The Hanukkah Fairy

Perhaps no character in history has evoked more controversy or provoked more heated discussion than the Hanukkah fairy. Mostly because he doesn’t really exist—and not even in a “Santa Claus doesn’t exist” way. He doesn’t exist in a much more “no-I-mean-he-really-doesn’t-exist-because-he’s-something-someone-made-up-just-so-their-kids-could-have-Christmas-without-being-Christian.” Here, he talks
about corporate outsourcing, parental guilt and little Jewish elf-fairy thingies.

French Davis: So, who are you, really? Where did you come from? What’s your story?
Hanukkah Fairy: First off, lemme start with a little background: Hanukkah is a fairly minor Jewish holiday. Historically speaking, it’s certainly nowhere near as important to Jews as Christmas is to Christians. So, I didn’t need to exist for most of recorded history. Then, along came America… and consumerism and Target ads and interfaith marriages and the next thing you know, I was conjured up as a result of a Hasbro marketing meeting and a few focus group sessions.

FD: Is your real name Harry?
HF: No, no…don’t confuse me with that hack Jon Lovitz. He’s just a Saturday Night Live sketch character. I’m a completely fictional result of parental guilt and excessive expendable income. Huge difference.

FD: What’s your schtick?
HF: Basically, I show up at some time before the sun goes down each of the eight days of Hanukkah, sneak into the house and drop off a gift for children who live there. Parents leave out a little something for me to nosh on, like gelt
or bagels…

FD: Sounds a little familiar…
HF: What, I should do something so different than Santa? The goyim have been borrowing from Jewish culture for 5,700 years. So, we borrow a little back. What’s so bad about that?

FD: Kind of unoriginal is all.
HF: Listen, it’s a proven formula. I’m a smart guy. I was talking to Moshe the other day and he reminded me of the old adage about not needing to reinvent the wheel.

FD: Who’s Moshe?
HF: He’s the lead Mazikeen in my toy factory. Mazikeen are kind of like fairies, except Jew-ier. They’re my version of Santa’s elves. Moshe is very old and he is very smart. He’s also a ridiculously awesome Mah-Jong player. I must owe him around 30 or 40 thousand bucks by now. I don’t know how he does it. I guess that’s the way it is with Mazikeen, know what I mean?

FD: Not really. How do kids ask you for what they want? Do they write letters?
HF: Actually, they have to. There’s no army of Hanukkah Fairies teaming up at malls all over the world. And really, you should write your fairy a letter once in a while anyhow. Would it hurt so much to write a letter now and again?

FD: Do you have a list of who’s naughty and nice? Are you checking it twice?
HF: Actually, here’s a little secret: Santa doesn’t have one of those. It’s outsourced. Google has an algorithm for that. It mines Facebook and a bunch of other social networking sites for children’s activity and assigns a ranking based on their friends, updates and those stupid “I-have-a-farm-and-just-got-my-own-llama” apps. It deducts for those, by the way.

FD: Wow. You really have the system dialed in.
HF: Put it this way: For a completely fictional being, I’m very efficient and talented.