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What is what, but the Norwegians take Christmas very seriously. They prepare special holiday calendars from… July!
From chocolate to toy
The tradition of Advent calendars dates back to Germany and goes back to the beginning of the 19th century. Advent calendar in its simplest form is made of cardboard in which twenty-four numbered windows are cut out with various pictures, mostly winter-holiday themed, under which there are chocolates. One window is discovered every day and it is a form of a 24-day countdown by children from December 1 to Christmas Eve on December 24.
With time, however, such a “simple” calendar has changed and increased in size. Currently, in Norway, parents create a calendar for practically every family with children. Most often it is a wooden plate hanging on the wall, a piece of decorative material or a metal frame with 24 numbers on which hang previously bought or hand-made toys for children.
Fun for children, work for parents
To properly prepare such a calendar, parents start working on it, often in the summer, meticulously collecting 24 toys for each child. Then at nights, when the children are asleep, they carefully pack the gifts and tie the strings. Recently, the story of a mother of eight children became famous, who prepared Advent calendars for each toddler, in total she had to pack 192 gifts! Some Norwegian parents continue this tradition even for their adult children.
Calendar in mass culture
The tradition of advent calendars infiltrated mass culture in the 1960s, and so, for example, 24 episode series began broadcasting, which began on December 1, the most famous of which is “Jul i Skomakergata”. Newspapers (eg Aftenposten) organize contests on the basis of an advent calendar, where you can win various prizes every day during the 24 days of December.
There is an alternative
Many people think, however, that Advent calendars containing gifts for children induce over-consumerism and shallow the idea of holidays to getting more and more toys. Therefore, alternative ideas for calendars emerge, for example Aktivitetskalender (Activity calendar) in which, instead of a toy, children draw a piece of paper with a pleasant activity to be performed together with their parents. It can be, for example, baking gingerbread cookies, going on ice skates, borrowing books from the library etc.
On the other hand, Julekalender for sjelen (Advent calendar for the soul) is intended rather for adults and contains 24 cards with a thought of the day, a motto or a positive message.
How do you like the idea of an advent calendar? Which of them do you like the most? If you’ve come across other types of calendar, feel free to share your ideas in the comments!
Glossary:
Julekalender (en) / adventskalender (en) – advent calendar
Gave (en) / presang (en) – gift
Jul (en) – Christmas
Sjokolade (en) – chocolate
Series (en) – serial
