Bear hunt entertains kids during coronavirus shutdown

Have you gone bear hunting yet? The stuffed toy sightings are all the rage in Belgium at the moment.

What you do is you put a plush toy in your window so that people (ostensibly children) can spot it as they walk by. The initiative sprang up organically across the world recently, inspired by British author Michael Rosen’s 1980s picture book We’re Going on a Bear Hunt

Unless they are lucky enough to have a garden right now, children can take part in little in the way of outdoor activities. They can only go walking with their parents, and hence the “Bear Hunt” was born.

The “Bear Hunt” has become so popular in Flanders that in some neighbourhoods it’s impossible to find a house without one peeping out the window. It has also expanded to include other kinds of soft toys.

One father out for a walk with his two kids in Merelbeke, East Flanders, told VRT that he had promised them a sweet for each stuffed bear they saw. “By the time we got home, it was over 200, so we had to make a new deal,” he said.

The author of the book, by the way, is currently in hospital in the UK. While the reason has not been officially disclosed, it is thought that he has Covid-19.

Photo ©Jasper Jacobs/BELGA