Debrecen, Hungary – In Pictures

Ceylon tea at Carpe Diem Tea House on Batthyány Street

Snow falls in all its beauty

Christmas market in the city centre

Christmas market in the city centre

A tram passes through the Christmas market all lit up

German style burger and hot-dog at the Christmas market

The Northern Great Plain, part of the Great Hungarian Plain

Nagypiac (Big Market) hosting many fresh fruit and veg stalls as well as butchers and fishmongers

Left: Road, Middle: Cycle path, Right: Footpath

Békás-tó (Frog Lake)

Nagytemplom (Great Church) The Great Calvinist Church of Debrecen

Nagyerdő (Big Forest)

University of Debrecen (UNIDEB) main building

2013 Flower Festival – Held in August, annually

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UK Christmas & the economic crises

Christmas is coming up soon and students (Chinese and Turkish) used to ask me what Christmas was like/about in the UK.

Well, as the last couple of census’ have shown us religion (and in particular Christianity) in the UK is on the rapid decline, however this doesn’t/hasn’t effected how we in the UK celebrate Christmas.

For most of the UK (God believers or not) Christmas is now more about family time, a time of the year when families get together and exchanges a gift to show their love and appreciation for each other (as well as eat and drink far to much).

Economic crises

Since the economic crises hit, Christmas has been somewhat a time of panic, panic for the parents who can no longer afford the latest games console for their kids, panic for the high-street businesses who will shortly realise that they are about to go into administration which in turn follows the panic for the governments and the market.

Last month Comet went into administration, who will be next?

Future

Historically Christmas was a time when consumerism went crazy and businesses really cashed in but with the UK’s triple A rating under threat the continued outlook is still rather gloomy. People’s jobs are not safe enough to risk spending money they don’t have, businesses will suffer and more redundancies will follow.