Hungarian Christmas traditions: Santa Claus Day

Devils? Corporal punishment? Welcome to the Hungarian Santa Claus Day!

Today is the eve of Santa Claus Day in Hungary. Yes, a major difference between Hungary – and some other European countries – and the Anglo-Saxon world is that Santa comes on the night of the 5th of December. This is the night every kid looks forward to with mixed feelings of joy, anticipation, hope and fear.

Télapó or Mikulás usually brings candy. This day is the Hungarian equivalent of Halloween when kids can collect so much candy that lasts until Easter when the Easter bunny brings some more. We usually give kids Santa packages, i.e. small cellophane bags filled with chocolate Santas, szaloncukor (Christmas candy dipped in chocolate), fruit and nuts. Nowadays, though, thanks to consumer society brings small presents, too.

Kids are usually pressured by their parents and teachers to clean their shoes and leave them on the windowsills – on the outside, of course, so Santa doesn’t have to commit criminal trespassing. He comes during the night and fills the good kids’ shoes with the items mentioned above. He has a helper, though.

Santa’s helper is not a cute little elf, but Krampusz. Krampusz is a devil-like creature who shakes his chains and threatens to beat the naughty kids with virgács (a bunch of birch twigs painted gold and tied with a red ribbon at the bottom) According to some legends, he even kidnaps the kids whose behaviour didn’t meet Santa’s expectations throughout the year. Fun fact, men dress up as Santa and visit kids at schools on Santa Claus Day. Of course, Krampusz is always with him, just to make sure kids get traumatised because the Hungarian education system doesn’t put enough emotional and mental burden on children.

I still have funny memories about this day.

I grew up in a village where in the early 1990s the community was close-knit. Santa used to come to our kindergarten and I will never forget that feeling of fear and hope in the minutes leading up to his arrival. When I was in first grade of primary school (I turned 8 years old a few weeks before this particular Santa Day) one of my classmates’ mom decided to dress up as Santa. Yes, you read it right. One of the moms played Santa. She convinced another lady to dress up as Snow Fairy or whoever it was, they borrowed a horse-drawn carriage from one of the local farmers, bought Santa packages for several kids, got on the carriage in the evening and visited the kids they bought packages for. They came to our house, rang the doorbell and my mom let them in and said to me, ‘Oh look! Santa’s here!’. As her daughter was a friend of mine and we used to hang out a lot at their place, I immediately recognised the lady behind the beard. I turned to my mom and said, ‘But Mom… This is Ági’s mother!’.

Another memory I have is from the early 2000s when I was a teenager. Our next-door neighbour’s daughter was a good friend of mine. One year my medium-height, super skinny dad got a Santa outfit and a shepherd’s staff, walked up to the neighbour’s front gate and rang the doorbell. My friend looked out of the window and texted me, ‘Hey, some idiot in a Santa outfit is standing at our front gate.’

Do you have any funny stories about Santa?