A Canadian Moose Singing Spanish Christmas Songs in German?

Now that I have been to about 4 different Christmas Markets - Koln, Bonn, Siegburg and Bad Honnef, I feel that they are all pretty similar with regard to what they offer. Typically one can find Christmas ornaments, carved wooden handicrafts, felt hats and bags, pottery and blown glass, your typical craft fair items with a little Christmas flair. All of the markets also have dozens of stands which sell gingerbread cookies with messages written on them. I’ve seen people wearing these big cookies around their necks. I’m not sure why they wear them. Maybe they are trying to make sure everyone knows that there is someone who loves them enough to buy them a stale cookie for 5 Euro.

I think the Christmas market is mostly about the food and the drinking though, much like your typical State Fair which has rides for the kids and beer and lots of fried food for the adults. At the Christmas Market, the food generally includes your brotwurst of course but also reibekucken (fried potato pancakes), flammkuchen (flatbread pizza with ham and onions), waffles, and some strange sweet dumpling with hot berries which I haven’t been brave enough to try yet. I have tried to like the Gluhwein, but I haven’t yet warmed up to the idea of steaming hot slightly sweet red wine.

My favorite part of the Bonn Christmas Market is a big fake moose on one of the Gluhwein stands. He talks and sings Christmas songs. I love how he tells you he’s from Canada and then proceeds to sing Feliz Navidad in Deutsch.

Medieval Christmas Market in Siegburg

On Saturday night Jim and I went to Siegburg to check out their Christmas market. We had been told that it was a Medieval Christmas Market so figured it would be something a little different than the markets we have already seen.

Siegburg is located between Cologne and Bonn about 15k away. We decided to take the train there as Jim hadn't yet experienced the public transportation system here in Bonn, and of course we both wanted to drink some gluhwein.

The market was torch-lit and had an authenticly medieval glow to it. I was glad that we went at night because I'm not sure it would have had the same feel during the day. The market was littered with small bonfires lined with people warming their outsides while drinking gluhwein to warm their insides.

When we arrived there were a group of entertainers in medieval garb with hand held torches singing a song. What they were singing about I had no clue, but it was entertaining nonetheless.

The food, drink and vendor stalls were all made to look like they were of rudimentary construction and the vendors were all dressed in period clothing. The items for sale were things you might have seen in a typical market in medieval times - baskets, spices, clothing, wooden toys and simple leather soleless shoes.

The food offered was slightly different than the typical fare of bratwurst, waffeln, and potato pancakes that you see at a lot of the other markets. We decided on what we thought would be an authentic snack - some seasoned grilled meat on a skewer. I have no idea what kind of meat it was, but the Germans love pork so that would be my first guess. We also decided to get some roasted chesnuts since neither Jim nor I have ever had chesnuts. After popping a whole chesnut in his mouth, Jim learned that you have to unshell the chesnut first.

Unfortunately the market started closing up pretty soon after we arrived so our visit was cut premeturely short.