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The Clown Club has several holidays which we try to celebrate with the children. Here we would like to share some information on these special days. Internatial day is a cultural celebration at The Clown Club. The children and teachers come from many different cultures and have diverse nationalities and religions. Once a year we set aside a day to pay special attention to these differences. We encourage our parents to join us in this celebration by sharing a bit of information about their culture and customs. The history of Halloween goes back more than 2,000 years. The earliest celebrations of Halloween were among the Celtic people who lived in the areas which are now Great Britain and Northern France. They worshipped Samhain who was the lord of the dead and of the cold, dark winter season. They believed that on October 31 Samhain would call together all of the dead and these souls would take on the shape of an animal. They believed that all creatures wandered the Earth on that night. They performed ceremonies through the night to ask the spirits to tell the future of the upcoming year. This was called the Vigil of Samhain. The Celts continued with their ceremonies until they were conquered by the Roman Catholics. The Roman Catholics brought with them their own customs and traditions. They had established All Saints Day or All Hallows Day on November 1. The church had hoped that by establishing this holiday, it would do away with the Vigil of Samhain and the other ceremonies and celebrations held on October 31 through November 1. But this was not so. Soon witchcraft came about, and October 31 was renamed Night of the Witch. It was believed that the devil and all of his followers (demons, witches) would come out on this night to perform unholy acts to make a mockery of the All Hallows Day celebration. These ceremonies and celebrations continued and October 31 was then called All Hallows Even. It was a night for superstitious beliefs and mystery. Through the years the name was shortened to Hallowe'en and then to Halloween. In the 1800s, as a lot of people emigrated to the U.S., the holidays and traditions of different cultures merged. Halloween was not always a happy time. October 31, or the night before took on other names. Some called it Devil's or Hell night, to others it was mischief night. To some people this became a time to play tricks on others. Some of these tricks were not fun at all. Luckily, community groups and individuals took action and started to change Halloween into a family event. Dressing up in costumes and going "trick or treating", costume parades, community parties and Fall festivals are some of the ways that Halloween is celebrated today.
In the fourth century a.d. St. Nicholas (in dutch called "Sinterklaas" or "Sint Nicolaas")
was the bishop of Myra, which is now situated in Turkey. According to the legend, he saved his town from starvation. He is
also said to have revived three dead children, and to have offered gifts of dowries to poor girls. Some sources say that he
died on the sixth of December in 343. It is unclear why, according to the Dutch tradition, he comes from Spain. Possibly it has something to do with the fact that St. Nicholas was the patron of
sailors. In the 17th century Holland was famous for its navigation. Maybe by contact with Spanish sailors this myth began.
It could also explain why St. Nicholas has "zwarte (black) pieten" to help him because the Moors dominated Spain for several
hundreds of years. (Another [more popular] explanation for "zwarte piet" being black is that he has come down the chimneys
so often [see below] that he can't wash the dirt off.) His legendary gifts of dowries to poor girls led to the custom of giving gifts to children on the eve of his feast day,
6 December. Together with his "pieten" he visits children to punish the evil ones and to reward the good
ones. The worst punishment is to be taken to Spain in "zwarte piet's" bag out of which the good children get the sweets
(called "pepernoten", "taai-taai", or "schuimpjes") and presents. A less radical punishment is to get the "roede" (rod)
instead of presents. Nowadays there are not many evil children any more... A few weeks before his feastday St. Nicholas comes to Holland (and Belgium) on his steamer with all his "pieten"
and the presents which they prepared in Spain during the year. This event can be seen on Dutch television. From his
arrival in Holland till his feastday the children can put their shoes in front of the fireplace. During the night St.
Nicholas visits all the houses by travelling over the roofs on his horse, traditionally a white/grey (called "Schimmel"
in dutch), and "zwarte piet" enters the houses through the chimney to put little presents in the children's shoes.
Sometimes the children put straw, carrots and water near the shoe for the horse. On the eve of his feast day St. Nicholas visits all children. After knocking on the door he gives them a bag full
of presents (if they were good children). Early in the morning of 6 December, when he has visited everyone, he leaves
and goes back silently to Spain, to come back next year. Back to the calendar. |