Christmas in France… meilleur than the UK

Having fallen victim to the ridiculously late winter exam period of my French university, I found myself faced with the reality that my return to the UK would occur only a matter of days before the big 25/12.

I, along with most Warwick students, have traditionally seen the lead up to Christmas to be part and parcel of the fun of the holidays. That means internal squeals of glee when the John Lewis advert pops up on telly for the first time, numerous invites to pre-Christmas Day Christmas dinners and more mince pies scoffed than one should be willing to admit. Being in a foreign country this year, I started to worry: was I going to miss out on all of this?

Roll on mid-November when a morning jog on the Cours Mirabeau of Aix-En-Provence was greeted by what looked like the makings of a small fairground and a lengthy row of wooden huts. Initially confused, it wasn’t until returning to the thoroughfare later in the evening that I clocked that this was part of the Christmas season in Aix. The place was dominated by carousels, dodgems for kids and rows of shops offering everything from crystal decanters to antiques, mulled wine to fresh croustillons.

Now, I pretty much assumed that this would be a week-long novelty; however, this was a couple of weeks ago. As I write this, the Christmas market-come-family funfair is still bustling and will do so until the big day itself. And this is not unique to Aix: from Strasbourg to Caen, similar scenes can be found all over la belle France.

Now you may be wondering how all of this justifies my argument that the whole yuletide thing is done better here in France, and don’t get me wrong, I am sure similar scenes can be found in some corners of the UK. But there’s something inherently, well, touching to all this that I don’t get in the UK.

Back home you’d be forgiven for thinking that Christmas was the ingenious idea of a board of executives as part of some conspiracy to engineer the shopping, television and lifestyle habits of the nation. The TV adverts, the obsession with the Christmas Number 1 single, yuletide confectionery appearing in stores in August! Without meaning to perpetuate the tired rhetoric of the “over-commercialisation” of Christmas, one has to admit that there is something a tad impersonal about the Christmas hype in the UK. Here in France there seems to be a greater emphasis on the family and the community in maintaining a strong spirit of festivity. This therefore means less inappropriately-timed marketing and more provision for family orientated recreation.

Don’t get me wrong, the country is, in some ways, alike the UK during the Christmas period. Christmas lights adorn every avenue, and stores are not exactly ignoring the season either. But the fact remains that it took till mid-November for me to notice anything yule-related, and I don’t feel like I am being bludgeoned by festive corporate slogans.

Yet I am still excited for Christmas and walking down the Cours Mirabeau each day reminds me that: a) I’m glad to be experiencing the season in a foreign country, and b) the ways of the French really aren’t all that bad and this is reflected in their Christmas season. But Mum, if you’re reading this, I still want mince pies as soon as I get off the plane.