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Tuxes and heels in the medieval city

Blogs: #10 of 29

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For New Years Eve we went to the area behind the cathedral. in Lund, Sweden. The sky was cold and black and the 6th century cathedral was softly lit up on the outside showing off all of the little arches and columns, and the solid, tall, dark towers. To the north is the white stone bishop's palace with its giant fountain. To the Northeast and East are old red brick buildings that were once part of the cathedral community but are now part of the university. In the center of these very old buildings is an area about the size of a football field but is filled with the tallest trees you can imagine. Their bare, black branches are like a black lace ceiling under the night sky. The streets are cobblestone and the buildings outside of the area are half timbered medieval homes one one side or old stone stores on the other.

When we arrived, there were at least 1000 people there, mostly students in their very best clothes. The young women wore their tiniest black miniskirts, black tights or hose, and short black wool coats with dashing scarves. Instead of their usual tall boots they had to totter on the cobblestones in their exquisite, very high heels. The young men were dressed in very nice suits with or tuxedos also with dashing scarves, ascots, silk ties or bow ties. All were holding glasses of champagne, or bottles of vodka in one hand and the young men had fireworks in the other.

These were not your run of the mill fountains or fire crackers and spinners, these were the big ones that go way up high and turn into giant flowers. The crowd milled around everywhere and when you felt like putting off a firework you set it on the ground and lit it. If the crowd noticed, it moved away. I saw people with these long poles that shot fireworks out of the end. They just held the poles in the hand that didn't have their drink. There was an especially good display coming off of the roof of the student union building. The fireworks were like the "grand finale" that we have, and lasted about 10 minutes although people kept putting them off for a while after that. The the sky was lit up with the firework showers all around us and over our heads behind our black lace tree ceiling.

It made our 4th of July fireworks back home look tame. There the city puts all of the dangerous fireworks out on a boat in Lake Macatawa, with a huge cordoned area around them. We are all on shore with soft drinks in one hand and potato chips in the other. Instead of wandering about in our best clothes we are all wearing our old blue jeans while we lie on our backs under cozy blankets on the hill in Kollen Park which overlooks the water. It certainly would be interesting to see all of the young American people in their good clothes and their tuxedos on. There may be a trend for Americans to dress up more, but it has a long way to go before it comes close to the stylishness of the Swedish youth.