Fifteen years ago, I had the very good fortune to take my first - and only - trip overseas to Germany to spend the Christmas holiday with my sister and her family who are ex-pats. It was an amazing experience flying to another country 6000 miles away on another continent where another language is spoken and being exposed to a different culture. It was winter in Germany, not far from the Alps, bitterly cold (the coldest winter on European record that year) and on top of that, my two nieces were mere toddlers, and aunty here, a single woman, was not at all used to the idea of being with two small children for two and a half weeks. In spite of it all, I had an amazing time when I was there and fell madly in love with the European lifestyle. They don't have the high speed, 24 hour lifestyle we have in the US. Nothing is open at night except for restaurants. The whole culture seems so much more family friendly because they expect families to be home at night with their loved ones. Dinner tends to be served much later, too, and when you go out to eat, you can sit in a restaurant all night long if you want without feeling pressured to leave because another customer may want your seat. When you order a meal, you have to wait....and wait.....and wait for it, because it's being homemade. As a result of the fact that everything you eat there is fresh, food just tastes better. And there's nothing at all like German towns at Christmastime. Every town, city and village has a Christkindl Markt, a Christmas market, featuring local artisans selling their wares, which also includes food and drink, my favorite being a delicious holiday beverage called glühwein, which is a hot, spiced red wine and perfect on a frigid German day. I drank quite a bit of this beverage when I was overseas despite never being able to tolerate red wine for some reason. It was quite a treat being able to drink it without becoming ill and maybe it's something about the way the Germans prepare their wine that enables me to drink it, but it was certainly wonderful to be able to drink it, whether hot and spiced or just served in a wine glass. Downtown Akron has a Christkindl Markt at Lock 3 Park featuring some German artisans from Akron's sister town Chemnitz in the former East Germany, but in recent years, the poor economy has pretty much whittled the little Markt down to but a few booths and one brave German who travels here despite the weak economy. On top of that, the Markt is only open on weekends instead of all week, a victim of the poor economy. I wish I could afford to return to Germany to visit a real Christkindl Markt, but between no longer being allowed any vacation time during the holidays and the skyrocketing fuel prices driving up airline ticket prices to levels only affordable by the very wealthy, it's not likely I will ever again get off this continent, which is disappointing and sad. Maybe if we ever come out of this Depression and back on to good strong economic footing again, I can travel again, but there's no economic recovery in sight, so I can sit and dream of the day it might happen 5-10 years down the road. Until then, I can listen to my German Christmas playlists on my iPod and look at photos such as the one I included with this blog, Garmisch, Germany - which I have visited - at Christmastime. I can revel in my memories of what may well turn out to have been a once in a lifetime trip. Well, at least I got to go once, and that's a hell of a lot more than most people ever get to do.
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