A Wonderful Christmas Market but a Very Lacklustre Christmas Parade

The Christmas season is really upon us now, and this is such a nice region to be living in at this time of year because you’re never far from a Christmas market. I think other bloggers have covered the subject far more comprehensively than I have and so I won’t attempt an overview, but I will shamelessy plunder wort.lu’s handy list of all markets within the greater region. So if you’re visiting and hoping to hit a Christmas market, click this list of the Greater Reigon’s Christmas Markets to help you decide.

We went into Lux City this weekend to catch the Christmas market, which, like last year, was fab, and definitely worth a visit. Unfortunately our kids were under the weather and we had to return home before we even made it to the part overlooking the Petrusse Valley with all the kiddie rides. As we have visitors over the weekend, we’ll be taking them and i’ll update the photos.

We did, coincidentally, manage to time our visit with the annual Christmas parade, and it reminded me that I’d read something about it in the Wort that it was going to be the last time the parade happens because authorities have said Luxembourg “can’t afford it”, because it’s too expensive. Now I don’t know if you know but this tiny Duchy is officially the world’s SECOND RICHEST COUNTRY, falling only second to oil-rich Brunei, at least according to this list in Forbes.

When you take into account that the state contributed around 500,000 euros to recent local Royal Wedding (that’s the official figure quoted, of course it would be far more in reality when you take into account all the policing etc and just the basic cost to keep any Royal Family in the manner to which they have become accustomed) you’ll probably be scratching your head as to why they were only able to throw 20,000 Euros at a Christmas parade that goes right through the center of town on one of the busiest shopping Sundays of the entire year. BAH HUMBUG is all I can say!!

Now I won’t lie, I was left scratching my head as to what they’d actually spent the 20,000 euros on. The resulting parade was a little lacklustre, to say the least. Actually, it was kind of funny because the people in the parade were so miserable and the effort so meagre that I had to draw one of two conclusion: 1. the parade usually isn’t very good anyway and politicians thought “stuff that, we’d rather spend 20,000 euros on a nice slap up lunch for ourselves” or 2. the people in the parade were making something of a political statement themselves with a stern show of disapproval. I’m feeling for the latter.

The parade essentially consisted of some really grumpy policemen leading a couple of carnival floats. I think they got in character for the occasion by pretending they were leading a funeral procession. One of the floats was left completely bare and very deliberately not decorated, there was a tractor with some tinsel on and some, admittedly gorgeous carthorses pulling tourists they’d likely borrowed for the occasion that were probably coerced with Gluhwein and hot chocolate. Oh and bringing up the rear was the familiar little green tourist train that runs around the city. They’d obviously borrowed that too. Honestly, I wonder if it was really worth anyone bothering at all and if a fabulously wealthy little country like Luxembourg can’t afford a Christmas parade then the world must be really in far more dire straits than I’d previously imagined.

Please excuse my terrible pics, they were taken ‘on the go’ with my phone.