Pura 8
THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1958.
DEAR SANTA
SANTA CLAUS is a slickly-operating
bureau in Denmark.
A "delighted-to-have-your-letter" do- partment which brings a warm word every Christmas to children' all over the world.
The department is staffed by three dozen school-children. A Scandinavian airline provides the envelopes and stamps,
Their annual mission: sending Santa's "personal" greetings to every one of the 40,000 children who each year address a letter to "Santa Claus, Greenland, c/o Denmark.”
Their annual mission: sending the Danish secondary school- Santa's "personal" greetings to children. every one of the 40,000 children for initiative who coch year address a letter to "Santa Claus, Greenland, c/o Denmarkt."
all started in 1948 in the Oreenland Department of the Clef Post Office in Copenhagen, where a young girl called Geidu Sipuming was busily sorting out
Christmas mail.
Suddenly, she turned up a letter addressed to "Mr Sanin Claus, Greenland." She put it alde. Then came another. And another. Soon there were 20 in. all.
the
Miss Stauning looked at letters for a long time. Should she defer them for returning? Instead, she took them home, opened them and replied with Santa's warmest greetings.",
One of her replies reached a Elle valge in Essex, England. It was shown to a local news- paper. The newspaper gave it Tourist headlines, the Danish Association took note-and the kheme was launched.
Over the years, the number of Last year, letters multiplied. there were nearly 49,000.
Dealing with the letters la a sought-after job among much
But there to no scope
the replies, for the children's task is simply to rort out the legible from the illegible, the genuine from Joke, and to address the reply envelopes.
the
Sometimes, the Santa Claus called "Heart- Department is
break Corner." The name comes
from letters like this-
"Dear Father Christinos
"Could you please and a be In a zunatorium for my big sik bruther?"
Or this. from Brentwood; In
Essex:
greenland
maty
of children all over the Every year thousands world write to Santa Claus. Often they address their Fetters to "Fairyland". One little girl in Dundee, Scotland, was not sure—but "sho was taking no chances. Har letter, 'you' will be glad to know, was safely delivered."
i
skates and a taldy-bear to hug) then ebays:
"My brother would also like someone to hug. He says Mari- lyn Monroe would do fine, so please see it you could get her for him,
that
don't want umama dolly or a teddy bear for
"He is 21, and he says Christmas he would not need another Xmas Please could you present if he gets Marilyn." give
From Karl, in West Germany: my Mum' my and Daddy a house instead."
"I want a train, a jeep and a But many of the letters pro- dog that alka. P.S. If you vide a clear (and sometimes need sum money; Just take it insight Into the out of my dad's pants, pocket. startling) foibles, fears and adorations nf He's a caplain and is loaded." the younger generation.
Many letters tempt Santa with
that food and drink like David's, aged six, of Birkenhead:
Pat, aged eight, lists her own requests (for a doll's pum, roller
JOHN CLARKE FINDS A STORY
BRISBANE.
E was ebony black,
HE
a husky 11 st. 10 lb.,
one inch over five feet
tall, a
square man, all
shoulders and grin.
He
pillbox
wore
a
blue, peaked
hat and dark bluc uniform -over which scarlet Erald ran riot.
He was an Aboriginal Black Troeker, 31 years old and In police employ.
"And what's your name?" i aked him, "Ceell," he answer- ed. "Cecil Garvey."
Black Trackers have been in $1.0 news here Intely, They have been used in a long drama- le murder hunt in the South Australian bush.
Paternal
So I asked Inspector Harry Beinke of the Queensland police I could meet сле. He pro- duced Cecil.
Keinké has come into town recently after being Protector of Aboriginals up in the distant north.
He is one of those friendly, trustworthy men whom you Bod up and down the Empire 5 District Commissioners, exerels-
benevolence ing firm, paternal over
have people who caught up with the world.
"When Queensland force started in 1884,' said, "we had 170 white
not
police
Reinke
of
"I will leave you some coffee, a mince pie and a sugar lump for Rudolph."
Even Mrs Santa is catered for: "If you bring your wife, please tell me then I can put two lola hot chocolate."
Sómo letters are faintly sinis. fer, like the request of one six- year-old who asks for a “bull- Jozer, a cement mixer and some Egypilan mummy books."
Others are plainly threatening: "Dere Santa Claus-
"I would like a naregun, sum bulets and a target. I no you are a kind man, but if you dont bring them I will by them my-
self when older and wate for you at the chimløy."
Some children are worried about Santa's travelling powers. Margaret, "clo British Con- sulato-General. Huff,” rerninda Santa that he will have to get a visa to visit her hoNTHE",
Is there a repentant note in the letter from Kennelti, of Water Strect, Middleton (Eng- land) who, discreetly reminding Santa at the name above the local toyshop, adds:
"Could ye's send a dummy for my brother and sum soap for my dirty face?"
But the children generally keop up with pelenilfie progress Last year I was rockels and Whi aeroplanes. This year, it undoubtedly bo sputniks
and guided missiles.
Even so, the most popular re-
youngest quests from the
Ara
for "a napple, a nomg and sum sweets," and from the older toy construction outfits,
Also much appreckted cowboy
policeman
tre sets,
and lorries, toy trains and airfields, and something called "a oof- OD{."
Books and clothing
arc
rarely mention- ed.
The record for brevity must go to Leila, of.
who Sheffield,
(per- requests haps chiding?): "Ples cood
Q
after
I hov 0 new daddy."!
And
de-
the re- cord for ousimism to Wallace, of Eust London, who mands a "grate big stallon In Ostralia so I can use my air gun."
The addresses on the letters pre varled, but often highly imaginative. One was to "Santa Claus, Toyland, Snowy White Ice
AWAY FROM THE TEST
I meet a man who doesn't miss a thing
BLACK TRACKERS HAVE BEEN IN THE NEWS HERE LATELY... SO I TRACK DOWN ONE OF THEM
and 183 native troopers in the force, But as the years went on the native clement dwindled, and by 1900 it had almost ceused to exist.
"It was then they began to recruit Trackers. We have 23 in Queensland now and they are used not only to track suspects, but to find lost people who wander, into the bush.
difficul! "It la not
to "CO bush" here for the bush begins in places ten miles out of town, and it goes on for ever in most directions. A man can wander out and get lost and die quite easily.
+
Diet of -snakes,
wrong way, a' bent leaf. can pur them on the track. You or I would not see any mark, but they would
"They serve. a most useful purpose, but the real old ones are dying out. It seems that when they eat the white man's food they begin to lose their wonderful eyesight.
When they are on their own (a lizard-like eating guana animal about. the size of hedgehog) and snakes and wild pig, which they hunt, they aro all right,"
He called Ceell, who had been sitting outside the open office Goor staring into space, or per- hps tracking Bics climbing up the verandah wall.
"These Black Trackers can Introductions were made. A ree things white people would frushing handshake,
broad always miss," sald Reinke “A sheaming print. quite small stone turned up the mon
"In the bush," sald Reinke,
“I'll give you a tenner aplace for tem
Thousands of letters to Santa Claus are re-directed to a department of the Danish Post Office in Copenhagen, Here a new batch is being delivered, · Last was answered individually, your, nearly. 40,000 letters arrived, and ́oach one
Reindeerland.
Forest. Fairy World. Iceland or "In any case, "I am sure you Those on the formal note Greenland." Another Was to will be pleased to receive one of paper are usually very polite "Santa, c/o The Seven Dwarfs, the fairy tales written by our "I should be very pleased, uir,
Danish story-teller, Hans Chris it you could come to
and Whatever the address, post- 11an Andersen..
"Nothing could have, pleased ma men in Britain, and lamany
better than i 2g Commonwealth countries, know
It was where to forward them to Copenhagen, whether or not the postage is adequate.
And back comes the reply, printed in
wobbly blue hand "Dear Little,Friend, "I was delighted to have your letter which reached me in my country, Denmark of which Greenland le a part.
“If you are very good, I be- lieve you will have your Christ- más wishes fulilled.
he'd not wear these clothes. Ccell has travelled more than switch names when they but khaki stacks and khaki many of the guests in Bris- switched employers. blouse. But with plenty of red bane's swank Lennens Hotel. "So it Ccell was with you for bruid on them.
liked you he might They love the When a call came from the New long and braid, that's right
Isn't it. Guinea police for Black Tracker decide to become Ceell Clarke,” Cecil?"
and ald, he
another Tracker said Reinke. were flown there to help search Before that could happen I for a suspect.
left.
1s
His duties
"Airplane was nice. I wasn't sick," he said.
After a two-week hunt the their Trackers decided
quarry must have been eaten by crocodiles and blamed the local police boys for messing tracks.
"That's right," said Cecil, wito
Lwo n bachelor and Church of England, and lives on his own 1: but in the grounds of a suburban mounted police depat, "Hut's 'bout as high as this desk," said Cecil. If so, he could only have lain down in it.
Outside the hut he did his own cooking on a government provided stove, buying his own food from a government allow- once.
"Corned beef and just beef mostly," he said.
Cecil's duties have included searching for survivors from airplane crashes in the rugged mountains of the
New South
Wales border, tracking a woman who had "gone bush," and find-
lost children. Aboriginals now live in settle- ments run by the government or
i
churches,
but occasionally wanderlust selzes them and they bid civiliation farewell to go on hunting trips called walkabouts.
"Like beef.....
"You been on Walkabouts?" Reinke asked Coelli Cecil gave him a look which did he would not dream of doing any ruch thing. Thought there was some- thing about his #rolling.. black eyes that suggested he would not mind/trying.
When his three-weeks-n-year leave comes round Crell goes to stay with an aunt at a setlic- ment called Woorabinda In Central Queensland. There he con get proper "tucker"- carpet makes 12 feet long and quanas, "Taste zame ilke beef, but beiter," salú Ceell. "You const them in hot ashen.**
On holidays he spends him sparo time fishing. Here in town he spends it carving walking sticks and boomerangs, smoking (20 a week). and going to the cinema where his favourites aro Westerns and
Abbott and Costello,
His name
His pay is £9.141 n fortnight with a similar mam banked for. him against old age.
"I've knowri gullo a lot of these chaps who'd have của mụch as a thousand pounds in the bunk," said "Nəinko.
-"How did you get yoUR name?”. Lasked Coell Garvey,
"My mother and father give it me,” be said, a
that Aboriginals usually, took ́ mure. names of people, they worked
---(London Express Service).
a shock, therefore, when one turned up with the blunt protest:
"You silly old man! I said I wanted a TALKING doll "·
Whatever the plea, or the in- sult or the threal, Denmark's busy Santa Claus Department works on enthusiastically.
And so on, into the fairy tale. Thank-you notes are tally common:
"Dere Santa ---- "Men thanks for a big red the bloons an books an fora choklits and most of all for crane of wich works well.
"I dint wont anyathing better, "See you again.
But then, it all seems worth- "Peter" Letters to Santa come in all while when a letter like that of into de Brian's (Glasgow) comes shapes and sizes, and the corations at the top range from the crowded sorting room: green-erbyened houses blow- "My frens' dint bèleey, in you ing smoke 10 bailoan-like 11 your letter came. Now they fairies, Some are written an do and. Mummy and Daddy do cheap, ruled paper with old sums 100 now. scratched out on the back; others "Thank you very very – mush come on formal note paper. Canta Claus."
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OEMAKERS!
HAMMERT
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JINKS
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