The Joy of Neighbors

I've explained the concept of Kehrwoche before - we have to clean the landing and the stairs down to the next landing in the common stairwell of our apartment building. We do this every second week, alternating with our neighbors.

Lots of people (including myself) are not very diligent about remembering Kehrwoche. But my husband, being the good Schwab that he is, always remembers Kehrwoche. The Saturday we got married, we came home from our reception at 4:30 a.m. on Sunday morning and Marc did Kehrwoche.

And having lived here for 1.5 years, we have never seen/heard our neighbors do the Kehrwoche on their week. And on the Sunday after their Kehrwoche, it doesn't look so clean. But being the trusting people that we are, we just take it for granted that they do it most of the time.

Well, last weekend, we had Kehrwoche. And as Marc was faithfully cleaning the stairwell, he found some powdery substance under the neighbors' doormat. Now, we've heard stories of neighbors putting threads or powder under their doormat to check that the others are doing their Kehrwoche, but we really thought these were a type of urban legend.

Well, not any more. It's happened to us personally. Take a look...

So, what do you do when something like this happens? Just clean it up and throw it away. Oh no, not Marc. He wanted them to know that we knew what they had done. So he made a little pile and left it in front of their door.
It was the neighborly thing to do, right? Maybe they lost it and were looking for it and didn't think to look under the mat. Or maybe they can use it again in two weeks when we're back on for Kehrwoche.

And cleaned the rest of the stairwell so loud that the whole house must of known that we do Kehrwoche!

Harbor Town

Two weeks ago, we visited Hamburg for the weekend. Marc has a friend who moved there about 6 months ago, so we headed up to visit him. We took the train, a ride of about 5.5 hours. This is pretty comfortable, although even on the train you can end up sitting in traffic (the ride home took about 6.5 hours). But since neither one of us had to drive, we could work on our website, read, sleep, whatever. It's a good, relatively inexpensive way to travel - taking the car would have cost more.

Hamburg is really pretty. It's on a harbor, the 2nd biggest in Europe. We took a tour of the harbor by boat. There were giant freighters and some really big luxury yachts. Roman Abramovich, the fifteenth richest man in the world, was having a yacht built that cost 200 million per meter and was 100 meters long. It had a lot of bathrooms and other crazy features, that you just cannot imagine needing on a boat.
Hamburg also has several seas, where you can go boating, kayaking, etc. It's really something special to live on the water, I think. Maybe you take it for granted once you've been there for a while, but for me it has a special charm.Saturday, we checked out the town and found that the Stuttgart wine festival happened to be in Hamburg while we were there:

Marc snapped this:
And I took this one:
It's not a memorial to Rex. After I took this picture, a homeless man came up to Marc and told him that these are the shoes of a volunteer from the Maltesers. The volunteer said he had been running around so much, that his shoes were smoking and needed to cool off...

While downtown, the police started blocking off the streets and then there was a demonstration. I know that one of the topics was against deporting illegal immigrants. Oh and they demonstrated, because Hamburg does not do a good enough job of protecting the environment. And I think they threw in a few other topics, too. I think it's great that people march for things that they believe in, but there didn't really seem to be a cohesiveness between the topics they had chosen for their demonstration, which made it a little difficult to understand what the primary goal of the demonstration was. The police escorted the demonstraters through. And filmed them, in case something happened, so that they could then have video evidence. (The banner says "No deportation, jail or camps. The right to stay for all!") It was a peaceful demonstration, but the police were dressed in riot gear anyways. Even though they do this regularly any time there will be a large crowd (European Soccer championships as an example), I still can't get used to it, it makes me nervous every time.

While the streets were still closed, some guy in a little sports car went around the barriers. As he came to the end of the demonstration, there was a police man on a motorcycle, who indicated that he should pull over. Instead of pulling over, he made a screeching U-turn and drove very quickly in the other direction. Now, you have to understand that practically the whole Hamburg police force was in this general vicinity. He did make it around the corner, but ended up having to stop at a red light. And there in front of him, was the big police riot van. So he didn't get any farther. Genius, huh?

Saturday night, we grilled. Marc's friend works on the 6th floor of a parking garage. Well, he doesn't work in the parking garage, but on the 6th floor there are offices. And not your normal, everyday offices. Little two room offices rented to a bunch of random companies, mostly in the IT area. And then they have a common area with a piano, a fish tank and books. And a big balcony with a picnic table and a grill. The whole thing is kind of random. But it had a good view!
During our visit in Hamburg, we did eat Hamburgers. Did you know that the Hamburger was actually started in Hamburg? And the German immigrants, who often passed through Hamburg, brought it with them to the US, where it was then premiered at several fairs and somehow made it's way to becoming an American tradition.
All in all, Hamburg was well worth the weekend trip!

I thought...

that the ticket-takers at the boarding gate were there to make sure that only those who had booked got on the flight. And then I read this

Something I thought couldn't happen any more!

Well, I'm just not good at keeping resolutions - in November, I wrote that I wanted to post every second day. And since I wrote that, it has been exactly 8 months since I posted.

A lot has happened in those 8 months! And since I'm sitting here on the couch with Bronchitis, totally bored out of my mind, let's do a brief recap...

At the end of November, Marc and I got married. At least, we had our civil ceremony. I heard from a lot of people that this is a really impersonal ceremony, but ours was actually a lot of fun. The official had quotes from Woody Allen and was quite funny. We just got the video from the ceremony this past weekend and I'm looking forward to watching it!

[Pause due to bronchitis-related coughing fit.]

In December, I flew to the States for a week of work and then two weeks of vacation. Marc came after Christmas (yes, we spent our first Christmas apart) with his parents. We had a really nice post-wedding party in the States (thanks again, Mom!), at which Marc met many of my family and friends. It was a lot of fun!
And then we dragged my in-laws through the cold to show them the Detroit area. Actually, it was lot of fun, even with the cold. You don't realize that Detroit can be kind of interesting until you see it through someone else's eyes. One of the highlights was definitely the Red Wing's hockey game - my mother-in-law asked me if she "had" to go, to which I simply responded, "yes" and then she loved it! Maybe not so much the game, but definitely the suite and the whole hoopla that surrounds the game! After a few days, they had had enough and left for warmer parts - Florida! We celebrated my birthday, New Year's and Marc's birthday before heading back to Germany.
Somehow, we both managed to get sick just before/during the flight. I had a cold and slept the whole time and Marc spent most of the flight in the restroom with the stomach flu. I didn't know he was sick until I woke up when we landed in Paris for our layover. The airport was so full that we ended up just laying on the floor. We got some pretty strange looks, but were both too sick to care. Marc got over the flu and ended up with my cold, which he had for almost two months!

In February, we were off to Montafon, Austria, to do (read "try to do") Marc's favorite winter sport, skiing. If you know me at all, you know that my coordination is...well, you know that I'm not coordinated. And that I have a fear of heights. So my husband, being the good man that he is, agreed to shell out the extra bucks for a ski instructor, because, hey, if I'm going to have to try and accomplish the impossible, somebody else should show me how. No, really, he loves skiing and hoped that with a professional to help me get started, that I would love it, too.I'm sad to report that I didn't love. But it's not just that I didn't love it, I HATED it. I was on the kid's slope (I don't even think it can be called a bunny hill, it was probably too small for that) and I was terrified. Here, kids are whooshing past me on skis and my knees are knocking, I'm so afraid. My instructor was nice, he was funny, but I couldn't get it. So I spent the rest of our ski vacation in the apartment we had rented, reading, watching TV, going for walks and just NOT skiing.

March and April were spent planning our church wedding. May, too. In May, we tried not to be too worried about all the small details we hadn't taken care of yet or thought about or...We did get it all done! A week before the big day, we had a polterabend. This was a very fun party, with lots of coworkers and friends. My cousin and his girlfriend had gotten in a week before to backpack around Europe. Unfortunately, their plans were (slightly) influenced by striking train drivers in France and the Netherlands, so they joined us for the party as well. A lot of porcelain was thrown (and thanks to my brother-in-law, the bags of shards were reemptied, to be cleaned up again) and a good time was had by all.
Then came the big day. It went pretty much as planned, with only little things being different that I had expected. We were really concerned about the weather, because it had been very cold and very rainy here. But it was a beautiful day and only rained for about 1.5 hours at 4 p.m. So we couldn't have coffee and cake outside, but hey, at least the rest of the day was beautiful!
Our church...(since the FeG doesn't have a building, we got married in the church that Marc attended as a child - and where he was baptized.)














And the reception was on a farm...



If you haven't seen the wedding site, let me know and I'll send you the link. And, my parents and my littlest brother (yes, you're bigger than me, I know!) were here! So it was a great day!

In June, with the wedding over, we asked ourselves, what will we do to occupy our free time, which had been consumed for the last three months with wedding preparations? The answer wasn't hard to find...soccer! The European Championships! Germany is a very tournament-oriented team, so although they weren't favored to win, we were highly confident that they would do well. We watched almost every game. I missed two and a half and I think that Marc only missed one. That's a lot of games, people. But it was a lot of fun. Generally, we watched the games here at home, carrying our TV out onto the patio, so that we could watch outside. But for the last few games, we went to public viewings, because the atmosphere is just so much better. (The picture is of the German fans swarming the streets after Germany won the quarter final.)

We watched some of the games in Prague, as we spent a weekend there. Prague is absolutely beautiful. It was bombed during the war (by the Americans in 1945 - the city had been under Nazi occupation since 1939), but it was not destroyed in the same way as Stuttgart or many other cities, so that it still has many old historical buildings and sites. But, Prague is a city overrun by tourists. During our trip, we didn't learn anything about the Czech people and heard more English, Italian and other languages than we did Czech. We learned a lot of history, but wished that we had learned more about today's Czechs or met some of them...
Then, it was back home, back to work and Germany in the European Championship finals, against Spain, who hadn't won in something like 24 years! We rooted for Germany, but they didn't make it. With a disappointing effort, they lost 0-1 to Spain.

And that's about that. Nothing exciting in the last week, because I've spent it on the couch, watching more TV than I care to mention.

[Another pause for coughing.]

So, I'm going to eat my chicken noodle soup, take my medicine, drink my tea and work on getting better. Have a good weekend!

[p.s. We'll see when I'll post again...I'll try to be better, but you've heard that one before.]
[p.p.s. I have a new email address, because I haven't been getting emails sent to hotmail. If you don't have it yet, it's . If you've sent me an email and haven't gotten an answer, please send it again to the new address!]

Also

I think posting every second day might be my new goal. Hey, in comparison to posting once a month, it's like a 200% improvement, right? This post will be short.....today I had to get up extra early, because I had a seminar about 40 minutes from here (without traffic backups), which started at 8 am. The seminar continues again tomorrow and again starts at 8 am. So, I will be going to bed very shortly.

We have an ongoing problem here in Germany - have you heard? The locomotive drivers have been striking on and off for a month, which seems like forever now. So, I basically have to check the news every morning to find out if I can take the train today or if there is a strike again and I should take the car. And on the days when they're not striking, there is always some problem which causes the delay or complete cancellation of a train. The union cannot agree with the employer on a salary level. It looks like they'll be striking again on Thursday, but this time they won't be striking the local street trains, they'll be striking the commercial transport. Most people are hopeful that this means that companies will put more pressure on the settling of a contract. Can you imagine if there's no commercial transport of goods possible? As a substitute, trucks would probably have to be rented for transport. Which will cause more delays and jams on the highways. It's a mess. Don't misunderstand. I'm all for the right of the locomotive drivers to strike. But it's going on too long now, in my opinion. I can't say which side needs to settle, because I'm not that knowledgeable on the topic. But somebody needs to do something......

Keep on Tryin'

Ok, so only 3 days into November and I've already failed at NaBloPoMo. Well, it's not that big a surprise given how infrequently I post....why did I think I would be able to post every day? But nobody loves a quitter, so I'm going to keep trying. Like my Mom always told us kids "Keep on keepin' on." We'll see....

There's a really cool new website "Free Rice." It gives you a word and then a list of four other words, one of which is a synonym. You have to find the synonym. For each word you get right, 10 grains of rice are donated to the United Nations to help fight hunger. 45,760,870 grains of rice were donated yesterday alone! How cool is that? And as a side benefit, your vocabulary will be expanded. Check it out. I had some words which I had never heard before. As you get words right, it gets harder, so good luck!

Here's the verse that's running through my head on a loop today:
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29.11 (NIV)

Happy Sunday!

2. November

I made it with one minute to go! Today I donated blood for the first time in Germany...more tomorrow. ;o)

Outback

On Tuesday night, Marc and I discovered the Australian Outback without leaving our little town of Fellbach. It surprised me to discover that there is an Australian wine shop in Fellbach. And on the last Tuesday of the month, they have a Stammtisch. Unfortunately, they don't speak English at their Stammtisch (it didn't bother me, but Marc was looking forward to it). They do have wine and food. So (hold on to your seat) on Tuesday night, I ate kangaroo. That's right, the little hippity hoppity creatures that look so cuddly. And.....it wasn't bad. I wouldn't make kangaroo a regular part of my diet, but it was definitely edible. It did not, however, taste like chicken.
While eating, we heard a presentation from Otto, a German who has lived in Australia for 15 years. He gives guided tours of the Canning Stock Route. His presentation was interesting, but I don't feel like I need to jump on a plane to Australia tomorrow.
In other big news that I haven't yet posted on this blog, we're getting married! I have alluded to Marc for the last many months and now it's time to finally make it official (on the blog anyways).
It's amazing what you have to go through to get married in Germany. As a foreigner, I'm required to present an Ehefaehigkeitszeugnis, or a document which states that I am able to marry (because I'm not married to anyone else). The United States, however, doesn't provide such a document. So, I had to drive to Frankfurt and obtain an Affadavit from the American Consulate, on which I swore to my single status. Then, I had to order my birth certificate, with an Apostille. That cost a pretty penny and took a while, because it had to go to the Great Seal office in Lansing. Then, I had to give it to a translator and have it officially translated into German. Marc had it much easier, he needed his family book and his parent's marriage certificate. Because his parents' marriage and his birth took place in the same city, he only had to go to one office and it's practically around the corner (I'm not bitter, just stating the facts).
Once we had all these documents, we went to the Standesamt, or Registry Office. In Germany, you are required to be married by the "state." It's not like in the US, where pastors are allowed to perform ceremonies which are in turn recognized by the state. Here, you can choose whether or not you want a "church" wedding, but you must be married at the Standesamt.
So, the Standesamt....we signed lots of papers saying that we're not already married, that we want to get married, that I want to change my name, .... And they took all of those papers and sent them to the Appellate Court. Because, remember, I couldn't present an Ehefahigkeitszeugnis. So, the Standesamt had to make an application to the Appellate Court to waive the requirement that I present that document and let me get married anyways.
And that's where we're hanging out. Waiting for the Court.
Today's a holiday in Germany - All Saint's Day. So the company is closed. And our department is closed tomorrow, too. Yea for a four day weekend!
Tomorrow, my landlord will come over to look at the faucets in the bathroom. The renter before me had to replace them, because they had washed them with something that ended up streaking them black. So he wants to see them and he wants to look at the water damage from the previous renter. He's also going to receive notice that I'm moving out, but he doesn't know that yet. He had called about a month ago and left a message that he needed to make an appointment with me to come by. I called him back, a couple of times, but it always just rang and rang. So I check the mail on Monday and I have a letter from him that I need to give access to my apartment within the next ten days, because he's left repeated messages to which I have not responded. This is an untruth and I was very angry. So I called him and told him I had received one message from him (he did not respond to that) and had called him back. He stated that he sees the number when he has missed a call and I stated that I see the same. Well, he just moved on to "when can we come by?" So he'll be here tomorrow....
Monday night was not a fun night for the mail....I had an 800 Euro bill from the dentist, which covered three months of visits, but should please be paid in the next 20 days. I also had a 150 Euro bill from the surgeon for the removal of my toenail. Then there was the 100 Euro bill from the Dermatologist. I think they had all called one another and agreed to send their bills at the same time. And unfortunately, because my insurance is in the US, I have to send the bills over (with claim forms that I'm really not sure I completed correctly, although I used to do that as my job...). Then they have to have the bills translated, then they will consider the claim. This will take ages. I know some fellow expats who have been waiting six months now to get their money back. Yikes.
In the last update for today, Marc gave me highlights yesterday. I'm not sure if I like them. I think I need to live with them for a little while. The color is a little funky. Not blond, but not quite red. Not orange, either, though....
November is National Blog Posting Month (NaBlogPoMo), so I'm going to try to post every day. Think I can do it?

August - where did it go?

It's almost the middle of September! I know, it's been almost a month since I posted. Somehow, I just keep forgetting to post.....

August/September was busy with three weeks of vacation.....My dad and brother came to visit! They arrived on the 20th and we took off running. We went directly from the airport in Frankfurt to Heidelberg, which is a really nice city with a castle. The next day was off to Strasbourg, France, where we saw the cathedral and ate Flammkuchen (yum, if you have the chance, try it!). Wednesday we visited Ludwigsburg. Ludwigsburg has one of the best palace tours I have been on. And the palace is surrounded by amazing gardens. The city center is also really nice and that's where we had a late lunch. That night, I dragged them along to a birthday party for one of my friends. It was really interesting, some of my friends got to test out their English skills and Dad and Andy had to test their German, because not all of my friends can speak English. (I think) A good evening was had by all! On Thursday, we checked out Stuttgart. The TV tower, which provides a good 360 view of the region from waaaay to high up, the city center (yes, they had to wait for me while I bought shoes). That evening when Marc got off of work we got in the car and drove to Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Along the way, we stopped in Munich for dinner (the Hofbraeuhaus is a tourist must!) I had reserved the pension for that night online (Hotel Bavaria booked through Hostelbookers.com for 18 Euro per person!!) and we were very pleasantly suprised. As we arrived, the man who received us determined that the beds in the room we had reserved (yes, all four of us in one room!) would be too small for Andy. So, he gave us (for free, can you believe it?) a second room. The room was very clean. And the breakfast the next morning was outstanding!
Friday morning, we drove to Zugspitze and took the tram ride to the top (we went up from the Austrian side...it's less expensive). I'm afraid of heights (yes, even despite the hot air balloon ride) and this ride was quite the test....the tram was pretty swingy. But the view from up there was amazing! (I am working on uploading pictures, the upload tool is really slow.) I highly recommend the trip up there. And on the top of this mountain, you're standing on the border of Austria and Germany, which is also pretty cool.
From there, we took off for Fuessen. Along the way, we saw a fortress ruin at the top of a hill (or was it a mountain?) and thought it would be fun to go up and check it out. I think this was probably the part of the trip that my honored visitors enjoyed the least. The way was steep. The way was long. The way was not easy. But everyone powered through and we made it to the top. (Confession? The ruin wasn't that interesting. And then we found a much easier way down. Oops.) We made it to Fuessen in time to have some coffee and look around the city a little. Dinner was at a Croatian restaurant (do you know how hard it is to find an authentic German restaurant?). A little too much meat for me, but okay. We headed for the hostel. This was interesting. Not so lucky this time, but still not bad. A real backpacker hostel. Hey it was clean, there were towels and it was cheap. We all slept in bunk beds. Apparently, I was breathing too deeply, because I woke up to being hit with a T-Shirt from above....
The next day was off to Neuschwanstein, which is the castle that Disney modeled Cinderella's after. Having been there before, I recommended we not take the (unimpressive) tour. But we did walk to the top (gotta love Germany - lots and lots of walking!).
Then we headed to the Bodensee or Lake Constance. I had never been there before. It's quite lovely. We went swimming (hurray!) and then went to our hotel. Marc did good on this one...it was lovely. We went for dinner (walked there, too) at a lakeside restaurant. It was, in the words of Marc, very romantic. I have to agree that it was quite lovely. On the way back, we stopped for a while at a concert on a street corner. They were a pretty good cover band. Then it was off to bed. Marc and I got up really, really early and went for a really, really cold swim in the lake. We wanted to go to the Island Mainau, but it was so expensive, we decided not to. So we headed off for home. On the way, we stopped at the castle Hohenzollern. This was another hard trek up a mountain. Man, did we get our exercise! The tour is brief, but beautiful. Later on our way, overcome with the desire to go swimming, we stopped at another lake for a quick dip. We were so fortunate to have good weather, it didn't last too much longer. I, for one, was very tired by the time we got home on Sunday night. Monday, we went to Esslingen, which I think is such a beautiful city. (They have a really cool Middle Ages Christmas Market.) Then the boys went to the zoo and I went shopping for a few last minute things for Italy. It was home for a while, then off to one last dinner in Stuttgart. The next morning, we were on our way to the airport in Frankfurt at 6:30. I got back to Stuttgart at about 10. I packed pretty fast and it was time for Vacation part 2.
Marc and I drove about 7 hours to Lago de Garda in Italy, where his parents were camping. I slept in a tent for the second time in my life! We got in pretty late and pretty much went right to bed. We were there from Tuesday night until Friday morning. The first activity each morning? Yep, swimming! Then breakfast. On Wednesday, we were able to take the boat out twice. It was gorgeous (check the pictures on Flickr, if it ever finishes loading!) On Thursday, it rained. I played a game with Marc's dad, read and was just generally lazy until afternoon, when we headed to Verona. Yes, the Verona where Romeo and Juliet takes place. I even saw the balcony from the story. And in the alley which goes through to the walkway, there are tons and tons of love notes stuck all over the walls. It was quite romantic! We stopped in Sirmione for dinner on the way back. It's a really beautiful city. And the food was sooooo delicious! Friday, it rained again (but after our morning swim) and then the sun came out about the time we had to leave. For vacation part 3.
We headed to the Allgaeu, Allmannsreid to be exact (good luck finding it on a map - I think it only consists of five houses). A group from church had rented a house. It was a very nice house. Unfortunately, we had incorrectly thought that it was closer to Italy than it was....we ended up driving 9 hours to get there and didn't get in until almost midnight, which meant that our friends had to wait up for us (sorry guys!). On Saturday, we decided to go ride a Sommerrodelbahn (this is translated as toboggan run, it's like a sled which runs on tracks, so it can run year round). To get up there, we had to ride a ski lift. I've never ridden a ski lift before. Marc had a pretty good laugh, because the whole way up, I was rationalizing to myself that no one falls out of a ski lift, that the cables of ski lifts don't break (often), that 100s of people ride ski lifts and live to tell about it. The toboggan run was a blast! Marc and I rode together (he manned the breaks, I held on tight). I think I only screamed once. It was so much fun, we went back on Sunday. I should have enjoyed the ski lift more, this time we hiked to the top. It was far. But it was worth it to ride down again! Unfortunately, when we got to the top, there was about an hour wait. Marc was supposed to fly to Berlin that evening. Let's just cut to the chase and say that he missed his flight. He rebooked for the next morning, which saw us getting up at 4:30 to get him to the airport. I headed back to the house (about an hour's drive from the airport) and was supposed to write him an SMS that I found it. My phone woke me up at 8 - Marc had landed in Berlin and was worried, because I hadn't texted him....I had fallen asleep writing the SMS. We didn't have good weather for the time in Allgaeu, but it was fun nonetheless. We played games every evening, sang, ate (really well!), visited a cheese factory, went for a long hike. On Wednesday, we headed out at about lunchtime. On the way home, I was supposed to pick up Marc from the airport. As I was almost to the exit for the airport, my phone rang - Marc was calling, not a good sign, he should have been unable to call because he was on a plane! Yep, he had missed his flight again. I started laughing. He didn't find it so funny to be paying another change fee. He ended up flying into Stuttgart and I made it there just in time to pick him up. We went for Thai in the city and then stopped by his parents before heading home.
Vacation wasn't completely over yet. Thursday we went to an indoor water park. Unfortunately, I injured my toe. I had injured it two years ago when I was working in Anderson. Then in Italy, I hurt it again and it bled pretty good. In the pool, it just almost fell off, but didn't bleed, a pretty clear sign I had killed it. I got a bandaid from first aid and we went to the movies. We saw the Bourne Ultimatum, which was pretty good.
Friday morning, I visited a surgeon for the first time in my life. He was sooooooo nice. And yes, he did have to remove my toenail. The worst parts were the shots he had to give me. They were painful. But then nothing else hurt after that. I had to wear a slipper until today, because none of my shoes fit/it hurt too much to wear shoes. I was supposed to keep my foot up, so we didn't do much that day. Well, we did go to the outdoor store and I bought hiking pants. Marc bought hiking boots. We are well-outfitted and now that my toe has healed pretty well, I hope we'll manage to get in some good fall hikes.
Monday it was back to work. I forgot how tiring it is to work - or maybe it's the lack of naps that I'm noticing.....
It was a very wonderful amazing vacation. Dad and Andy, thanks for visiting, I'm so glad you came! I would recommend Italy to everyone - I would like to see more of it myself! And Allgaeu is always nice - even in the cold and rain.
Next vacation? December 17th -> Stateside!

Hot Air Balloons and More

I guess I'm on a once-a-month-posting pattern. I have gotten TERRIBLE at posting. And I"m not sure why, because it's not like there isn't stuff to write about. Like there was the time we jumped into the Neckar River in our clothes and it was FREEZING! But somehow, I just don't get around to posting about it.....

Last Saturday, we went to the Allgau for a hot air balloon ride. Marc made a bet that he lost and the price was that he had to pay for his buddy's portion of the hot air balloon ride. It was an amazing experience! Here's my certificate, which christens me with my balloon name: Princess Sarah the charming airborne Amazon from the Föhn clouds. (Föhn is a regional term referring to winds in the Alps.) It also says that we went as high as 1200 m (almost 4,000 feet), but the driver (hot air balloons are driven, not flown) told us that we went up about 350 m (almost 1150 feet). We have pictures, too, but they'll come later...
The weather here has been terrible. It's been raining and not warm. But the weekend is supposed to be nice. I hope it stays that way!

I got the new Harry Potter book two days ago. I'm so excited to read it! It doesn't come out in German for another two months or so, so I'm really ahead of the crowd here.....

Yesterday I had a very interesting experience. I went to the Dermatologist. Now I know that's not that interesting. But she was pretty interesting.....she practices holistic Chinese medicine. I didn't mean to go to a Chinese medicine practicing dermatologist, I just found her in the internet. But it's very interesting, I'll be drinking tea and tracking my diet and going for a facial. Not your run-of-the-mill treatment plan for skin problems.....But I figure, I've been fighting with my skin for more than half of my life, so as long as she's not telling me I have to eat turtles or stand on my head, I'm willing to try what she's offering. I'm very curious to see what happens.

Who knew?

I have a very un-German last name. And despite that, there are lots of people in Germany with my last name....From www.verwandt.de

Happy (Belated) Anniversary to me

Amazingly enough, I have been here in Germany for one entire year. (My actual anniversary is June 24th, but like almost always, I didn't manage to post on time.)

It seems pretty amazing that it's been an entire year. There have been some extreme highs and some deep lows. Overall, there have definitely been more highs than lows. I've been very fortunate to have made some really good friends here and they make my life here really, really great. And Stuttgart is an amazing city. There's no end to the activities here. And it's beautiful, really beautiful. My job is a challenging, but it's also pretty great. I never dreamed of having the opportunity to travel on business trips as I have in the last several months.

But I wouldn't be honest if I said it was all roses. At the beginning, it was very hard. I struggled with the language, I was totally afraid of picking up the phone at work, because I thought I wouldn't understand the person on the other end. And I spent a lot of time alone when I first moved here. And I'm very far away from my family - when you live five minutes away from family, you take them for granted. When they're not so close, it's, well, I still have homesickness some days. And then there are the days - let's call them the "foreigner days"...Most days I do feel at home here, but these foreigner days are the days when I am very aware that I am living in a "foreign" country.

I would do it all over again, though. In a heartbeat. I have learned so much about myself and about what I am capable of. I've improved my German. I've made amazing friends. I bought a car all on my own. I've lived in three different places in one year. I've been on 3 different continents in the last four months. All in all, it's been one amazing year.

Back home again....

I arrived home again on Saturday evening. I was awake for an entire 24 hours on Saturday. Quite the achievement. I'm tired now, but not terribly. I think it's so much easier to fly from east to west than from west to east.

Japan is a very interesting country. I'm really grateful that I had the opportunity to be here. At the same time, I'm really, really glad to be home again. I'll try to get the pictures uploaded soon.

I guess this will be a short post today....more about Japan to come. :o)

What to do in Japan when you can't sleep....

There's no English programming on TV, so.....

You Are Very Mature

Even though you may not always feel like it, you're a full fledged adult. And while everyone should be as mature as you, most people aren't!

Are You Immature?

There might be more, we'll see...

Greetings from Japan!

Hello from Prince Kawagoe Hotel! Kawagoe is about thirty minutes from Tokyo with the fast train or two hours from the airport with a bus (in the upperish left corner of the map).

I arrived in Tokyo this morning after an 11.5 hour flight from Zurich. The flight from Stuttgart to Zurich is short - less than an hour. Unfortunately, we had to sit on the tarmac for thirty minutes to wait to take-off because of traffic in Zurich. So I had to book it to make my flight to Tokyo, because the airport in Zurich is huge. I had to take an underground train from the terminal I arrived in to the terminal I departed from.

I had zero problems at customs in Tokyo, I'm happy to report (always a really happy thing to get through customs with ease!). The guy actually didn't ask me a thing. He stapled something into my passport, stuck a sticker in there and handed it back to me. Easy as that. Guess I look harmless.

I had been given instructions to take a airport transit bus from the airport to my hotel in Kawagoe. But when I went to the ticket counter, the lady told me that their buses don't go to Kawagoe. So I asked her which bus did and she pointed me to a counter further down. That lady informed me that their bus goes to Kawagoe, but only to the train station, not to the hotel directly (these buses generally make stops at each hotel). So I asked her how I could get from the train station to the hotel (it was only supposed to be 7 minutes walking or so). But she didn't know. Without other options, though, I took the bus to the Kawagoe train station. Because we took the freeway, I didn't see much of Tokyo (plus, I dozed off a lot!). My only impression is that the buildings are really, really close to one another.

When I got to the train station, I didn't see any special signs for the hotel or maps of the area. So I went to the nearest taxi, showed him the print-out from the hotel's website and asked if he knew it. He nodded, said something in Japanese and started to put my suitcases in the trunk. So I guessed that he would take me there and I got in the taxi. Well, the hotel is about 3 minutes drive from the train station. That three minutes cost 660 Yen. (The conversion rate at the airport was 156 Yen to 1 Euro. In the Internet it's $121 to 1 Yen). They have 500 Yen coins and 100,000 Yen bills!

Mom, you'll be interested to know that on the way here, I saw a 7-11! Slurpee anyone??

The hotel is a very different style. I don't have a Japanese-style room (I do have a bed and the table does have legs), but it's not typical American or European. The toilet has so many buttons, that I'm glad I could figure out how to flush it. The bathroom reminds me of a RV bathroom, only a little bigger. You have to step up into it, for reasons which are not clear to me. They have CNN on TV, but everything is translated into Japanese and you can't hear the English behind the translation. So there aren't any stations that aren't in Japanese.

Twice since I've been here, the Japanese Democratic Party has driven by, with a loudspeaker and some announcement/propoganda/??. If only I knew Japanese......

I took a nap when I got here, because I was so tired and it was raining anyways. Around 5 pm, it had cleared up, so I went to the front desk and asked for a map. At first, she tried to give me a Japanese map, because they didn't have any in English. I must have looked not too happy with that, because she asked me to wait, went running away and came back with a map in Japanese, English and German. She asked where I wanted to go and I asked where I should go. So she marked on the map where the old district is and where the shopping district is. I went walking for about two hours and took some pictures.

My camera battery ran out, so I went into a grocery store to buy a new one. If I read correctly, then an onion costs 85 Yen! 4 AA batteries cost 398 Yen. Imagine always having to have such large amounts of money available. Because the Yen is so devalued, this probably doesn't seem like a lot of money to the average Japanese, but it sure seems like a lot to me. I have to keep doing the math to convert into Euros to assure myself that I'm not giving away the farm while buying batteries.

Because I saw absolutely nothing in English at any of the restaurants, I decided to come back to the hotel for dinner. There are multiple restaurants in the hotel, including French, Chinese and Japanese. Being that I am in Japan, I chose the Japanese restaurant. I sat at the Sushi bar and told myself I would at least try everything placed in front of me. First, he brought me a menu in Japanese (I appreciate that it seems that people think you can speak Japanese, rather than assuming you can't), so I had to ask for a menu in English. He brought me one, but to be honest, it wasn't too helpful...."5 seasonal appetizers", "Salad"....not too descriptive. The cheapest menu was 3,000 Yen, the most expensive was 10,000. So by American or German standards, it's an expensive restaurant! I selected the most inexpensive Tempura menu, because I knew that meant at least part of my meal would be cooked (Tempura is lightly breaded and fried). I received a salad, a pickle dish, the Tempura (fried crab, fish, eggplant and another vegetable I couldn't identify), 5 slices of various raw fish, another bowl with shrimp, tofu, vegetables and some more fish, soup and rice. And Japanese tea, of course. I ate almost everything, including most of the raw fish, except for the soup. And all of it with chopsticks (a fork wasn't offered). I wasn't sure on the soup, are you supposed to pick up the bowl and just drink it? (No spoon on the table.) So I left it completely alone. Then came dessert. No idea what it was, but it was delicious.

Now it's a little after 8. And I noticed that Starbucks is next to my hotel. So I'm going to go get a coffee and hope that they have a Japan mug for me to add to my collection.

It's going to be a very interesting week......

Lego Land

Yesterday we went to Lego Land. What an awesome place! Unfortunately, the weather didn't play along. It was about 50 degrees (Fahrenheit) and raining buckets. Even with rain jackets, we still got pretty much soaked through. The kids were troopers, though. We saw the whole park, went on almost all the rides. And they hardly complained about being soaked and cold.

I'm not a big fan of roller coasters. But I rode them anyway....hey, if a 7 year old who also dislikes roller coasters can cut it, so can I! And it was scary, but it was the fun kind of scary.....

And the Lego displays were amazing. Nearly life-sized animals in the safari area. And then displays like the airport in Munich or the harbor in Hamburg or the capital building (Reichstag) in Berlin. Absolutely astounding what can be done with Legos.....

This and that....

I have a fabulous four day weekend this weekend. It's so great to know that tomorrow's Sunday (well, actually, today is Sunday, because it's already 1 a.m. here), but I don't have to go to work on Monday.....or on Tuesday!

The weekend started yesterday at 3:30. I decided a while ago that I really wanted to buy a bike. There are so many great places to bike here. But I hadn't gotten around to really shopping for one. So yesterday, Marc and I went to 3 different bike stores to look at bikes. But we didn't find "the one." Either the color was too ugly or it had more features than I needed or.....It was a good start, though, and gave me an idea of what I would be spending on a bike with enough features to maybe be able to do a weekend biking trip, but not one that would let me trek through the Alps.

Then, last night we went to the Opera. We also went to the Opera several weeks ago, to see a modern Opera piece. It was horrible. Absolutely awful. So, because it was so awful, it was absolutely necessary that we go to the opera again to wipe away the bad taste of the horrible piece. So we went to see La Traviata by Verdi. It's a tragic story, but absolutely beautiful. And the music was amazing. The set design was a little funky, but the music was amazing....It was wonderful. (If you've seen the movie Pretty Woman, it's the Opera that Richard Gere takes Julia Roberts to.)

Today was the Day O' Shopping. First, we went to Ikea and had breakfast (1.50 Euro for two rolls, jelly, cold cuts and cheese and unlimited coffee....!!!). Then, we bought stuff....I bought a new bench for my apartment, which I'm really excited about. We left Ikea and realized we had forgotten something. So we tested how long it takes to buy a shower curtain at Ikea from the time you switch off the motor in the car to when you switch it back on.....our result: 15 minutes. (I think it should be an event on the next Amazing Race - it's really not as easy as it sounds!) And then we went to another bike shop....this is cool - Marc looked in the internet to see which bike shops were around the Ikea. He picked one randomly and we went there. The guy was totally helpful (which, in the customer service desert that Germany is, is not always to be expected) and they had a bike, which was perfect for what I needed, a good price and a good brand. And it's a lower bar than the trapezoid frame, so it's way better for short persons like me! So I bought a bike. Another cool thing happened....we were driving along and Marc's mom called to say that she wanted Asparagus and if we passed a stand, could we please buy some. As he was still on the phone with her, we passed a stand. So we stopped and bought fresh asparagus and strawberries. We promptly ate tons of the strawberries....they were delicious! Then we wanted to go to another city, but took, for some reason, the surface streets and not the Autobahn. The view was fabulous and then another great thing happened....we drove past the Ritter Sport Factory......Do you know Ritter Sport? Well, it's chocolate. Do you know me? Well, I love chocolate. So Marc had to turn around and go to the Ritter Sport Factory. We bought a bunch of chocolate (some of it will be gifts). It was great! Then we went to a furniture store and Marc bought a new dining room table. It's absolutely gorgeous, real solid wood, made in India. And I bought cushions for my bench. It was a very Shop-O-Rama day.

Tonight we watched Stuttgart play for another title (they won the German championships last weekend). Unfortunately, they lost tonight. But it's not really so tragic and watching the game was really fun!

And now I'm going to bed....shopping is exhausting!!

Exhale

So, it's almost the end of May. It's also almost the end of a conference here in Stuttgart that I was responsible for organizing. I purposely avoid work issues on my blog, but this is nothing negative, definitely very positive and I will intentionally write generically......we have an annual conference where the colleagues from all over the world gather in one location. Last year was in Vienna directly after my move to Germany. I had to pay really close attention, knowing that the responsibility for the conference would be transferred to me. So this year it was my turn. And I was so nervous that something would go terribly wrong or that I forgot to think about something. All of the preparations have been totally stressing me out for the last couple of weeks. Well, the conference started on Sunday and it will end tomorrow morning. And with the exception of the problem of the beamer going out during the presentation of a senior engineering VP, it has run extremely well. There have been very good discussions. And the dinners have also gone very well. Yesterday we toured a winery and then had a wine tasting. And tonight we had dinner at a cafe in the middle of a big park in Stuttgart. It's been really nice. So I'm happy to report that barring any totally unforeseeable dramatic events in tomorrow morning's 1.5 hour session, the conference has been a success! Tomorrow afternoon, it's back to the normal workday. But only for a couple of days, because Monday is a holiday and Tuesday I have the day off to go to Lego Land with the Dressler clan. Should be really, really fun, especially because the adult to child ratio is 1:1. :o)

Also, if it didn't make the international news, the soccer team in Stuttgart won the German Championship (Meister) on Saturday. I have never seen anything like it.....they put up a big screen in the middle of Stuttgart on the square in front of the castle (Schlossplatz). So Melissa, Rene, David and I wanted to take the train to the city to meet Marc and watch the game. Melissa and Rene live a few stops further out from the city than I do and Melissa called to say that there were about 400 people at the train station and she didn't think they would make the train. As I was standing at the train station in my town and talking to her, another train drove through without stopping, because it was so full. So they got in the car and drove to David and I. We drove together into the city (we had to park pretty far away - actually not in the city center (Mitte), but in the West) and went to the Schlossplatz. But it was so full, they had already closed it, 1 hour before the game even started. We looked for a place to watch the game (on TV, it was only being shown on a premium channel or satellite, which we don't have), but everything was so full. I have never seen Stuttgart such a mess - bottles laying everywhere. And another "odd" thing, the police were filming the crowd, so that if anything happened, they would have record of it. Anyways, we ended up driving to a whole other part of Stuttgart (Bad Canstatt) and saw only about the last 7 minutes of the game. (Live and learn. Next time we'll go 3-4 hours beforehand to the Schlossplatz.) But anyway, they won and the whole city celebrated until the wee hours of the morning (I was in bed by 12, no worries....). On Sunday, we were in the city again and it was absolutely disgusting....McDonald's bags everywhere, broken glass from bottles. (I bet the rats had a field day! Yuck....) But they won, which no one was expecting at all at the beginning of the season, so I guess it was worth the clean up.

In other news, I got my first ticket ever. No points, but I was caught by one of the "Blitzers", going 15 over the speed limit. A blitzer is a radar detector, which takes your picture when you are over the speed limit. So, I got to pay the city of Stuttgart 25 Euro for speeding. First time in my life that I got a speeding ticket.....

Happy Birthday, Buddy

15 years and nine months ago, we were a family of 5. And had been for 10 years. And then there was a suprise. A surprise named Seth. And while the addition of Seth to our family was a suprise, it was a surprise only in the best sense.

When my Mom said that she was going to have a baby, I hardly could believe it. When she gave my Dad the positive test wrapped in a gift box, I think he could hardly believe it. It was all so exciting...another baby....would it be a boy or a girl? (I have to admit that already having two brothers, I was pretty much hoping for a little sister....but Seth, I wouldn't trade you for any sister in the world.) When the ultrasound said you were a boy, the debate over names started and was only made more difficult by the fact that the siblings wanted a say, too. Mom wanted to name you Eli. But that seemed waaaay too old-fashioned. (Now I think it's a great name.) I think Seth was Mom's idea, too. I have to admit that I wasn't thrilled with it, because the only Seth I knew was a boy in my class who ate the core of his apples and was a real nerd. But it's a great name, a strong name, which means "placed" or "appointed" in Hebrew. And that you are, you're placed by God in our family.

I remember the day you were born. Mom had a scheduled C-section and we three kids got sent to school. I could hardly concentrate - I just kept staring at the clock, waiting for them to call my name to the school office to tell me that you had been born (Mom promised that someone would call school to let us know). And then finally, FINALLY, they called Andy and I to the office (Josh was in the other building in elementary school) and told us that you and Mom were both fine.

You were the most adorable baby I had ever seen. And you were good. You'll have to ask Mom, but I really don't remember you crying very much. I do remember cuddling with you. Especially when you were sick, you liked to cuddle. So that time you had the stomach flu, I had the pleasure of wearing the contents of your stomach....But I didn't mind, because I was so happy that you wanted me to hold you and nobody else. One of Andy's favorite stories also has to do with bodily fluids....the first time he babysat for you, you had it "coming out both ends" as Mom says. You even threw up in his shoe. I'll let him tell the rest to you....it's too gross for this blog.

For a long time, we thought you wouldn't talk at all. You just pointed at whatever you wanted, said "uh" and someone got it for you. Too many older siblings, I guess. But then once you started talking, well, you hardly stopped. I don't know which parent that comes from, but you and Josh definitely have that in common. And once you started talking, we had to be careful of what we said in front of you.....I found it pretty funny when Mom told me that she was driving with you and you were talking to the drivers of the other cars - "What are you thinking, driving like that?", "Yeah, nice cut us off..." and so on. She couldn't figure out where you had learned that. And then I had to confess that you had learned that from driving with me.....Boy, was I glad that I hadn't used any bad words!

I see all three of us "big kids" in you. You and I share a major love of reading. Andy was always the sportier one and you like to play football. You and Andy also look very much alike. And your sense of humor reminds me of Josh. But you're also very much your own person, too.

You're your own person on your way to being an adult. But I have to tell you that no matter how old you get or how far away from me you are, you're always going to be my baby. (I won't embarass you (further) by using my nickname for you, but you always be that to me, too.) I'm so proud of you, of who you are and I'm very excited to see who you'll become.

I love you very, very much. Happy, happy birthday!!
Sis

My New Apartment

Hello again from Turkey! For the second time within three weeks, my work travels have brought me to the lovely city of Bursa. Since I have some time (and since the hotel has free wireless internet), I thought I would post some pictures of my new apartment.

Here's my living room. You can see the doorwall and the windows, it's really bright and sunny. The balcony starts just outside this door, continues in the direction of the windows, past the bedroom and wraps around the corner. It's narrow, but really long. Since I took this picture, I hung sheer curtains as well, so I'll have to get some new pictures. I can't tell you how happy I was to have my couch! And I really like the terracotta accent wall. The floor is also really nice, it's some kind of biological wood, so it shifts a bit, and my landlord is really attached to it, so I worry about it getting scratched, but....

Standing in front of the couch, here's looking into the dining "room" (more like the dining corner). Here's another doorwall, but there's no balcony, it just looks out over the street. But I get a really good cross breeze with all of these windows. You can see from the picture leaning against the wall and the coat tree in the middle of the room that I'm not finished moving in yet, but in the last few weeks, I have come much farther than I ever did in Feuerbach. At least the coat tree is now in the basement. If you continue past the picture to the left, there is the kitchen:

I have no idea why this picture is sideways and I can't seem to turn it. The kitchen is basically a perfect square. It's not huge, but it's sufficient. (And blue!) I didn't photograph the bathroom, which is just to the left of the kitchen. My washing machine is in the bathroom and I also have a bathtub, which I didn't have in Feuerbach. To the left of the bathroom is the front door to the apartment.




And the last room then is my bedroom. You can see the door to the balcony (the shutter-like window cover is down). The bedroom door is to the right of the ladder shelf which is to the right of the couch in the living room. At the foot of the bed is also a window, so the apartment really is very bright (which is great. As you face the bed at the angle, behind you is the Kleiderschrank, which ended up fitting with room to spare in the corner for the vaccuum cleaner, ironing board and stepladder (if you remember, I was worried that the bed and the Kleiderschrank wouldn't fit....they do). You can see in this picture also that I'm not all unpacked.

And since I had a bunch of hair cut off, I thought a picture of me with short hair might be good: