My last afternoon in Luxembourg, I made my final journey to the Christmas markets and had my final takeaway fondue and gromperekichelchen. I finally tried a feuerzangenbowle. It was actually pretty tasty. There is a special mug with a little metal wire over the top. They balance a brown sugar chunk on the wire, then squirt it with rum. Then, they light it on fire, and the rum and sugar burn into caramel and melt into the wine. I think the fire part of it burns off some of the alcohol in the wine, so it’s not super alcohol-heavy. I sipped on it while eating a fondue and wandering the markets. Then I walked to the train station and bought my ticket to Cologne. Then I went to a different market and enjoyed a beer and a potato pancake. It’s just such a relaxed, pleasant place to hang out. I can’t say enough about how mellow Luxembourg City is. It’s just beautiful and serene. After lunch, I met a friend for coffee, and enjoyed a very Silicon-Valley style coffee place, complete with cold brew and pour-over options.
Drinking my feuerzangenbowle 
More cheese! Fondue to go 
Having a beer with lunch
I went to class from 7-9 before heading to my final dinner in Luxembourg. Here, I made a terrible mistake. I reserved a table at the restaurant Am Tiirmschen, believing it to be the same restaurant where we ate when we were in Luxembourg in April. I was going to have a celebratory kniddelen with foie gras as my final meal in Luxembourg. But sadly, this was not to be, as the restaurant I had wanted to visit (and which I still don’t know the name of) is upstairs in the same building, but is not the same restaurant. Since it was 9:15 p.m., it was far too late in the evening to wander out and see if they have any available tables, as they all close at 10 and would probably have turned me away. So I stayed and had dinner at this well-reviewed traditional Luxembourgish restaurant. The food, sadly, was just ok, but also considerably more expensive than most of the other meals I have had. As they did not have any kniddelen with foie gras, I decided to have their wainsaucisse, which is such a particularly Luxembourgish dish that I really enjoy how strange its combination of French and German cuisine is. However, this time, the mustard sauce is … I dunno, not very creamy. It’s like a runnier sauce and it was just ok. It wasn’t bad, but not a celebratory last meal in Luxembourg. Oh well. It was good and I did enjoy the dessert afterwards, which was a Portuguese biscuit cake. This is a ‘cake’ made from taking cookies (biscuits if you’re british) and layering them with frosting so that they get soggy and soft. That was wonderfully creamy and light.
Wainsaucisse 
Portuguese biscuit cake 
So many layers
On Friday, before getting on the train, I stopped at the Oberweis and purchased an apricot tart and a croque monsieur to eat on the train. Goodbye Oberweis, and fancy pastries. Goodbye Luxembourg. It has been an amazing month.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my time here in Luxembourg. The people have been fantastic. The entire country is beautiful and the city is clean and inviting. Everything is scaled back, quaint, calm. It is perhaps one of the most relaxing cities I have ever visited. There isn’t a ton to do. As a tourist, you’d be pressed to entertain yourself for more than a couple of days. But it’s beautiful and pleasant all the same.
The culture here and the city of Luxembourg are unsettlingly clean and orderly. It’s strange to be in a place where the beauty of the place relies so much on the conformity of the people. There is both an urge to become part of this and a fear of what happens if you don’t fit in. What of the people who aren’t orderly and don’t fit into the box? I don’t get the feeling that there is an overall rejection of people who don’t fit in, but still… I feel like not fitting in somehow degrades the overall appeal of the place. I think my entire life has been an exercise in deciding when to try to fit in and when to be aggressively different. I have both of those things inside of me, so it is definitely a little intimidating to think of moving here someday, and knowingly sacrificing that part. And of course, there is the ever-present background thought of what other people in the world must suffer for this playground to exist. It certainly does not come without its costs.
Politically, it is strangely progressive for a country dominated by a religious political party. The separation of church and state is a fledgling idea here, but the people have voted to allow euthanasia, legalize marijuana, and allow same sex marriage, seemingly without a lot of drama. But… on the other hand, religion and schools seem to be inextricably intertwined, and the wearing of full face coverings was recently voted to be illegal, even though there are exactly 11 women in the entire country who wear them, and the country only stopped paying salaries for priests in the 1990’s. There’s an interesting cultural distaste for any level of surveillance, including dash-cams being illegal and protests against police wearing body cams. Here, though, the police are actually wearing body cams to help catch people who commit acts of violence against the police. Apparently, attacking police with bottles or syringes is a thing here.
There’s a strange balance between the immigrant community, which comprises about 49% of the country, and the Luxembourgish nationals. The immigrants want more power to make political decisions and the right to vote. Which I understand. At thee same time, the country of Luxembourg has one of the easiest paths to citizenship that I am familiar with, so I’m not sure why those people aren’t just applying for citizenship. The Luxembourgish citizens do, however, greatly benefit from the immigrant community. The banks and international businesses here bring in lots of tax revenue. And Luxembourg has positioned itself to prevent other EU countries from offering the same tax breaks that they offer, so they remain a very desirable location for international businesses. But to that end, they do ensure that the citizens benefit from this situation. Any jobs with the state are limited to Luxembourgish citizens, and pay quite well. Teachers can make $100,000 a year here, since the requirements for most of these jobs is fluency in Luxembourgish, French, and German, and few foreigners can meet these criteria, even if they do obtain citizenship. So being born here has its perks, and working as a government employee, being limited to only half the population, seems easy to get into and pays quite well. There are bus drivers and forest wardens and of course, all of the politicians and lawyers, and teachers.
So with this, I say goodbye to Luxembourg for now. I have so many fond memories and have had a lovely stay here. The people have been wonderful. The city is unbelievably beautiful. The food was fantastic. I learned a lot in my classes and I hope I did well on my language test! <3
