Saint Nicholas Day

Today is December 6 and it is Saint Nicholas Day. That by itself is not a holiday but in Hungary and I guess in a lot of European countries where St. Nick is not associated with Christmas this day has a little more meaning.

I have no idea who Saint Nicholas was and why his name day is being observed but honestly, I couldn't care less as long as it was being noted.

When I was a little boy I was told that the night before St. Nicholas Day (Mikulas in Hung.) children put their shoes in the windows of their home. Next morning when they awoke if they were bad children they found birch twigs or coal in their shoes. However if they were good kids they found chocolate or other candy in those shoes.

Nobody knew how and when that stuff got into the shoes and how did old St. Nicholas knew how the children behaved. But anyway those were exciting times for us. Every year the night before December 6 I put my shoes in the window and in the morning lo and behold, there was candy in them.

And I did that until the last Saint Nicholas day I spent in my parents' house before leaving Hungary.

It was very moving. I was almost twenty years old and as a joke I put my shoes in the window on the night of December 5, 1956 before going to sleep. Waking up in the morning of December 6 my first look went towards my shoes and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was candy in them.

It didn't matter that I was almost twenty years old, to my Father I was still his little boy whom He loved very dearly and for whom He kept this tradition going.