Happy St. Martin's Day!

Without knowing or understanding much about St Martin's Day, we ended up at Lia's kindergarten on November 11th with our neighbours and friends, paper lanterns (built and decorated by Karla and Lia a few days earlier) in hand. Every kid there had a lantern on the end of a stick lit up with a battery-powered light. Despite the dark, cold, and rain, we were a cheerful bunch! After some songs and a re-enactment of Martin's encounter with a poor person (apparently he cut his coat in half and gave it to a someone...but I don't have all the details about Martin), we all formed a parade.

We followed a horse, while eating the giant Bretzels that were hanging around our necks on purple and pink ribbons. The kindergarten had asked us whether we wanted to pre-order our Martinstag Bretzels along with everyone else, so we were all set.





























Children were singing, poking each other in the head (accidentally, I'm sure) with those lanterns-on-a-stick, and a police officer was walking ahead of the horse and rider to stop traffic.
Once we had walked a big loop, we ended up back at the kindergarten, while the fire department set up a gigantic bonfire. It seemed to me that those guys sure enjoyed starting a big fire for a change. Some more songs were sung, and we headed inside for hotdogs and Gluhwein. It was a strange mix - but I think Karla and I are integrating here despite ourselves and our lack of understanding about what's going on :)

On the way home, we watched the massive fire truck put out the enormous bonfire in the kindergarten yard. Huge though it was, that poor fire never had a chance.



















It turns out that every school in Bochum has St Martin's Day parades. But there are so many that they are spaced out over two weeks, so as to prevent the world's most massive traffic-jam-inducing, lantern-waving, Bretzel-eating parade of children. Sure enough, the other night, from our balcony, I heard a brass band playing some vaguely familiar Martinstag tunes.

It's pretty cool here in Bochum, once it begins to feel familiar. Happy St. Martin's Day!

-Marc