A Very German Christmas

By Alex Allen

sss

I'm half German. That's something I feel I'm now far enough away from the secondary school playground to be able to write without fear of retribution from the school arsonist, bully or idiot. Actually those three nouns all relate to same person, never mind. Being half German is not cool, especially when you grow up in a village where 30% of the people in it think that the war is still going on, and every other person asks you how you're dealing with your split allegiances in Euro 96. This includes the day after England were knocked out on penalties, the kids were filled with rage, and a teacher came out with, 'now, I know some of you are feeling a bit upset today about the football last night, well, apart from you Alex, you must be pleased!' Alienate me from my classmates further, please.

ddd

Despite my clear attempts to remain as utterly English as possible, I can't help feel certain elements of German culture penetrating my subconscious. Every now and again, I'll learn some other intriguing fact, and eventually realise that actually, I know quite a lot. I appreciate that this is beginning to sound like the first chapter of some fucking awful autobiography, but I promise you I have a point to make. Christmas is generally a confusing time, some how we've constructed some sort of festival out of the birth of Jesus, and some completely unrelated red jacketed lunatic running around giving out presents to people. Generally, the atheist in the majority of us seems to have concluded that winter is rather terrible, and a giant banquet where the TV is good, we all receive nice things and generally drink ourselves stupid is quick and effective relief. European countries have each put their own take on this basic idea and come up with strange customs of their own, and, because of my bipartisanship, I'm better placed that most (or at least some) to write about it.

ddd

The German Christmas dinner consists of boiled chicken and boiled potatoes, served with cabbage in a white sauce. We don't do that, in fact, it's probably one of the top five reasons my mum moved here in the first place. You can tell the whole thing is a complete shambles because we, Britain, took one long look at their Christmas proceedings, kept the tree, and unceremoniously binned the rest. Even the Christmas tree was not left as it was, and I'll tell you why. Until quite recently, my German grandparents used to put actual candles on their tree. Can you believe that? Michael Burke would have had a field day on 999, you're practically encouraging a fire, why not just leave the hob on too? There are other differences. December 6th is called Nikolaustag, which roughly translates as St. Claus Day. On this day, kids leave out a shoe or a boot outside the door (because that's perfectly normal), and the next morning they find either presents if they were good that year, or a rod if they were bad. And I've asked, the rod thing actually happens. Since my last visit to Germany, when I was walking down a one way street and a car started driving up it the wrong way, before a passerby strided in to the middle of the road, put up his hand, and yelled 'halt!' before making the driver turn around and go back the other way, nothing surprises me anymore, but come on! Fight the stereotype! I should point out, that on your first day of school in Germany, you're given a giant cone full of pick and mix, so it's really all swings and roundabouts (why do people say that?). At least we know where we stand with the traditional English Christmas. We eat and drink until we're sick, and then we sleep it off in front of Ace Ventura. It may cause more heart attacks, but at least we have a good time while we're doing it.