the times and the originating locale.

Either way, wherever they have come from, I have to say that I can't think of a culture that does not have some lack of altruism in its past so, my thoughts, embrace your history and talk the foreigners down off the ledges.