If you really want something but just can’t find it, you can grumble and moan. Or you can roll up your sleeves and make it happen, like Nicole Rahimi did. Saxon by birth, Rahimi comes from Zwickau at the foot of the Erzgebirge mountains – a region also known as the Land of Christmas. “I love Christmas! It’s a wonderful time of year and I’ve enjoyed it ever since I was a child. To me, the festive season means Schwibbogen candle arches, incense candles, stollen and a stroll around the Christmas market,” says the 37-year-old. “When I moved to London with my husband and young daughter in 2004, I was really shocked to find there was nothing really special about the run-up to Christmas, unlike back home in Germany. There weren’t many traditional Christmas markets around then.” Two years later, the family moved to Oxford when Rahimi’s husband took up a research post there. But the city of dreaming spires had no Christmas markets either.