We’ve read about them. Drooled over the words we were reading, the pictures we were seeing, the images we were conjuring in our minds. Imagined the sounds and the smells.
But nothing matched the exhilaration of the reality of the European Christmas markets. We were lucky. We got to markets in three cities.
They were such fun.
We wandered Firenze and found several markets, filled with people, artisans, and happiness. We watched as masters demonstrated their crafts, carving wood, caning chairs, roasting chestnuts, baking huge cheeses.
The most famous Firenze market is the German market and we wore our shoe leather out, wandering through town looking for it, with ultimate success occurring totally by accident. Even with map in hand, we had given up ever finding it in a city where streets names seemed to change every block. We suddenly just turned a corner, and there it was.
You could hear it before you could see it; it hummed, filling all the senses. Food was mostly German, no surprise there, since it was a German market. Pork hocks on the fire, brats and sauerkraut, pommes frites, candied apples, candy floss, the traditional German Christmas cake (sorry, I forget what it’s called), strudel. Drooling begins again as I write. My keyboard is wet.
It’s all about the people, and the people were happy, the children were excited although Christmas was still three weeks in the future and the market was filled with the sounds of Christmas: laughter, children shrieking with excitement, music, bells.
The streets glittered with lights and decorations, and every square had its tree. The streets are narrow in Firenze,and the Christmas decorations sweep across from building to building, spanning the road with greenery and lights.
Nice sparkles at Christmas. The main square is alive with people, lights, sound, scents. You can FEEL Christmas. It’s innovative before Christmas decorations, with dancing jets of water alternating with whispy steam. It’s magic with Christmas added to the mix.
Christmas lights, a remarkable market, a Ferris wheel, merry-go-round, and a skating rink make, music, children, a Santa corner. At the far end of the fountains was a fairie tale castle of lights either reflected in the pools left after the dancing fountains, or peeping mysteriously and romantically through whisps of steam.
Glorious.
Paris glitters all the time. At Christmas, well, it defies mortal words.
The Champs Elysees is alive with Christmas. The stretch from Place de la Concorde at the bottom of the Tuileries garden to where the shops of the Champs Elysees begin becomes an amazing world of its own.
Starting with a big Ferris wheel then moving towards the Arc de Triomphe, each side of the street is filled with a double row of stalls filled with just about everything you can imagine. My favourite was the mulled wine. You could buy a glass and walk the street sipping away as you looked at everything else. How civilized.
In a small side alley was a gourmet corner with foie gras (you could get a foie gras sandwich, honest) and champagne and other high end nibblies.
Hand-made jewellery, scarves including some guaranteed to be Canadian, so I guess that was guaranteeing warmth, hats, Matryoshka (Russian nesting dolls) of all descriptions, regional Christmas food specialities from all over France (and possibly Germany as the brats were there again).
It sparkled. It glittered. It twinkled. It was tacky and it was glitzy.
My favourite was the live Santa flight. It happened three or four every times each evening and we managed to catch one of the shows. From the street, you could see Santa’s sleigh about fifty feet up in the air with four of his reindeer tethered to a tall poll with a star on top. When it was time, the sleigh lit up and it started moving across the sky at a stately pace.
When what to wondering eyes should appear, but . . .
. . . a real, live Santa`who stood up in the sleigh (to the horror of Ken who has a height phobia) and waved at the crowd below, ho-ho-hoing and blowing kisses. The sleigh travelled the length of the wire — maybe 50 feet — turned and came back. You’ll have to imagine this…my little Cool Pix couldn’t capture it.
About half way back, the sleigh stopped moving and Santa stood up (to Ken’s increasing horror) and addressed the crowd. We could pick out occasional words, but we knew the meaning, especially as Santa signed big hearts with his hands and blowing kisses.
We looked at the crowd and everyone was smiling, but the children were mesmerized and filled with awe. Big shining eyes, smiling faces.
Then Santa started singing. Up until now all the music we had heard was English, actually American — Bing Crosby, Gene Autrey (yes, the cowboy from the 50s), Frank Sinatra, which surprised me I must say because even my limited knowledge of French tells me that there are some amazing French Christmas carols and songs.
But this one was different. It wasn’t one of the songs we had sung in any of my French classes, but we were the only ones in the crowd who weren’t singing along. Everyone sang all the verses, even normally recalcitrant teenagers were singing.
And the children. They were transported.
That’s when we were touched by the magic of Christmas.
