Los Reyes!

22 Dec 2011

After Papa Noel's visit yesterday, it was starting to feel a lot more like Christmas--at least Christmas as it is in the United States!

However, I was more interested in experiencing how Spaniards celebrate Christmas. For this reason, I was excited for the visit of the Reyes (Three Kings) to our school.

Three dads with kids in infantil came to dress up as the Reyes--Gasper, Melchior, Baltassar. Their costumes were pretty elaborate and required a lot of make-up to make them unrecognizable (to their kids)! The dads were also pretty tall so the moms had to constantly remind them to stoop down a little so the kids couldn't see their jeans and tennis shoes!

Instead of visiting all the classrooms as we did yesterday, all the kids met the Reyes on the playground. Even though it's December, it's nearly 70 degrees Fahrenheit here!

The Reyes sat on their thrones with their helper (students from 6th grade). One by one, each student put their letter to the Reyes in the mailbox and approach one of the Reyes.

These letters are similar to the letters that American children write to Santa. Typically, kids will address their letter to just one of the Reyes, but it's not uncommon to address the letter to all three of them. The kids write about how well they have behaved that year and how they are going to behave in the new year. Then, they ask the Reyes to bring them something.

Since the 3, 4, and 5 year olds can't write yet, their letters included pictures they had cut out of catalogues and their names written as neatly as they could manage.

The Reyes gave each of the kids some little toy to take with them--the 3 year olds got noise makers, the 4 year olds received puzzles, etc...

After school, we had a staff Christmas party with some fantastic food--which, in typical Spanish fashion, lasted for hours!

I wish I had remembered to take pictures of all the food that we ate, but I was too busy enjoying it! We started with some tapas including bread with cheeses and ham as well as some potatoes. There were a number of other tapas that are typical for this region such as delicias de Elx (these were dates surrounded by bacon), a soup with noodles and a giant meatball, and on and on... I can't even remember all that I ate! I'm going to try and track down the list with all the foods so that I can share it!

Part way through the meal, the kitchen staff came out to toast us. They started to sing the song Feliz Navidad--a song I ACTUALLY know because we sing it in the US. So when everyone started to sing along, I was able to also join in! Everyone was REALLY impressed!

For dessert, of course, there was fruit, flan, turrón, and some homemade ice cream.

At that point, I could hardly move because I'd had so much to eat!