Have yourself an Eco-friendly Christmas

Or not...

We went to the Warsaw Christmas lights festival in Plac Zamkowy last night.




This is the event where a whole passel of Polish pop stars descend upon Old Town, whip the crowd into a frenzy of singing and dancing under strobe lights, and play music with heart stopping bass amplification.




The town fathers gradually turn off the lights in the square, until only the stage is still pulsing with LED and strobe illumination, and then suddenly....

"10!" the emcee says.

"9!" A few in the crowd join him.

"8!" More people add their voices to the countdown.

"7!" The suspense builds.

"6!" Small children squeal with excitement.

"5!" People are turning heads every which way.

"4!" (And by the way this counting is all being done in POLISH, of course.)

"3!" (Which we were so pleased to be able to participate in, naturally.)

"2!" A child bursts into earsplitting screams two counts too early.
(Clearly someone who still finds Polish quite difficult...)

"1!" Not much left to say, is there?

"Zero!"

And the lights turn on again! And the tree is now alight!

And in the spirit of the thing, bazooka fan-guns filled with 800 bazillion mylar Christmas tree cutouts blast shiny confetti up into the sky above the crowds, as if to say,

"The hell with you, Poznan Climate Change Conference!"

"We're not complying with your lousy emissions standards!!"

"In fact, we're objecting so much that we're going to spew several thousand kilos of non-biodegradable substances into the sky so that said bits can flutter all the way down to the Wistula to clog up our fair river."

"Take your emissions standards and blow 'em out yer.... oh never mind... "

"It IS Christmas, isn't it?"




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