Has anybody of you ever been to a European-style Christmas market? One that is built like a small town of cozy huts decorated to the nines and located in a town center, not inside a building? It was one of my annual joys to go see the small-town ones around my native town of Stuttgart, Germany. Stuttgart’s main Christmas market had become that big that it took you ages to get from one end to the other. Besides it was crowded like a rock concert. I discovered the small-town Christmas markets and their charm especially during my time as a freelance journalist when, one weekend, I had to report about four of them. Oh, the love the local clubs and sellers put into their offers! The neighborliness of them (of course, they knew most of the other vendors) instead of the anonymity of huge touristy markets. Think the fragrance of Glühwein, frying sausages, shashlik, gingerbread, and burned almonds, Christmas music from a stage, the visitors’ joyful anticipation, the festive lighting of the booths and the surrounding façades, a giant decorated Christmas tree in front of the town hall. Those markets sometimes popped up just for a weekend. But their memory lasts till today.
