Yes, that’s a giant man in a Santa hat taking a huge shit in a Barcelona shopping mall. Read on to learn more about el Caganer and other batshit Christmas traditions. (credit)

It’s time for our annual conversation about unusual, controversial, and fucked-up Christmas traditions.

Krampus: We’ll start with an easy one that’s become familiar to Americans thanks to the internet and a so-so 2015 holiday comedy-horror film, leading to its commodification like everything else around Christmas. Krampus is basically a terrifying horned monster, hairy with fangs and hooves, that eats bad children. He looks like Steve Bannon. Krampus also may just lash the bad kids with a birch switch or kidnap them and take them to hell. He shows up with St. Nicholas on Dec. 5, on the eve of the saint’s feast day, so this is a dicey week for children on that behavioral razor’s edge. We all know terrifying humans into behaving well always works in real life [eye roll]. Not surprisingly, this dark Alpine folklore is brought to you by our Austrian and German friends. Per the Wikipedia, the etymology of “Krampus” is Bavarian or German for something like “rotting claws beast” and it’s appearance suggests antisemitic tropes. No wonder those kids grew up to inflict genuine horrors upon the world.

Zwarte Piet: Literally, Black Pete. He is Santa’s slave in the Netherlands and the Low Countries. Some people think this is OK. Many do not. And man, does the Feast of St. Nicholas have some batshittery around it. Anyway, this character is basically St. Nicholas’ assistant, helping to deliver candy and presents to good children in the small countries that the bigger European powers regularly use as invasion routes to each other. This character has secular and pagan roots, and his characteristics and role were evolved by Christians to better fit their narratives. By the mid-19th century, he took his most familiar form as a Black Moor dressed as a colorful Renaissance page, assisting St. Nicholas. In some narratives, the pair are Turkish and arrive in Amsterdam from Spain. Which sounds bonkers and is brilliantly explained by David Sedaris in his hilarious 2002 Esquire essay and monologue “Six To Eight Black Men.” (The three-part audio is absolutely worth your time)

The Dutch spent the last several decades trying to soften the obvious racial problems with Black Pete, transforming him from a servant or slave (or six to eight slaves) into a bosom pal that Sinterklaas rescued from slavery. And they’ve suggested maybe he isn’t actually Black but is merely covered in soot from all the chimneys. No one is buying this, of course, and there regularly are protests in the Netherlands over Black Pete. White actors often wear Black face to portray him, which is an obvious no-no in America, but the Dutch don’t share our domestic history on this topic, so it remains a controversy. Also, why aren’t his clothes black with soot, too?

Caganer: Thought Santa having a slave was bad? This one is the Spanish tradition of a Santa or some other figure that shits in or near the nativity manger scene. They display this in shopping malls and other public nativity scenes both private and official. They sell celebrity manger shitters. I am not making this up. This is perhaps the most fucked-up of all the holiday traditions, and that’s saying a lot after slaves and cloven-hoof child-eating monsters. The origins of “el Caganer — literally “the pooper” — are unclear but date to the Baroque 17th or 18th centuries, and it’s a popular tradition in regions of Spain and some places in France and Italy. Is it symbolic of fertilizing the earth? Honoring the mischievous? Humanizing the overly pious season? No one quite knows. And honestly, who cares? I hope this comes to America.

The character depicted dropping a turd near the freshly born Baby Jesus is traditionally a Catalan peasant, but it’s now celebrities, politicians, royalty, sports stars, superheroes, artists, and religious and pop culture figures sold as caganers. They’re typically clay, porcelain, or resin and stand about 5.5 inches tall, but can be any size. You can buy a full-grown Jesus Christ caganer to put in your manger scene to shit next to his infant self. You can get Caganer books on Amazon, but not really figurines. Several online sites sell them and it’s hilarious to scroll through the options. The pope, Biden, King Charles, Mona Lisa, Einstein, Kim Jong Un, Michelin tire man, Elon Musk, Charles Darwin, Ghandi, Che Guevara, de Gaulle, Michael Jordan, Marine Le Pen … all available, pants down and shitting. I did not find one of Francisco Franco, however.

Related to this in the region is the the Caga Tió, which is a children’s smiley face wooden Christmas log that shits out a tasty nougat as a present. I desperately want one.

Mari Lwyd: I saved the best for last. It’s not the most insane Christmas ritual, but it’s definitely weird. From my ancestral Welsh homeland comes the tradition of mounting a frightening horse skull on a stick and groups of men carrying it to houses where they would sing until given strong drink and food. It’s part of the wassailing tradition, which never really caught on in the New World.

Mari Lwyd is basically a horse skull, genuine or handmade, mounted on a stick and adorned with decorations such as ribbons and lights, often with the eyes aglow. The head is then covered with a white sheet that also hides the person holding the horse-stick, making it functionally a type of terrifying hobby horse. The half-dozen or so men accompanying the Mari Lwyd would walk to houses in their village and do funny and rude call-and-response sort of singing, with the people in the homes coming up with reasons to deny them entry before eventually relenting and allow them inside to get boozy and eat. I’ve seen it described as the “Welsh Ghost Horse Christmas Rap Battle” and that is perfect.

Once inside, the horse head, with its bony snapping jaws, also is used to scare children and adults amid the merriment. This is what you get when the Welsh have been forced to work deep in unhealthy coal mines 23 hours a day starting at age three.

It’s uncertain where the name Mari Lwyd originates or even what it specifically translates to (Y Fari Lwyd in Welsh, or Cymraeg), but it’s apparently either “Mother Mary” as a reference to Christ’s mommy, or “gray mare” as a in a gray lady horse. The tradition is certainly a mix of pagan and Christian elements dating to the late 18th century and probably earlier, though I’d say it’s mostly eccentric Welshness. Cymru am byth, baby.

Lest you accuse me of being culturally chauvinistic, I know there are other strange, disturbing, unnatural Christmas traditions from America and around the world. These are my favorites and I genuinely enjoy them. And honestly, an elderly obese bearded man that lives in the Arctic “making” toys with non-unionized elves before using a magic sled pulled by non-unionized flying deer to go around the globe to deliver Hasbro, Lego, and Mattel merchandise to well-behaved Christian and secular children via narrow chimney chutes is pretty fucking odd, too. Humans are gloriously weird.

Nadolig Llawen!

The Mari Lwyd is a strange Christmastime tradition in Wales. Yes, it’s a decorated horse skull on a stick. (credit)

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