christmas eve

Today is Christmas Eve in Estonia, and in Estonia, like most Lutheran countries, it is the the day when people gather, eat, and even are visited by Santa ... at night.

Now, I know what you are thinking. How can Santa visit in secret when the kids are awake? Isn't it better to go to sleep, therefore leaving Santa plenty of time to deposit presents before the kids wake up, sugerplum visions still dancing in their heads, on the morning of December 25?

Ah, but in Estonia, Christmas Eve is also a time to visit the graves of loved ones and leave candles. Since most people visit the cemeteries at night, Santa Claus -- called "Jõuluvana" here, which basically means "Old Man Christmas" -- has plenty of time to visit the homes of little girls and boys with his sacks of toys.

While Santa was visiting our house -- we left him a key on the front door -- we visited Raadi, a big, very old cemetery in Tartu. Epp has no relatives buried in tartu, so we went for the next best thing, the grave of Lieutenant Julius Kuperjanov, who fell during the Estonian War of Independence in 1919. Here's a video clip of our visit to his tomb, which is something of a national shrine:





When we arrived home, we found at that Santa had indeed paid us a visit while we were away. Among the many gifts was an extra special one -- the Mamma Mia DVD. As mentioned about a thousand times here, this is Marta's favorite movie. She even has her own, child friendly words to the songs. The lyrics to the suggestive "Does Your Mother Know?" in Marta's world are:

You've got to dance like a baby/ All you little babies/ Dancin' like a mother giraffe

Here's Marta opening Mamma Mia:




And here is a clip of Marta dancing like a mother giraffe to "Honey, Honey." Wait for the growl at the end: