Tue
06
Dec
2011
December 6 -- On the Trail of St. Nicholas
Update: The t-shirt winner from the US is Tom Allen! Congralations and thanks again to gossengold!
The other winners:
Franzi from Germany
abc35.jimdo.com from France
c-e-s-i-teacher.jimdo.com from Japan
ecuarioja from Spain
d_serg from Russia
The three "Jimdo care packages" are going out to Stephen Roche, Alex Moises and linko sling!
Today is St. Nicholas Day - meaning excited children's faces all over central Europe. Last night before going to bed, children in Germany, Czech and Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, and the Netherlands put their shoes outside or in front of the chimney, hoping for sweets when they awake the next day.
The serious-looking guy with black crosses on his scarf is St. Nick
In America we talk about St. Nick, but oftentimes we just mean Santa Claus. But in many parts of Europe, St. Nicholas is an important holiday figure, in some cases (the Netherlands come to
mind here) even more important than the jolly old guy that comes at the end of the month.
But who was St. Nicholas, anyway? To start with, he was a bishop and lived in the 4th century in what is now Turkey. Modern science puts him at 5'6" tall or shorter, with a heavy jaw and a broken nose. To this day, he is considered the patron saint of children, thieves, and mariners (what a combination!). Most of all, Nicholas is known as a gift-giver and general kind spirit. In the picture on the right by Ilya Repin, he is saving three innocent prisoners from the sword.
Since today is Nikolaus (as it is called in Germany), we are raffling off two sets of gifts:
- 6 T-shirts from gossengold, a young T-shirt label from Munich, Germany
and
- 3 'St. Nikolaus boots' hand-filled by the Jimdo team
Roughly translated, gossengold means 'gutter gold', and reflects both the quality of the products and the urban, 'anti-fashion' style of the label. The motto of the store is 'one life to live' -- and boy, the t-shirts sure reflect that! Check out the pictures of the shirts below so you know what you can win here.
Since some of you may not have had the pleasure of putting your shoes out yesterday evening for St. Nicholas to fill (North America and Australia, I'm looking hard in your direction), we wanted to give you the chance to win one. Three lucky commenters or retweeters will win a hand-picked Nicholas boot!
Here's how to win:
- Comment on this blog post below - make sure to log into your Jimdo site or check back tomorrow so we can find you if you win!
Comments: 17(Discussion closed)
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#1
good stuff;-)
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#2
The patron saint of theives and children. So, soes that mean the thieves also get a treat on December 6?
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#3
Even two sets of gifts today, wow! Well, a boot would be nice! With a lot of chocolate in it??:-)
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#4
would be so proud to wear one of those T-shirts during the Film Festival !
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#5
I love t-shirts!
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#6
Santa is Finnish language "joulupukki".
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#7
Nice t-shirts
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#8
The picture shown in the article appears to be "not for Christmas." Maybe a merrier, happier one would fit Jimdo's holiday treats theme.
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#9
These are looking nice ;)
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#10
Cool!
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#11
Hi
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#12
Alex, that's an interesting point. It seemed to me to be the right picture for St. Nicholas - at least *one* of the right pictures. Do you have another one you would suggest?
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#13
nice
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#14
I love Jimdo! Even though I won the giveaway on Friday - thank you! - I still want to support the Holiday Bash! Jimdo ROCKS!
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#15
By the way, I really enjoyed the link to the St. Nicholas Center. Check out the interactive painting! Thanks!
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#16
We've pretty much slapped St. Nicholas on a lunch box over here in the states, and guess everywhere else as well. It's nice to see the historical man get some credit.
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#17
Wow, these shirts are intense!, Cool
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