Culebra, Puerto Rico
January 6, 2009

Last night the children gathered grass and set it out in a tin for the camels of the Magi, who come to deliver gifts to the boys and girls of Puerto Rico (and the rest of the Spanish speaking world) on Three Kings Day -- January 6th. The 12 Days of Christmas mark the time following the birth of Christ when the three kings journeyed to Bethlehem to bring their gifts to the Baby. It's interesting -- the holiday decorations here all feature the Magi, not Santa, and although (largely due to US commercialism) thye now observe Christmas, too, Three Kings Day is really their major celebration.

As one of the locals told me, Santa Claus is not part of the Bible, and having the tradition of giving gifts in honor of the worlds most famous gift-givers makes much more sense. The Kings must have found us, because the grass was gone and the tin that held it was filled with chocolate sweets, lollipops and little toys! Exciting!

Then later in the morning Mitch heard that there was a children's party going on in town, so our wonderful Argentinian neighbours hustled the kids into their vehicle and sped them the three miles into town to see what was happening. The kids came home laden with candies and amazing gifts: Cachell got a Twister kit, Lochlan a huge box of varied board games, and Caelan a lego kit. This is such a generous community -- apparently the kids were standing on the edges, watching, when a lady ushered them into the thick of things and made sure they got gifts. The three Kings themselves had been there earlier but sadly our guys missed out on that... but they did get hot dogs and ice cream and little fireworks, not too mention another memory that will last their lifetimes, and resurrect every January sixth.