Nikolaus or Eco-laus?

     So first, a couple of clarifications. Apparently December 6th isn't Santa Claus's birthday, as an old Catholic friend swore by (and sung me the song to), but is the day St. Nikolaus died, and was reborn in heaven, maybe? Putting sweets in shoes is apparently a German thing, because in Poland, you find stuff under your pillow (a preamble to the tooth fairy, maybe, or maybe the Poles have sweaty feet like my  kids). And the second day of Christmas is really the feast of St. Stephen, or Boxing Day, and according to timeanddate.com is the day when Germans: (1) Spend time with family and friends (2) Enjoy seasonal treats (a.k.a. chocolate Santas, cookies, and hot wine) (3) Watch television (like "Deutschland sucht den Superstar" (Germany's version of American's Got Talent) or "Bauer sucht Frau" (Our version of The Bachelor, only in our case the bachelor is a farmer and is looking for a farmhand wife),  (4) Play board games (really?) and (5) Spend time outdoors (which they do EVERY day, regardless of the weather or the holiday).

     Apparently Nikolaus was a little stressed this year. What do you do when the kids don't help around the house, never go to bed on time, never brush their teeth without a struggle, worm their way out of showering - and when they do, seem to forget to wash the 'important' parts? 
     So keeping with the holiday spirit, Nikolaus got everyone health and beauty aids this year! A new toothbrush and toothpaste to go along with that 12-inch chocolate Santa! Deodorant spray for those pre-teens who have no idea how badly they smell. All this along with plenty of Clementines and Peanuts for extra vitamin C and protein! Thanks for the foot balm, St. Nick!

     The kids seemed excited about the goodies they found, although Sweet Papa complained he got too many peanuts in his shoes. Sweet Papa's been on a diet since the year 2001, the year he became a papa and gained all that weight along with MY pregnancy. The other two pregnancies didn't help much either, nor did the three extra birthdays we were celebrating every year. I'm supposed to be baking cookies right now for the After-school-care's Christmas party. But I'm afraid if I bake them today he'll eat them all before I deliver them tomorrow. No seriously, it's happened before.
     And although Sweet Papa did enjoy the relaxing shower gel he got, and used the three minute toothbrushing timer to boil his eggs instead of for brushing his teeth, he still complained that it felt like Eco-laus showed up and not Nikolaus. Well, you can't please everyone all the time. Better get back to ordering those socks and underwear sets I plan to get everyone for Christmas, and I saw some Christmas-themed toilet paper that'll make awesome stocking stuffers!

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Christmas Wishes

     It's only December 2nd and already my son is on my nerves about his Christmas wish list. According to him, his sisters get everything and he NEVER gets anything (except the PSP Go, electric guitar, new bike, three versions of something that resembles a skateboard, not to mention as much food as he cares to eat, enough clothes to wear, his own room, and a safe, clean place to live WITH loving parents, I might add). Which brings me to the question, why are we celebrating Christmas, I'm not even Christian! 

     My mom told me the reason we got a Christmas tree was because my brother asked her why we didn't have one when all the other kids in his kindergarten class did. Which makes me wonder why my sister, who is 5 years older never asked for one, and was she to blame for me missing out on at least 3 years of potential presents?

     We had a plastic tree that comes in parts, a stand, two stems, branches in sizes A to F and a piece that goes on top. My mother never believed in killing trees in order to celebrate anything, and I must say, the tree is still one of the more realistic ones I've seen on the market, and is still in good shape 40 years later. So every year we put together this plastic tree, decorated it, and put presents underneath. No church, no Christmas dinner, no reading the story of baby Jesus. Just presents and some Indian food, and then a whole day of playing with the new toys. 
     When we were younger and we had relatives near by, we'd celebrate with my cousins, depending on who was fighting with who, and who was or wasn't talking to each other. One year my aunt bought all the kids the same present - wooden jewelry boxes - EVEN for the boys! There must have been a blue light special at Kmart going on that day.

     I ended up marrying a Christian, who even after 10 years of required religion class in grade school, still doesn't know a darned thing. But he loves chocolate at Easter and he loves presents at Christmas. Something my kids inherited, apparently. Over here in Germany, we also celebrate Nikolaus on Dec. 6th - St. Nick's birthday, by putting our shoes outside at the door at night, and in the morning, find them filled with chocolate and goodies (a.k.a. nuts and mandarin oranges). Sometimes, if your parents can swing it, they hire Nikolaus to come by and give you presents in person. If I could afford it I'd go with option #2, because food does not belong anywhere near anybody's shoes, especially not the way my kid's feet sweat. That's just plain nasty.
     But I do it, I gotta get my kids something on the 6th, just like all the other kids, and then apparently there are more presents brought by the "Christkind" or Christchild who comes to visit you on the 24th at 6pm after church, and then you sleep in on the 25th and do nothing but eat with your family, and there are no presents involved (although my son claims eating his grandma's Sauerbraten is like having Christmas all over again). The 26th is the second day of Christmas, another day off from work and another day where all the stores are closed, but I still don't know what you're supposed to do that day, or why it's important. My sister-in-law generally has plans on that day that we're not involved in, so we just drive home.
     No Santa Claus, no elves, no Rudolf (except when they rerun old American movies on tv) and definitely no Black Friday. Even after 3 years out of the land of consumerism my 10 year old can't decide on a present that he wants that costs less than $300. Oh wait, he's got a suggestion - a new cellphone! Followed by the question, "Can we return the one I got two months ago?" God help me survive the season.

the meaning behind the tag line

I don't consider myself to be too strict of a mom. My kids eat junk food, they can watch (limited amounts of carefully screened, age appropriate) tv, they've done days with out a bath. So I was really surprised when I heard of my daughter's impression of me. My husband was driving down our street and let her sit in the front passenger seat. She hops in, buckles up, declares she's mommy and announces "NOBODY GETS ANY CHOCOLATE!"
I've never said that. I've never said anything like that. Maybe I've said, "If somebody doesn't pick up all the candy wrappers off the living room floor I'm throwing all the junk food out of the house this minute!" But I've never denied any of my adorable children the God given right to have chocolate. 
My husband, definitely the dominant chocolate-loving-gene-carrier of the family, once asked me if the children were getting enough candy in their diet. As if it was one of the FDA's necessary daily requirements. He tried to convince me that Nutella was healthy for you because it has hazelnuts. AND because his mom used to give it to him as a child. HIS mom?? His mom gives him cigarettes so she doesn't have to smoke alone!

Living over here, I'm constantly confused at what is considered healthy eating habits. One thing's for sure, the kids get really healthy lunches at their kindergarten and after school care (because you know, there's no lunch at school since it ends at 11:10 to keep one parent out of the work force for another 4 years). Apparently it's really important over here to have a hot meal at lunch, because dinner is usually something to the tune of cold cuts and bread. Lunch is generally catered by companies that also cater to the larger companies in town, and they make an attempt to provide healthy, well-balanced meals to the kids. So you can imagine my surprise when I saw listed on the menu Milchreis mit Zimtzucker. Rice pudding with cinnamon sugar???? For lunch? After working hard for 3 hours (and 10 minutes) at school, having run out of the house with only 8 oz. of chocolate milk for breakfast? That's just plain crazy.

Where are you from, lady?

      I turned into my mother, although I'm sure my brother would disagree. But don't listen to him, he's crazy. Seriously. Like lunatic crazy. In all sincerity I'm not 100% like my mom, I'm just 100% the part of her I never wanted to be like when I was a kid. The high pitched shrieking, for one. The total loss of sanity when she thought one of us were hurt or in danger, for another. Yes, she called the cops looking for me when I was 24 and gone for like 3 hours longer than she thought I should have been IN THE MIDDLE OF THE AFTERNOON! Yes, she was the mom standing behind the bushes to make sure I got on the school bus but didn't want me to see that she was checking up on me (the bus driver saw her and asked me if I knew her) WHEN I WAS IN FREAKIN' HIGH SCHOOL. Her excuse is that it wasn't she didn't trust me, she just didn't trust the rest of the world.
     But there was more to it than that. Growing up in the 70's in the US, a child of immigrants from India, I was American, southern almost. I didn't speak Hindi, I didn't know nothin' about Hindus, I didn't wear salwar kameezes (they made me hot and I kept losing the scarf). My mother came to the US when she was 23, learned English along with a Korean woman she befriended (I'd love to know how they communicated) after she arrived there, and somehow managed to raise 3 children in a completely foreign culture in a foreign language (I was the youngest child and refused to speak anything but English after the age of 3). Of course I turned out crazy. Half of the things we said to each other got lost in translation. I'm pretty sure she never actually heard the words I said, she just reacted to the tone in which I said them. And considering I'm usually depressed or pissed off, I'm guessing she had no idea what I was talking about.
     So what do I do with my three kids? Move to Germany! Not as completely foreign as a move from India to the US, but foreign enough (what's up with the three hours of school per day, or the rule against running your engine for more than 3 minutes if you aren't in motion, and don't even get me started about the no noise on Sunday law). At least I learned the language before I got here, and only now, three years later, is my almost 5 year old's vocabulary surpassing mine. And I kind of get the culture, too. I mean, I totally get the significance of drinking a liter of beer and standing on a table, arm in arm with a bunch of drunks singing John Denver songs.
     I wear a dirndl about as easily as a salwar now. But the difference is that when I wear Indian clothes, I actually look Indian. It's only when I open my mouth to say something that people realize I'm not really like the other billion people who look like me. I got really confused looks from people when I traveled to Bangladesh and people start talking to me in Bengali, and I'm like, dude, sorry, no Bengali, only English, and yea, no Hindi either. And I get equally strange expressions from Germans when I speak to them in German and they actually understand what I am saying (do all Asian-looking people in Germany really speak that much worse than me?). When I was in Mexico City people asked me why I didn't speak Spanish, that's something different all together, but at least I learned how to say no comprende from Dora the Explorer.
     Whether or not my kids understand me or not is another story. Apparently the words "brush your teeth" "turn off the tv" "you're old enough to wipe your own butt" are not understandable by youths under 10 in any language, unless you you repeat them a minimum of 10 times and threaten them with the loss of chocolate in their diet.


Were you raised by people from another planet, I mean, culture? Love to hear your stories.