LL-L: "Holidays" LOWLANDS-L, 06.DEC.1999 (06) [E/L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 06.DEC.1999 (06) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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From: Roger P. G. Thijs [roger.thijs at village.uunet.be]
Subject: LL-L: "Holidays" LOWLANDS-L, 06.DEC.1999 (04) [E]

> From: Robin Huggett [Rhuggett at datasource.net]
> Subject: LL-L: "Holidays" LOWLANDS-L, 06.DEC.1999 (01) [E]
> about the various customs relating to Sinterklaas and... a carrot!!! He
> was told that if he put the carrot in his shoe and placed it outside his
> door Sinterklaas would come and collect it to feed it to his mule, and
> that he might leave a little gift in return (which he did).

There is something racist in the traditition though.
"Sint Nicolaas" is the good guy, and has candy and toys for the kids.
But there is also a bad guy: "zwarte piet" who has the "roe" for punishing
kids that didn't behave well.

It's curious, parents need somebody, who frightens kids, and who punishes in
place of the parents themselves. When I was a kid, my parents used the
Belgian National Police (the "gendarmen", later also called the
"rijkswachters") as threats for punishment.
The "gendarmen" were opposed to the good and helpfull municipal police (the
"veldwachter" in small municipalities, in our dialect the "boy", I don't
know where "boy" came from, it was also used in all the municipalities
around ours; our municipal policeman was "Gus-te-boy"; all members of the
family Neven in Schalkhoven were all called "... van de boy (van
Sjaakoave)", since there grand-father once was municipal policeman).

So what I often heard was:
"Pas op zur, aa neej braaf zit koome de sjenderme oech hoale"

("aa" is a contraction of "aa dzji-e": "als je")

Regards,
Roger

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