Wednesday, January 05, 2005

The Three Kings

Tomorrow is a very traditional holiday in spain, Three Kings day (los Reyes Magos). It is the day on which the children get presents, delivered by the Three Kings of the East (or so they think). Santa is not very popular in Europe.

Tonight every city in Spain will have a big procession to celebrate the arrival of the Three Kings. Last year I was impressed by the procession, with elefants, camels, sheep, beautiful wagons with hundreds of lights and three beautifully dressed kings and their helpers throwing tons of sweets. The thousands of children in the streets were all singing and cheering.
On the 6th of january, you can see the kids in the streets playing with their brandnew toys.


Today, a special cake, roscon de Reyes, is made and sold all over Spain. It is a ring-shaped pastry, covered in sugar and fruit flavoured jellies.
The cake contains a little plastic figure of a king. Whoever finds the figure is named the new king and will be blessed with good luck for the new year.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

That is totally awesome ^_^ Thanks for teaching me so much stuff about Spain. ...Eh, waarom ben ekik eigenlijk int Engels bezig? Amuseer u hé morgen!

Lien

Suzanne said...

They do that in Belgium too,...groups of children dress as the kings and go door to door. They sing a song and get money for their efforts. Kind of like trick or treating.

Dag! Ik kan ook een bijtje Nederlands praten maar mijn schrijven slecht is.

amiethinggoes said...

looks delicioso! does it taste yummy too?

Dioniso said...

Lien,
Spanje heeft veel prachtige tradities die voor mij ook totaal onbekend waren. Het is een schitterend land.

Suzanne, you're right. I remember I went from door to door when I was a kid, all dressed up like a king, singing: 3 koningen, 3 koningen, geef mij ne nieuwen hoed... Maybe I can introduce that in Spain. :-)
By the way, your Nederlands seems very good. Congratulations.

Hi Amy, there are 2 types of Roscon, actually. I like one more than the other. Mónica's parents bought us a big one the other day, and when I start eating from it I can't stop! It's delicious.