Originally Posted by
Teri
Many parents tell their children Zwarte Piet was black due to the chimney, or were brown due to a lot of sun in Spain.
And then the scientific/historic origins that Zwarte Piet was a Moor or Sinterklaas a Turkish Bishop, but really you don't tell your children that, cause the generic "tradition" of at least the last 30 years ,was he came with his Steam Boat from Spain with candy and presents.
And as of recent years, the part where they use the "roe" (wooden sticks) to slap naughty children and take them in their bag to spain is generally faded out.
Even going further back it seems to be Germanic Mythology based off Odin/Wodan Riding his horse sleipnir (sinterklaas riding his horse on rooftops), giving rune letters to people (chocolate letters these days), Odin had a spear, and 2 black ravens, (Sinterklaas has a staff and black helpers).
And WoW-s Odyn is based off Odin also of course with spears/ravens/runes :P
As for Suriname:
It was a colony for many many years (we traded New Amsterdam/Manhattan with the English for Suriname), and many people speak Dutch there, same for the Dutch Antilles.
Anyhow going too offtopic again so enough from here.