'Do something different' is a common refrain from those of a more adventurous bent. Those jolly souls who think nothing of chucking themselves off a piece of a relatively high piece of landscape while attached to a piece of elastic. Or out of a perfectly serviceable aircraft attached to a duvet cover. Or even in front of an enraged bull in some Spanish village.
In our case, however, "doing" is often in itself "different" enough for us. So yesterday found us walking to get a bus into town. There are two different doings in that one sentence alone.
We were going into Birmingham town centre for the German Christmas Market. They've been running these for eight years now; we get a genuine Frankfurt market for over a month in the run-up to Christmas. It's a big operation - there are the seasonal gift stalls, food places and even mini beer-halls, all run by German families. Their kids even get the month in schools over here, too, by all accounts.
I do wonder if there's an exchange programme going on, with the good citizens of Frankfurt getting a whole load of market stalls run by Brummies selling knock-off DVDs and handbags made by Louis Vuitton's brother-in-law.
But I digress.
This year the market was bigger than ever, and though the icy rain did its level best to dampen everything yesterday, it was all picturesque and everyone was in good spirits.
'You did remember your camera, didn't you?' was Katie's earnest query on the bus going in.
'Oh bugger,' was my witty response.
So you'll have to rely on these pictures from the Beeb to give you a flavour.
After we'd had a random wander around we were to be found in one of the afore-mentioned beer-halls. We'd filled ourselves with various fried pork products and I was reaching for my third stein of ice-cold beer.
'So, this "do something different" malarkey,' asked Katie. 'When do we start?'
1 comment:
Germans, disguised as bratwurst vendors, have infiltrated Birmingham town centre...those patient, sneaky bastards.
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