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Originally Posted by Drury18
Okay that's more terrifying then the version I heard about Krampus.
The version I heard (from a Slovak) was that you went into the town square for the celebration and there would be an angel and Krampus that came around on December 5th asking each child their name. If you were listed in the giant book, the angel would give you a small something. If you weren't in this giant book, Krampus would put you in his bag and drag you off to be eaten to dragged to the depths of hell.
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what it pretty much boils down to here in Austria is that the Krampusse are the helpers of St. Nikolaus and the idea is that the good children get presents from Nikolaus, while the bad children are punished by the Krampus. The second thing never happens though, it's more of a symbolic reminder to the children. What usually happens is that St. Nikolaus and one or two Krampusse visit schools and stuff around December 5th and the children sing songs or tell a poem for the Nikolaus and then they get a small present (usually a combination of sweets, oranges and nuts). It's actually pretty cool for kids (at least it used to be), although the Krampus is scary as hell ...
Then there's another thing which is the Krampuslauf. This is a very long tradition where a lot of Krampusse gather and banish evil ghosts. The several Krampuspassen (which is basically a bigger group of Krampusse) make a lot of appearances at Christmas markets, town festivals etc. The biggest one is always on December 5th or 6th and basically every town has one of those festivals at town square. The tradition has changed a lot though and now it's more about the different Passen trying to outrival each other with their fire shows and stuff. Unfortunately for some guys it's also just an excuse to be allowed to beat people up while being in their costumes ... also some guys just totally #### on tradition and put stupid LED lights and stuff on their costumes, which is a travesty to be honest. Those festivals are always a great opportunity to meet friends and drink a lot of great Austrian beer though
If you want to take a look, this is a video of one of those festivals in a town near to my hometown:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3Wy37bBp0I
sorry for off-topic, but I never expected to read about Krampusse on a Canadian ice hockey forum