14th Christmas in Europe

The 16 schools from 13 different countries each found their stand among those arranged in a circle around the 'central fir-tree'; each stand consisted of a fixed structure, two small tables and a fir-tree which happened to come from the local forests - let us not forget that this edition of Christmas in Europe took place in Northern Portugal. It was up to each team to make their stand as attractive as possible whilst observing the guidelines, in order to illustrate Christmas customs in their country of origin.
While some schools had successfully included this notion of Christmas in the design of their stand, others had preferred to emphasise the tourism aspects of their region. But we could say, in the end, that generally speaking the exhibition was pleasant to look at.


around the 'central fir-tree' the stands are being decorated inside the handsome Fundão municipal building which also contains the hotel school.

As for the actual task of erecting the stands, the work was carried out in an atmosphere of general good humour and hard work. Local ad-hoc solutions were needed to nail, glue, fix and decorate the allocated space as well as circumstances allowed, using items which had often been brought with great difficulty from their own schools. Some schools had wisely brought their items with them, while other unlucky ones waited - in vain - for their packages to be delivered.



There were large numbers of visitors on the opening day of the exhibition, though on the following day the numbers dropped off somewhat. The displays continued nevertheless - for example by the 'Grupo Folklorico et Etnografico Amigos de Fundão' and the 'Santa casa da Misericordia do Fundão' which gave presentations of folk dancing. There were also displays at the Azores stand …


The young Portuguese from the Azores made their stand a lively affair


Portuguese folk dances.