An Ode to the Pan European Child Whipper

I grew up Abroad: Iran, Northern Ireland and Germany. Mainly Germany, in the same picturesque Westphalian town (Detmold) for nearly ten years. Consequently our family habits are a bastardisation of many other countries' traditions. We solve stomach upsets with stewed apples and starchy rice, eat pokes and gravy rings, and include the continental celebration of St Nicholas Day in our run up to Christmas.

The night before St Nicholas Day (6th December) German children put their boots in front of the fireplace in the hope that they will be filled with goodies from a kindly saint. But wait, it's not all sweetness and light. In true fairytale fashion there is a delightful darkside to the tradition. If they've been bad their boots are filled with sticks by St Nicholas' sinister companion Black Pete (Schwarz Peter). Handy sticks to beat naughty children with. Oh my. Cruel of course, but a cunningly effective addition to the "if you're not good then Santa won't come" pre-Christmas parental threat. Try it. Repeat after me: "if you're not good then Santa won't come AND Schwarz Peter will beat you to Berlin and back".

I understand that this tradition is not exclusive to Germany and variations on its theme are duly observed in a plethora of European countries. There is something to be said for our continental neighbours' parenting style. I'm pro-Europe on this: nothing beats the pan-European child whipper in getting children to complete their homework, tidy their rooms, go to bed on time and generally adopt the sickly sweet character of a Walton. Tremendous.

Seid ihr dieses Jahr gut gewesen?

Post note: I marvellously managed to completely delete this post today (7th December); a glove and sausage fingered app related incident. This led to the loss of all the lovely comments, which caused a tremendous technophobe tantrum at Port Talbot train station, which could only be solved by tears and too much tea.

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