Bosna'dan mektup

[omer...@hsbc.com.tr]

A LETTER FROM THE WALDORF KINDERGARTEN IN SARAJEVO by Leila Kostic
Sarajevo is
the capital
of
Bosnia-Herzegovina

I will try to describe our activity as clearly and concretely as possible.
You know, in Sarajevo we always joke when we talk about organizing our
festivals, saying: „why should it be simple when it can also be
complicated?“ This is a saying one often hears in Sarajevo, and it also
fits our festival preparations....
We celebrate Advent with a beautiful advent seasonal table, advent wreath
and play a Christmas play at circle time. The children look forward to
this, especially to the costumes of Mary, Joseph, the angel, the donkey,
and so on.
In this play, we also sing many and quite diverse songs from the Catholic
Croatian tradition as well as from the Serbian Orthodox tradition. And then
there are songs sung traditionally by the Protestants – the Protestant
church does not have such a long tradition here as the other two, but there
are children of Protestant parents in the kindergarten, and this must be
respected.
In addition, the Jewish festival of Hanukkah always falls in the Advent
time. And the parents of Jewish origin bring cakes and sweets that are
traditional for this festival in our region. Every day we light a candle in
the window for the Hanukkah festival – for eight days, every day a new
candle in the Menorah is lit. We also sing Hebrew songs like „Hava
Nagila“ (Let us Rejoice) and others, but we do not explain these things to
the children. We allow them to experience the beautiful atmosphere with all
their senses, and naturally we look forward to the sweet cakes from the
parents. Throughout this time, the daily Christmas play continues – each
day our Bethlehem stable is illuminated by more and more light from the
eight candles from the Jewish menorah.
We celebrate Christmas in the kindergarten together with the parents.
Parents who celebrate Christmas organize and prepare the festival together
with the kindergarten teachers. But it often also happens that Muslim
parents help, for example with baking the cakes. The question „who has time
to bake?“ becomes more important than the question of one’s background and
traditions ...
All the festivals in the kindergarten that are connected with a particular
religion, such as Christmas (Protestant and Catholic), Hanukkah, Easter,
Bayram or Kurban Byramare, are celebrated as simply as possible.
We also celebrate a festival for each season – winter, spring, summer and
fall. We always have these seasonal celebrations on Saturdays, together
with the parents and with lots of games for the children. After the end of
Socialism and especially after World War II, religious festivals have
become very popular. There is a lot of consumerism and hustle and bustle,
and everything is very external and superficial. Therefore we say to the
parents, we will sing and celebrate with the children with elements from
our rich traditions, but will try to do so as simply and peacefully as
possible.
This year we plan to do a Christmas Play with the children; the parents
will experience the play and then we will all go outdoors. There we will
spend a half hour in the garden and the children can play – hopefully there
will be snow. And the parents who have baked something will place it
outside on a table. Of course there will be cakes, which are traditional
for the Catholic and Orthodox families. Together we will sing a few
Christmas carols, and then after an hour, the celebration is over.
A really big festival is the Winter Festival, which takes place around New
Year. Father Frost comes to the kindergarten and brings presents for all
the children, regardless of whether they are from Muslim, Jewish,
Christian, or atheist families. I can describe this festival another time.
For us it is clear with the festivals, that it is VERY important to
cultivate the sense of balance and the sense of touch, not only for the
children but also for the parents. So: „why should it be simply, if it can
also be complicated?“
With loving wishes
from Leila
______________________________________________________________________________________________


http://library.constantcontact.com/download/get/file/1103422986922-113/Sarajevo
+EN.pdf


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