Léiwe Kleeschen

Léiwe Kleeschen, gudde Kleeschen
Bréng eis Saachen, allerhand,
Fir ze kucken, fir ze schmaachen,
Aus dem schéinen Himmelsland.
Bei der Dier do stinn eis Telleren
Beieneen an enger Rei
'T läit och Hee do fir Däin Iesel
Dofir bréng ons Spillgezei. (bis)

St. Nicolas, or Kleeschen in Luxembourgish, comes down from heaven during the night of 5 to 6 December. He brings sweets and toys to those children who have been good during the year.

When I was young, as soon as I would see Christmas decoration in the shops, I would ask my parents, “how many more sleeps before Kleeschen comes”? It was the excitement of the year! Since Kleeschen only gives gifts to the well-behaved children, my parents used him as a pressurising medium saying that if I did not do this or that, he would not visit me at all!

So in the event of us not having been good, his partner “Houseker”, with charcoal smeared face and dark clothes, would call on us and all other misbehaved children with his birch-rods. In our house we disappeared under the kitchen table when his name was mentioned….

Hoping that the holy man would visit me instead, I cut out all the pictures from the toy catalogue which I would glue on the handwritten letter that I had prepared for him. I was not sure if he would get the letter in time and how he would manage to visit all the children in one night, but I trusted that he would somehow find my house.

On the first day of Advent we were allowed to put our shoes outside, for them to be filled with sweets. Next to them, we’d put some hay for Kleeschen’s donkey and Schnapps for Houseker. We children would try to stay up all night to catch him “in flagrante delicto”, but we never saw him. We did however find that our parents behaved ever so strangely when we caught them next to our footwear.

On the 6th itself we would get up at the crack of dawn, run down the stairs to find the dining table full of plates filled with chocolate, marzipan, nuts and clementines.

Next to the plates would be beautifully wrapped boxes filled with the Barbie dolls, electric trains and other beautiful toys which we had hoped for. We’d play with them all day, as Luxembourg is the only country in the world where children are off on St. Nicolas Day.

For us, Kleeschen was much more important than Christmas. It was on the 6th of December that we would get our toys whilst we’d only get a garment on the 24th.

My sister remembers that one year, whilst sitting on Kleeschen’s lap, I pulled his beard down to see if he was real. We have no recollection though about what went through my head when I saw that he was not who he pretended to be.

In any case, St. Nicolas is not only the protector of children, he is the also the patron saint for seamen and tradesman. In Russia for instance, St. Nicolas is, after Maria, the second most admired saint.

Happy Kleesechersdaag!

Native Luxembourger Carole Miltgen is CEO of Prisma S.A., a project and document management firm in the funds sector.