Our holiday special brings you a collection of yuletide traditions from cities around the world. Then, we roll out another festive round of ‘The Urbanist’ quiz and give you the perfect gift idea for the urbanist in your life. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Hello and welcome to the Urbanist, Monocle's program all about the built environment.
I'm your host Andrew Tuck.
Coming up, I suggested that we write down everything we liked about Christmas and everything we hoped would happen the following year.
A special holiday edition of the podcast to celebrate the festive season.
We resurrect the Urbanist annual Christmas Quiz for another round as a team has their buzzers at the ready to answer some holiday themed questions about our cities.
And also we check in with Monocle's editors and hosts to hear a few wacky and warming festive traditions from their home cities.
That's all coming up over the next 30 minutes here on the Urbanist with me, Andrew Tuck.
We start with a trip around the world.
First up, a Nordic trickster comes knocking at your door.
In my home country of Norway, it's not just Santa Claus running around eating people's food and leaving Christmas presents.
At some not entirely known point in history, Norwegian folklore threw into the mix the so called Nisse.
The Nisse is a small elf like creature usually known to wear gray clothes and a red pointy hat.
You can think of them a bit like a mischievous trickster version of Santa Claus.
They hang out in people's houses and barns, the latter being called Lor vanisse, which is the kind I grew up with in my family's farm.
The thing to know about the Nisse is that once it's settled down on your property, you need to keep it happy around Christmas time by bringing it its favorite food and a Norwegian Christmas staple, rice porridge with butter, sugar and cinnamon.
If you don't, the Nisse will be angry and pull pranks on you, like making a mess of your home or making your farm animals disappear.
But if you're good and leave the Nissa a bowl of porridge, you might return to find an empty bowl and an extra Christmas present.
You'll know the Nissa has been there by the tuft of grey beard hair left in the boar from its vigorous eating.
That's how you know you're in the Nissa's good books until next year.