Samichlaus (Santa Claus) and his assistant Schmützli (the dirty one) arrive on December 6th. They make the rounds in towns and villages distributing sweets, oranges and peanuts to virtuous children. Samichlaus wears a long red robe and carries a big book in which good and bad deeds of children are logged. Schmützli wears a long brown robe and carries a broomstick and a bag into which naughty children would be deposited!
We went to the Zurich parade the weekend before the big day of Dec. 6th and saw more Samichlaus and Schmützli than you could imagine! Each of the Schmützli gave the kids a gingerbread cookie - after saying (in German) to the first several Schmützli that we had already received the cookies, we finally just started taking them (we were at the end of the parade, and they obviously had lots of cookies left!). So, our bags and pockets were bulging with gingerbread. On December 6th, the kids left their shoes outside and in the morning they found bags of nuts, candies and oranges, as well as a small gift for each of them.
During the day on Dec. 6th, Elise went to a church activity where they learned about Swiss Christmas traditions and baked "Grittibenz", a traditional Swiss Christmas bread shaped like a little man. We took the boys to a reading of Christmas stories (in English) at the big English bookstore on Bahnhofstrasse in Zurich. This was a traditional Santa - except that he spoke with a British accent and when he passed out cookies, of course he said, "Biscuits for everyone!". We joke that our family is learning High German, Swiss German, British and Australian (as many of the expats and the kids' teachers at school are British or Australian).
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