Planet Hero

In a lot of western countries people celebrate Christmas with Santa Claus. What a lot of people don’t know is that this famous happy guy from the North pole is based on the tale of Sinterklaas, a tradition from The Netherlands.

According to the tale Sinterklaas is a guy from Spain that comes to the Netherlands accompanied by his Black Pete’s (Zwarte Pieten) late November, to celebrate his birthday on 5^th December by giving presents to the kids. Sinterklaas rides a big white horse and brings the presents by riding that horse on the roofs and dropping the presents in the chimneys or putting them in the kid’s shoes.

And he’s back in my favorite city, Amsterdam! I found this site that has pictures of his arrival with his boat on the Amstel river, his parade through the streets of Amsterdam, pictures of Sinterklaas and his Pieten. I hope he comes by my house as well!