German post office replies to 30,000 letters to Santa Claus

A post office in Germany has responded to more than 30,000 letters addressed to Santa Claus, the dpa news agency has reported.

The German village of St. Nikolaus — located in the Saarland, bordering France — shares a name with St. Nicholas, and children have written it letters for years.

On Monday, the post office said that it handled more letters than ever this festive season and had nearly 44 volunteers replying to a total of 30,711 letters from children in 43 countries, according to dpa. It is 866 more letters than last year's.

A majority of letters came from Germany — accounting for about 90% — while globally, children from Taiwan sent the most letters, 1,083 in total.

The post office answers every letter, and each reply is sent in an envelope marked with a special St. Nicholas postmark.

The Deutsche Post has a total of seven Christmas branches across Germany.

Aside from the village of St.Nikolaus, Santa Claus can also be reached in Himmelpfort (Brandenburg), Engelskirchen (North Rhine-Westphalia) and Himmelstadt (Bavaria).

This Christmas, the three branches in Lower Saxony saw 80,000 letters arrive from 58 countries, including China, Morocco, Australia, Argentina and the United States, a postal spokeswoman told the German news agency KNA last week.