Strasbourg Christmas market 2010

Hello audience! As the dawning of Christmas is upon us, and I am currently living in Strasbourg, the home of all things Christmas-ey, or as they like to call it, 'The Capital of Xmas,' I thought I'd pop into town to take some pictures of La Marché de Noël.

Essentially it's everything you would expect from a typical French market. Mulled wine, pretzels, novelty hats, the real deal. I was lucky with the weather yesterday (when I took these photos) as it remained a clear sky, and fresh snow had settled everywhere the day before.

Let's crack on to the photo's of Strasbourg's Christmas market 2010!

Strasbourg Christmas decorations in the streets

More Strasbourg Christmas building decoration

Strasbourg Christmas pub

Strasbourg Christmas market 2010

Strasbourg Cathedral and xmas market

Another pub with Christmas decorations

Strasbourg market stalls

Strasbourg Snow, Cathedral, and Christmas market. This is probably my favourite picture

Some more of the Christmas stalls in Strasbourg

Mulled wine stall on the right

Again, more of the market stalls

Strasbourg's cathedral 

Another one of the cathedral and part of a stall

Strasbourg's Christmas market attracts thousands of tourists

Mulled wine

The entire town seems to get in the festive spirit when it comes to decorating buildings

Strasbourg in all its Christmas and snowy glory

Some more of the market

Every building was decorated in some way or another

More of Strasbourg's cathedral, it's architecture and some Christmas stalls

Strasbourg Marché de noel 2010

Picture came out slightly darker than itended

Just a final shot of Strasbourg's streets in the snow

Hope you enjoyed all these!


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Mad Caddies adventure last night / Unannounced Mad Caddies UK Tour 2011? / My first month here

So guys if you're reading this now (It's 14:31 Europe time on the 14/10/10), as of this hour I have officially been here a month! Just thought I'd share haha. But yeah life is getting easier here. No longer the lonely, difficult, confused boy I was once, but now...a man. Ok so I'm still kinda confused about this entire country but life is progressing, and so is my level of French, which is always good because it's the entire reason I'm out here.

Anyway, enough of that, if you've been following my Facebook/Twitter/This blog you'll be aware that last night I went to watch the Mad Caddies play!

(Original post here: http://studentaroundtheworld.blogspot.com/2010/10/mad-caddies.html)


So yeah, last monday I was talking to some German lads who informed me that the mighty Mad Caddies would be playing in Strasbourg! Now for me this was huuuuuge. It's been about a month since I'd been to a gig and I'd started to get withdrawal symptoms, so the fact that one of my favourite groups were playing here on such short notice was awesome.

Anyways, I had no idea how I was going to get to the gig (It's about a hour and a half walk) I just knew it was one bus, then a 40 minute walk. Instead, after staring at a map for about 10 minutes a helpful French woman approached me and told me that to get to where I wanted I had to take a tram. So one bus and one tram later, I arrived at tiny back alley gig which was actually a really good venue.

What surprised me about this gig was that there were only one support band. Either way these guys were amazing! A French ska/punk band called Zéro Talent. They were AMAZING. I would strongly suggest you check these guys out. I haven't found a link to their myspace yet but they can be found on Facebook here:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Zero-Talent/119980766185


Anyway, after a very enjoyable 40 minutes, they left the stage and Mad Caddies took over.

And they were just as brilliant as they always are. It was the third time I've seen them and with no barrier at the gig, I was at the very front and all I can say is took part in some serioussss stage diving. There's nothing like running on stage while the group is playing then running and diving into the arms of hundreds of sweaty German's and French. I said I'd take some photos for you guys so here we are:

Mad Caddies singer

Mad Caddies guitarist

Mad Caddies guitarist live

Mad Caddies bass and guitarist

Mad Caddies lead singer

Mad Caddies sweaty singer

Mad Caddies bassist

Mad Caddies trumpet

Mad Caddies trombone

Here's the setlist for you Caddie fans:

Mad Caddies setlist 2010

Anyways, after the gig I asked the guitarist for a plectrum, and the drummer for one his sticks. Although neither were signed, the plectrum is sweet as it has their name printed on it. More merch to add to my collection of band merch I guess! I also bought a pretty sweet Mad Caddies Tee shirt ;D

Front of Mad Caddies plectrum

Back of the plectrum

Mad Caddies tee shirt

Oh, I also met the trombonist after the gig who was surprised to find out that I was English and all the way over in Strasbourg haha. He also informed me the Caddies would be touring the UK in February 2011! So watch this space guys!


After the gig finished at 11 and I discovered that the last tram had left or wasn't running because there was a strike (so typical of the French), I spent the next 50 minutes running and cycling with a lovely chap I found lives at my residence, and as he bought a bike to the gig we kept swapping. It was a brilliant way to improve my language as I spent the next 40 minutes conversing in French!

But yeah that's all. Hope you enjoyed!

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Strasbourg at night

Hey guys. Had a lot of people asking for more photos of Strasbourg and upon my walk home yesterday I discovered that the European Parliament looked amazing at night. So, here are a few photos of the European Parliament and other buildings at night.

Now, these are by no means amazing pieces of photography, (I'm only using a £40 Canon Powershot a470) but the river looks quite cool at night, and some of the colours the buildings use to light themselves are pretty sweet.

Ideally, I would've liked to have taken these at sunrise, but I don't fancy it tonight as I'm tired. Another night/morning I will.

Anyways, here are the photos of random buildings:

and here are some of the European Parliament:

>

And there we have it. I know it's only a few but I'm so tired so I stopped taking many I thought it'd keep it as a bit of a teaser.I was also getting a lot of dodgy looks. I mean, hood up, hidden away, taken pictures of the European Parliament in the pitch black.Hope you enjoyed
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Mad Caddies!

So tonight I decided that rather than spend another night sat with my laptop on the internet, I would venture into Strasbourg city centre and head to some bars to speak French with the locals, to improve my language skills. So after meeting some English friends, we headed to a bar with some French guys and some Germans to celebrate someone who I hadn't yet met's birthday.

After several drinks and therefore a confidence boost I found myself



spending the next three hours talking in French about random subjects from music, to new slang words etc.

But the greatest thing I learnt tonight was that one of my favourite ska bands, Mad Caddies, who I have seen twice before, are coming to this small town this Wednesday!

Needless to say I am so hyped!

Oh and also on the way home I saw an Otter jump into the river. Was pretty bad ass! And found a new place to take some awesome photos so hope to give you more soon!


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Strasbourg Cathedral

Hey guys. I know a lot of you like photography, (this is hardly photography, just photos I've taken with a standard digital camera) so I thought I'd upload some pictures of the beautiful Cathedral in Strasbourg city centre. It's an absolutely incredible piece of architecture and I just thought I'd take some photo's so again, I could make my adventure seem even more realistic to you readers. I am sharing my experiences DIRECTLY with you guys :)

Any fool can just Google pictures, but these are taken from my point of view. Nothing fancy here. Just a standard 7 Megapixel camera.

Check them out! 

EDIT: Was just informed by The Lazy Geographer that this was 'Tallest building in the world until 1874, a record it held for over 200 years, and it's still the 6th tallest church in the world.'

It's an incredible spectacle in person. It's honestly over whelming.

Hope you enjoyed! 

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Off to Oktoberfest / Beautiful photo of the Cathedral

Just a short two part post guys. Part one is that tomorrow at 7:30am I am getting the train to Germany to take part in the world renowned Oktoberfest!

In short, 12 hours of drinking non stop in Germany. This picture kinda sums it up:

Don't worry, you'll receive a post upon my return filled with pictures of me no doubt completely off my head!


Part two


A photo of the Cathedral I took. I planned to upload way more but the plugin crashed so I will post another update when I return!

Cya soon!

Remember, if you like the fact I'm off to Oktoberfest or enjoy this picture I took, you can 'Like' it on Facebook by pressing the button up there^

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