Skiing in Switzerland...or at least what I can remember

Since I went away to Switzerland this weekend without Heather, she is letting me be her guest blogger and tell you all about it myself.

I'm Karl.

I had the opportunity to ski in the Swiss Alps this weekend with my American co-worker, Greg Weber (as in Weber Grills). We drove down Saturday morning, January 27th. It's about a three hour drive to Grindelwald, Switzerland in the Alps. He rented skis and I rented a snowboard. From there we took a steep train up to the slops.

The view was fantastic! For the view alone the price was worth it. It was breathtaking! Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera up to the slops for fear of damaging it, so I have no pictures to prove it.

Greg and I were looking for simple hills because it has been about 10 years since the last time I laid foot on a ski slop. As best as I can recall, we did a couple of short runs, then, after gaining our confidence, decided to tackle something a little more adventurous. I vaguely remember selecting a slop and snowboarding down parts of it. But the rest of our day...I've had to depend on Greg for what exactly happened.

We decided to go through a more wooded part of the hill and, as we were trying to slow down, some ice caught the edge of my board and I fell backwards onto my lower back and the back of my head. Apparently, I hit my head VERY hard. Hard enough to cause a concussion and slight memory loss. Greg says that as we walked the rest of the way down the hill, he quizzed me on different things to help jog my memory and keep me talking.

"What country are we in?" "Germany."
"What's your birthday?" "May 20th."
"How old are you?" "I'm not sure."
"Are you married?" "Yes."
"Who's your wife?" "Heather. What happened? Did I hit my head?"
"Yeah, you hit your head. What's 4 + 6?" "10."
"What's my name?" "Greg Weber. As in Weber Grills."
"What year is it?" "2006."
"What day is it?" "I don't know. My head really hurts...did I hit it?"
"Yeah, you hit your head. Do you remember going out to dinner last night?" "We went to dinner last night?"

Basically, I had no short term memory. Greg returned our ski equipment and he decided he better drive me back home. First he called Heather.....

Let me jump in here for a moment, and tell you my end of what happened, since Karl really has no recollection of this part of his weekend. I, Heather, got a call from Karl at about 6pm on Saturday. The first thing he said was, "I have amnesia." "You do, huh?" (I'm thinking this is some joke.) "Yeah, I hit my head and I have amnesia." (Now I'm getting alarmed.) "What happened?" "Um...I'm not sure...you better talk to Greg." So Greg told me what happened and that he was planning to take Karl back home right away. I asked to talk to Karl again, but that didn't go very well. "What's the last thing you remember?" "Um...I'll have to think about that." He did not sound like Karl...he sounded very confused. I told them that they should probably go to a doctor right away.

A while later Karl called back..."Hi, it's Karl....Um...I don't remember why I called you." So I asked to talk to Greg. He had some questions about our medical insurance and then they went off to the hospital. Later that night Greg called back with the news that the hospital took some X-rays (which looked OK), put him in intensive care, and wanted to watch him for 24 hours. The doctor would look at him in the morning and decide if he could go home. So I had a stressful night.



It's Karl again....my memory gradually started to come back that night. The nurses woke me up once an hour to shine a light in my eyes and ask me questions like, "Do you know where you are?" and "When's your birthday?" I felt like I was in a police interrogation...but with nice police. The only thing I don't remember now is from about 15 minutes before the accident to about when we called Heather...though I don't remember anything I said to her. I met with the doctor at about 10:00 am and he told me I would be alright and I could leave at 4:00 that afternoon. Which we did.

Before driving home we went out to a lake west of Interlaken where Greg had eaten lunch earlier that day. We sat on the shore and enjoyed the amazing view. Eventually we got back in the car and headed north up to Germany, listening to Weird Al Yankovic on Greg's iPod.

The doctor instructed me not to go to work for a week, and when I was home, not to work on a computer (so I'm dictating this to Heather), to watch as little television as possible, and not read anything too intently. Basically, to let my brain rest. So this is a good week to give us a call (from January 29th to February 5th)!

And I've decided to swear off skiing and snowboarding forever. I don't need it.



View more beautiful Swiss photos here.

Bratwurst 101

This is a Bratwurst.

It is THE fast food of Germany. You can find Bratwurt grills anywhere you can find people. They are especially found in pedestrian zones, Christmas markets, and farmer markets (where I am about to eat mine above at the Freiburg Farmer's Market). They are usually sold at little mobile stands and are eaten on the go or while standing (note my fellow Bratwurst eaters standing behind me).

And please note: a Bratwurst is NOT a Hot Dog!

The name Bratwurst comes from the old German name Brätwurst..."brät" meant finely chopped meat and "wurst" meaning sausage.

You almost always are served a brötchen (a hard roll) with the wurst and not much else should accompany delicacy...you are often given the option of grilled onions and traditionally you should only put spicy mustard on your wurst, although ketchup is offered as well. (Note the spicy mustard on mine and somewhere in the bread are some grilled onions).

The wurst is often placed inside the roll but I have also seen the bread placed on the side. And the wurst is ALWAYS longer than the bread...and no, as you can see above, you do NOT cut the wurst to fit the bread. The only exception I have seen to this is when you order a Langewurst (long-wurst) which are quite long. Then usually, just before serving, the wurst is cut in half and both pieces are placed in the roll...and the ends still extend beyond the bread.

A variation is Curry-wurst...the wurst is cut into bite-sized pieces and covered in a spicy curry ketchup.

There are red wursts and white wursts (I think I like the white ones better...they have more spices added to them).

They are cooked on a grill or in a pan and eaten immediately when they are hot, toasty, and sooo good!

For our family and friends in Ohio, please visit the annual Bratwurst Festival in Bucyrus, Ohio, August 16-18, 2007!

For our friends here in Germany, please consider visiting the Bratwurst Museum in Thüringer, where the first Bratwurst was made!

Guten Appetit!

Grüße aus...Freiburg!

Karl and I ended 2006 by spending the day in Freiburg. I had already taken a couple of trips to see Freiburg, which is an hour south of us, but Karl had never been. So I took him so he'd stop his whining.

Freiburg is home to a large university (founded in 1457), whose students are apparently very into organic foods (or so says my German instructor who graduated from there). It's a beautiful, old city on the edge of the Black Forest.





We first visited their huge, well-known Farmer's Market surrounding the cathedral. Such amazing-looking food and bread and flowers and handmade pasta and olives and bratwurst....We bought a quarter of a HUGE loaf of rustic bread (and even then it went bad before we could finish it) and had a yummy and very German lunch of bratwurst and then went inside their famous cathedral.





The church was beautiful! It was begun to be built about 1200 and finished in 1513 (after changing the architectural plans to a more "modern" Gothic and financial delays).



For the rest of the afternoon, we walked around the old part of Freiburg, through it's quaint streets and shops. It's a beautiful city!

Heilige Drei Könige

Last Friday, January 5th, I was surprised to wake up and find out it was a holiday...actually, Saturday, January 6th was the holiday, but everyone seemed to be celebrating it a day early....here's what happened...

Karl went off to work as usual around 8 am...I watched a little Knight Rider on TV then got into the shower around 9 am. Shortly after emerging wet from the shower, I thought I heard someone outside our door. Since I was in no way decent to take a peek and since I didn't hear a knock or a ring, I ignored it. Not long after, as I was finishing up my daily primping, I heard some people talking in our building's stairwell. I took a peek out the door and heard our landlord talking to someone...and then the someone started to quote a Bible scripture...and I imagined that it must be Jehovah Witnesses and I was very glad I had been conviently in the shower when they stopped at my door. As I walked back into my apartment I noticed some strange writing in white chalk at the top of my door...what the freak?



As I heard them leave, I took a peek off of our balcony to confirm my suspicions and was very surprised to see instead a group of kids dressed up like kings! What the freak?!



And then I remembered Karl mentioning to me once that there was some German holiday coming up but that since the holiday fell on a Saturday, he sadly would not be gettting any days off of work. Could this have anything to do with a holiday? So I took a gander through the internet, putting all the clues together, until I discovered Drei Heilige Könige Tag = Three Holy Kings Day!

This holiday may be better known in the English-speaking world as Epiphany. It's a Catholic holiday celebrating the day the kings visited the Christ child, bearing their gifts. It has an interesting history which you can read about in this Wikipedia link. Here in Germany, apparently, children dress up as the Magi and then go from door to door to ask for money to donate to needy children. They carry with them chalk that was blessed by a priest. Over the doors of the homes they visit they write 20 + C + B + M + 07. I'm not sure what the 20 means and I'm pretty sure the 07 is the year, but I do know that the letters stand both for the traditional names of the kings (Caspar, Balthasar and Melchoir) and for the latin phrase "Christus mansionem benedicat" which means "may Christ bless this house".

Now you may be thinking...come on, Heather, you lived in German for a year and a half already, didn't you already experience this holiday? Well, please remember that I lived in EAST Germany...as in former Communist country...as in religion and the celebrating of religious holidays was frowned upon (although they managed to still keep Christmas absolutely lovely!). Right now Karl and I are living in a heavily Catholic area where these Cathlolic holidays are widely celebrated. And when I was in eastern Germany 10 years ago holidays like this still really weren't being celebrated. And besides...the east Germans certainly have a few holidays of their own that the rest of Germany wouldn't consider putting on their calendars (just ask me about Herrn Tag...man, was that a horrid day!).

Stammtisch in Oberkirch

Every quarter LuK organizes an activity for the families of their employees who are from other countries and working here temporaraly...like us. I think of these activities as LuK's way of saying, "See! You LIKE living in another culture and learning another languague and being far away from your family!" These activities are called a Stammtisch and Karl and I had our first Stammtisch last month on December 1st.



LuK took us all in a bus down to Oberkirch and up to the Schauenburg ruins. A tour guid met us dressed in medieval costume and took us into the ruins to tell us all about the history of the castle. It was all in German and we understood only half of it...but it was interesting. There had been four families living in Schauenburg, each lived in one of its four towers. The castle was never destoryed from without by an attack. It was destroyed from within, by family bickering. Eventually the four families all left Schauenburg for different areas in Europe. One family stayed in Oberkirch and built a palace in the town.





After our history lesson, everyone got a torch...and I don't mean the British word for a flashlight, I mean a fire-burning torch! It was cool! We walked down the hillside through a vineyard by torchlight until we got back down to Oberkirch and stopped at the palace grounds for warm drinks. We were then led across the street into the restaruant called the Silberner Stern (the Silver Star...click on Silberner Stern at the bottom of this link to see images of the resaurant). It was in this restaurant that the great 17th century German poet, Johann Jacob von Grimmelshausen, would write. The restaurant still had a 17th century feel to it...it was beautiful and the dinner they served was wonderful!





The whole evening was so lovely that we most definitaly could agree that we love living in another culture and learning another languague...just not being so far away from our family! We wish you could have all been there!

Silvester!

Germans call the New Year holiday Silvester. It is so named after Pope Silvester I who died on December 31, 335. Germans celebrate the New Year very loudly...don't we all? As missionaries in Berlin, Karl and I had to go home before dark and go to bed at the usual time and stay off the streets. Of course, it was hard to sleep because all I and my mission companion could hear were very loud fireworks. They never used the colorful kind of fireworks that we could have watched from our windows, just the very loud kind that prevented us from sleeping. And the next morning the streets were dead to the world and it was impossible not to avoid stepping on any kind of fireworks remains.

This Silvester, Karl and I had a quiet evening at home grilling pizzas on the balcony, watching movies, and playing games until just before midnight when we watched the countdown from Berlin on TV. And then the fireworks began...it was both beautiful and terrifying! They were all very loud and very colorful and very close! We watched at first from our third-floor balcony that over looked the street below and farm fields beyond. Someone was setting off fireworks in the street just below us and the fireworks would scream up into the air and explode just about at the level of our balcony! I kept expecting one to blow our faces off! So we went to the window at the other end of the apartment that looked out over the city of Bühl and the Black Forest mountains...the sight was breathtaking! Colored lights were exploding everywhere!! The entire valley and city of Bühl was covered with a blanket of exploding colored lights...near, far, and everyone in between! More fireworks were exploding higher up in the mountains. Karl took the photos below, but really they don't do the spectacle justice!









To us, it actually looked more like this (a photo of some Silvester fireworks in the German city of Zwickau).

Our landlords gave us this large bread loaf in the shape of a pretzel...apparently they are for good luck in the New Year!



We feel hardley deserving of yet more good luck...we've had so much of it this past year! We are amazed at how much we have been blessed. It has been a year of transitions...the past 6 months since Karl's graduation has been especially hectic, we've hardly had a chance to take it all in. We've moved not once, but twice, have said goodbye to dear friends in Michigan and have found new ones in our new home. A year ago we were looking forward to Karl's graduation and wondering where we would be celebrating the New Year in another year...we are still surprised to wake up most days to find that our dream of living in Germany again has come true! We hope 2007 will bring all of you great joy and that you are looking forward to the new year as much as we are!

Christmas in Germany: Part 2

Karl and I had a wonderful Christmas! Our Christmas season began with the celebration of the first Advent Sunday with our German friends, the Küchler family. They showed off their beautiful Christmas decorations...some of which were family heirlooms and very old...and we ate cake, drank a delicious winter fruit tea, and had root beer floats...yes, root bear floats! This family loves all things American, and they are one of the only Europeans I've ever met who actually like root beer. Root beer simply doesn't exist here, but they showed me how they make theirs homemade.



We also celebrated St. Nikolaus Tag on December 6th. We have actually been celebrating this German holiday ever since we were married...every year we put our shoes out in the hallway and the next morning we fill them full of treats for each other. Here is a photo of my shoes filled with candy, hot chocolate mix and a new bell for my bike.



On the 16th I took Karl to the little French medieval village of Riquewihr that I took his parents to when they were here for Thanksgiving. The village happened to to be having a Christmas market that day so we wandered through the very crowded streets eating yummy French food and enjoying the medieval and Christmas-y atmosphere.



On December 21st my parents and my sister, Susan, arrived from Texas to spend the holiday with us. The next day we went into France and visited Riquewihr and then Strasbourg. The Strasbourg cathedral had their beautiful set of tapestries hanging depicting the story of Mary and Jesus...apparently the cathedral only displays these precious tapestries only at Christmas time. We also explored the Christmas market in the square around the cathedral. It was also fun to watch Susan finally enjoy some of her favorite French foods again (she served a mission for our church in France) and to have her there to translate for us. For once, Karl and I didn't feel like complete morons while visiting France!



The next day we visited Baden-Baden, shopped at the Christmas market and the city's shopping district in Lichentaler Allee and looked for last-minute Christmas gifts.



On Sunday, we celebrated Heilige Abend by going to church and then made a stop in a little town near Bühl called Schwarzach to see their beautiful Romanesque church. For dinner we used our new Raclette set. Raclette cooking originally comes from Switzerland and is basically like a cheese fondue. The more modern sets you can find in Europe have a cooking surface that sits on the table with little trays that can be placed under the cooking surface and everyone cooks meats, vegetables on the table, melting the cheese in the little trays. A fun and tasty way to eat!

Christmas morning, after opening all our presents, we made crepes for breakfast on our new crepe maker. A Keller family tradition has always been to go and see a movie in the theater on Christmas Day. Karl and my favorite movie theater is in Strasbourg, France, mostly because the theater usually shows films in their original language with French subtitles...so we can watch American movies without worrying about understanding all the plot points in the German dubbed movies. (Germans really like to dub over foreign languages.) The only thing we don't like about the Strasbourg theater is that we don't speak a lick of French, so it can sometimes be an adventure buying the tickets for the right movie. So we were excited and relieved to have French-speaking Susan with us this time...buying tickets would be a breeze! Or so we thought... At home we looked up the movie times on the Internet. We decided we wanted to see The Nativity Story. Often the French and German (and other languages as well) will translate the titles of movies much differently from the original title (for example, Monty Python and the Holy Grail has been translated into German as Ritter der Kokosnuss = Knight of the Coconut). So Susan found the movie with the French title meaning A Woman Above All Others. She assumed the French were being typical French and focusing the title of the Nativity Story on the Virgin Mary. So off we all went to the movie theater. And Susan flawlessly bought us tickets for A Woman Above All Others, making sure with the ticket lady that the movie would definitely be in the original language, and we all sat down to enjoy our Christmas movie praising Susan's French talents. So imagine our surprise with A Woman Above All Others began and all the characters were modern-day army women speaking Hebrew! And imagine Susan's embarrassment to realize that she had wrongly interpreted the title to be for the Nativity Story! We ended up heading home and watching a DVD instead. So much for going to the movies with someone who can speak French. (We love you, Susan!)

On December 26th we had yet another day of Christmas (remember, Germany celebrates the 25th and 26th as Christmas). We got out of the house and took a drive through the Black Forest...it was beautiful! We made a few stops to enjoy the view and ended up driving to a city called Freudenstadt, which is known for having the largest marketplace in Germany. We walked through the market place (unfortunately, being a holiday, there wasn't much of a shopping opportunity) and visited the city's large Protestant Stadtkirche...a church built in the early 17th century in a unique L-shape, so that men and women would be separated during services. As we continued our drive through the Black Forest, we happened to drive through a little town where the well-known German mineral water Schwarzwald Sprudel is bottled. So we stopped so that Karl, a bigger mineral water fan than I am, could fill up an empty water bottle we happened to have with us. We ended our trip through the forest with a visit to Schauenburg, the ruined castle in Oberkirch.



Unfortunately, all the fun had to end when my parents left for home the next day. We hope you had at least half a nice of a Christmas as we did!

Please enjoy lots of photos from our Christmas adventures here!

Christmas in Germany: Part 1

We LOVE Christmas time in Germany! It is our FAVORITE place to be at Christmas! We let our families know before moving here that they were not to expect us home for the holidays...we were not going to pass up this opportunity to spend Christmas in Germany!

By mid- to late-November Germans start preparing for Christmas. The first real sign that the holiday is finally upon us is the opening of the Weihnactsmarkt...the Christmas Market.

Every German city and town has a Christmas Market. Somewhere in the center of town, often around an old church, little wooden booths are set up and vendors sell all kinds of good things: Christmas decorations, candles, and handmade crafts. You'll also find yummy food...like chocolate or wurst with bread or warm drinks like Glühwein (a warm red wine with spices, or the non-alcoholic version for children of warm red grape juice punch with spices). Often, markets also have music performers or merry-go-rounds for kids. The market is typically open daily through December and it is especially lovely in the evenings, with Christmas lights all around the market.



My other favorite thing about Christmas here, are the traditional decorations:

Räuchermännchen ...the name means "little smoking men" and they are little men made from wood. You place a little cone-shaped peice of incense to burn inside him, and curls of smoke drift out of his mouth. Charming! Click here for an example.

Schwibbogen...these are decorative wooden arches that hold candles. They are usually placed on window sills. Click here for an example.

Nussknacker...or Nutcrackers, are of course well-known to you all. But click here if you need an example.

Pyramiden...these are my favorite! Named for their pyramid-like shape, these wooden decorative carousels hold candles at their base. The heat from the candles turn the propellers at the top, which turn the decorative figures on the pyramid. It's just not Christmas without a pyramid! Here's an example.

Although these decorations are well-established German traditions...you will find them in EVERY German home...they all originate from one small, specific region of Germany: the Erzgebirge (or Ore Mountains) found on the Czech border.

And then there's my other favorite thing about Christmas in Germany...St. Nikolaus Tag (St. Nicholas Day)! This is like a little pre-Christmas Christmas. On the evening of December 5th, all the children shine their shoes then leave them outside their bedroom doors. During the night, St. Nikolaus comes and gives candy and nuts and little toys to all the good boys and girls enjoyed by them the next morning, December 6th, St. Nicholas Day! This is what he looks like.

Some other important days before Christmas in German are the Advents...each of the four Sundays before Christmas are the advents. Each advent a candle is lit in anticipation of the coming of the Christ child: on the first advent, one candle is lit, on the second two candles are lit, the the third...you get the idea. Often Germans will celebrate each advent by eating Lebkuchen and drinking tea or coffee. You can read more about this tradition here.

But one of my favorite things about Christmas in Germany is that it lasts for THREE DAYS! The most important day of Christmas for the Germans is Christmas Eve (December 24th) or Heilige Abend (Holy Evening). On this evening, the family gathers for a simple humble meal (often sausages and potato salad) which symbolizes the humility of Christ's birth. Then the gifts are opened. Santa Claus...or the Weihnachtsmann (Christmas Man) isn't usually as generous as he tends to be in the US. Gifts are meaningful but not necessarily plentiful. I've also learned that in this region of Germany, which is strongly Catholic, many Germans receive their gifts from the Christkind...or Christ Child. The Weihnactsmann tradition really comes from the United States image of Santa Claus. But the Christkind represents Christ as a child. The Christ child is represented by a young woman with golden curls and an angelic robe. Here's an example. After Heilige Abend, Christmas continues on the first day of Christmas (December 25th) and the second day of Christmas (December 26th) with lots of big meals and family gatherings.

Karl and I hope all of you have a wonderful Christmas! We miss all of our friends and family at this special time of year, and we wish we could be with all of you...but rest assured we are loving our traditional German Christmas!

(By the way...if you have any questions about these or other German Christmas traditions, or if you have any Christmas traditions you'd like to share...please feel free to leave a comment!)

(And if you're interested in adding some wonderful wooden German Christmas ornaments to your holiday, here's a good place to start. Or for more information on German Christmas traditions and ornaments click here.)

A Return to the Vaterland

Karl's parents, Ann and Joe, came to visit for the Thanksgiving holiday! This was a return to Germany for Joe who had both served a church mission in Munich and also served in the military in German. However, this was Ann's first ever visit to Germany. Her father and her mother's mother were both born here so it was a special trip for her. We had a lovely time with them!

France



They arrived on Sunday, November 19th, and on Monday, while Karl was at work, I took them to France. We visited the beautiful city of Strasbourg, France. The city is located in the Alsace region of France. This region was once German, then it became French, then German again, then French...you get the idea. Although it is now solidly part of France, there are many German-named towns, German architecture and they speak a dilect that sounds like a cross between French and German.

Besides being the seat of the European Parliment, Strasbourg also has an absolutely huge and beautifully stunning gothic cathedral. The cathedral was built mostly in the 1200s and is espcially known for its astronomical clock. The first clock in the cathedral was installed in the 13oos, replaced in 1574 and in about 1840 that clock was expanded to the clock that stands now. At 12:30 pm daily the clock strikes. After looking through the rest of the cathedral, we attending the fascinating ringing of the clock: a child turns an hourglass, apostles file past a figure of Christ, and a cock crows three times.

After eating lunch in Strasbourg we drove about 40 minutes south to the tiny village of Riquewihr. This little town was founded in the 6th century...and it hasn't changed much since! We could have thrown up from all the quaintness if it weren't just too beautiful!! Not only did we fall in love with the narrow streets, the colored timberhouses, and the cobblestones but they had just decorated the town for Christmas...it was all a fairy tale come to life!

Frankfurt, Wasserkuppe, and Bad Kissingen



The next couple of days we took a trip into Joe's past. On Tuesday we all drove up to Frankfurt am Main at the church's temple where Joe met an old friend of his from when he was a young missionary, Erna. She was a darling woman! We spent the evening with her then spent the night in a small pension. On Wednesday we drove up to Wasserkuppe where Joe had served in the military. The old base was at the peak of a hill, but unfortunately it was a very foggy day and there was no view...although the drive up and down was gorgeous. We drove on to Bad Kissingen where Joe spent much of his mission. We arrived after nightfall but it was still a very charming town. As its name suggests (Bad = Bath) it is a spa town. We walked around the park near the spa and around the beautify, charming city center before heading back to Buehl.

Burgs and a Biergarten

We had a German-style Thanksgiving starting with visiting a couple of ruined castles along the edge of the Black Forest. We spotted one off of the autobahn at the top of a hill in the middle of a grape wineyard. Then we visited Oberkirch and Schauenburg. We decided to eat our Thanksgiving dinner at our neighborhood biergarten (biergarten = beer garden, an open air drinking house with a yummy menu) up the street from us in Oberweier. It was a very traditional German meal in a traditional German atmosphere...all very un-American!

Baden-Baden

On Friday, we visited Baden-Baden. It was the first day of the city's Christmas Market, so we spend some time enjoying the market with yummy food, crafts, candles, and Christmas decorations. We walked through the old Trinkhalle (Drinking Hall) where people can enjoy the natural spring water, and through a beautiful city park then finally walked through the shopping area as night fell.

Windeck and Karlsruhe

On Friday we made a morning visit to Burg Windeck. Ann and Joe had a view of the burg out their bedroom window all week, so we finally visited it. But not before playing on the playground next to the ruin! We then drove up to Karlsruhe and walked around the Botanical gardens next to the palace. We walked around the palace and the city center, then ate dinner back at the resturant looking over the Botanical gardens. It was beautiful!

On Sunday, we thought we were saying goodbye to them, but Sunday afternoon, Ann and Joe were back again after a mix-up with their stand-by airline tickets when they found out they wouldn't be able to leave until Tuesday. One Monday we all ended our week as it began by visiting Strasbourg and their newly opened Christmas market. It was beautiful! There were gorgeous lights everywhere and booths all around the cathedral and Ann and I ice skated!

Click here for many more photos!

We have Stuff!!

Yesterday, Tuesday, November 28th, we got STUFF!!



We have been waiting for 8 weeks for our stuff from America to arrive...it all came by ship...which was suppose to arrive 2 weeks ago...and yesterday it all finally came!



We were very happy...until we started to unpack everything...and suddenly our apartment started to feel smaller and smaller...and all our storage space shrunk...and we began to wonder why we needed all this stuff...until we decided to watch a movie and we had 100 to choose from instead of like 2...and then I opened up my closet this morning to find I actually had a million choices of what to wear today instead of the same like 3 outfits! Yay for stuff!

Berlin is still Berlin!

A couple of Tuesdays ago (November 7th) Karl called me from work to tell me that he had found a VERY cheap train ticket to Berlin and that I should go...so on Thursday (November 9th) I hopped on a train and I spent my weekend in Berlin! I had not been able to return to that fair city of my mission since my mission, 9 1/2 years ago, so it was a very exciting trip for me! I stayed with a friend of ours, Michaela Müller, whom Karl knew from his misison in Berlin.

Berlin is an amazing and unique city. It is constantly evolving...it is very much a microcasm of Germany itself...German history is reflected in its captial. You can experience the old Hohenzollern palaces at Unter den Linden, the modern 21st century at Potsdammer Platz, the communist remains of the Wall and even Nazi shadows here and there. The city is at once ugly and beautiful, old and modern, united, yet still divided.



As we walked the streets and saw the sights of Berlin I had two reacurring thoughts: "Of course I'm in Berlin! Did I ever leave?" and "Where the heck am I?! This is NOT Berlin!"

Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate)



In 1788-1791, Carl Langhans built 14 gates around Berlin for King Frederick Wilhelm II. This is the only surviving gate, which has Victory riding her chariot toward the city. The Berlin Wall ran just on the other side of the gate from where you see Michaela and I standing. The gate now separates the streets Unter den Linden and Strasse des 17. Juni going into Tiergarten (a large park...think New York's Central Park) behind us. During my mission, the #100 Bus drove back and forth under the gate and a black market was located just off to the right in this photo where you could buy Nazi, Soviet, and East German memorabila. Now the buses drive around the block and the black market has moved down Unter den Linden near the Dom. But still beautiful!

Potsdamer Platz



During my mission, Potsdamer Platz was simply known has Europe's largets construction site. It was nothing but a famous pile of dirt and a collection of cranes (the cranes had become so permanent feeling that an artist had created an installation of neon lights for them). Today, Potsdamer Platz is all shiny and new! The plaza had once been Berlin's busiest city centers, but WWII left it desolate and the Berlin Wall was built right through the plaza. After reunification, construction began and today it is a collection of hotels, theaters, and shopping centers, the best known of which is the Sony center shown above. But it was all foreign to me.

The Holocaust Memorial



Between Brandenburger Tor and Potsdamer Platz is the new Holocaust Memorial, or Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. Karl and Michaela happened to be able to visit the memorial the week it first open last May 2005. I loved this memorial...it was amazing. It is a large square with stone blocks of various sizes. They begin quite short...even flush with the ground...and grow taller and taller as you walk through them. We are free to explore the grid between all the blocks and the only rule is that you do not sit or climb on top of the blocks. As you get deeper into the blocks they become higher and higher so cannot see over them and you become in danger of walking right into someone walking down a perpindicular path. You could almost become lost in them...it begins to feel almost like a labirynth. I got the feeling that is presented a simple, logical grid that became more confusing and disorienting as you explored it as link to the twisted logic of the Final Solution.

Gedächtniskirche and Ku'damm



As my train rolled into Berlin Thursday night, I looked out the window into the darkness and city lights for anything recognizable...and suddenly, for a brief moment between buildings, I saw the Gedächtniskirche! The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church (as its known in English) was built in the 1890s as a memorial to Kaiser Wilhelm I from his grandson Kaiser Wilhelm II. During World War II it suffered heavy damage, nearly completely destroyed. Instead of tearing down what little remained, the church remained as it was as a memorial to the horrors of war. Two modern structures were added flanking it in the 1950s, a tall bell tower and a circular chapel (knicknamed by Berliners as the lipstick and powderbox...or the the disco church by us missionaries 10 years ago). Along one side of the church runs a long street with a long name: Kurfürstendamm...but no one calls it that. Whether from affection or ease, the street is simple known as Ku'damm. This street was obviously located in the capitalistic West Berlin because it is a shopper's heaven: you'll find everything from H&M to Laura Ashley, from Pizza Hut to Hard Rock Cafe. My favoriate is Kaufhause des Westens (Shopping House of the West)...but again, noone actually calls it that. Its known simply as KaDeWe (say "Kah-Day-Vay") and its huge and expensive and sells American food and expensive pens and fashionable clothes and pretty buttons!

Unter den Linden and Palast der Republik



Perhaps the heart of Berlin...or at least one of them...is the street Unter den Linden. The name means "under the lindens" after the linden trees that have always lined the street (except for during the Third Reich when Hitler knocked them down to make the street more parade-friendly). It was created during the 1600s for the palaces of the Prussian royalty. The royalty wanted a grand boulevard to ride down to Tiergarten...the large park in the center of Berlin that use to be a royal hunting ground. Now the palaces have became museums and opera houses...and former communist parliment buildings. This street lay in former East Berlin and the communists torn down the 15th century Hohenzollern palace for ideological reasons, bulding their parliment building on top of the foundation in 1976 calling it Palast der Republik (Palace of the Republic). After reunification in 1990, the debate began over what to do with the building...the biggest problem being that it was full of asbestos. So it has been closed up and gated off, sitting in limbo for the past 16 years...until now when the building is finally begin gradually and carefully (because of the asbestos) demolished. It was strange to see this familiar building being finally stripped.

Pergamon Museum



Along Unter den Linden is one of my personal favorite spots in Berlin...Museuminsel=Museum Island! A little island of one world-class museum after another! Michaela and I visited the Pergamon Museum. A giant ancient Greek temple built around 180 BC known as the Pergamon Altar was relocated to this museum in Berlin...and it is stunning! I love the dramatic Hellenistic relief sculptures surrounding the temple depicting the Greek gods in battle against the Giants (with legs of snakes!). There is also a wonderful collection of Greek art through the centuries as well as an ancient Babylonian gate. It was all as wonderful as I remembered it...happiness!

Reichstag



The Reichstag building was built in 1894 to house Germany's imperial parliament. Although it had been damaged by fire a few times (the last being in 1933 giving Hitler an opportunity to rise in power) and was damaged in WWII, the building still stands. During my mission it was also a construction site, I saw it only from afar. Now it boasts a new glass dome and again houses Germany democratic parliament. Michaela and I stood in a line for an hour for the opporunity to go up into the glass dome. The dome looks down over the parliment at work and has a winding walk way that looks out over all of Berlin in a gorgeous panoramic view. It was strange to finally get a close-up view of this historic, important building!

Although so much was still my Berlin, the city had changed tremendously in less than a decade. But that's Berlin...a city that is constantly changing. Marlene Dietrich said it best when she sang:

"As long as the old linden trees stil bloom, Berlin is still Berlin!"

Listen to Marlene sing a few lines from this song here: scroll down the song list to Disc 2, song #25, click on "Solang noch Unter'n Linden (Berlin Bleibt Doch Berlin)".

Click here for lots more photos of my weekend in Berlin!

And click here for a good 1999 newpaper article written as the German parliment was about to move from Bonn back to Berlin. It gives a good point of view on the unique characteristics of Berlin and a little of its unique history and may help give you a sense of why this city holds me spellbound!

Grüße aus...Rastatt & Speyer!

Two weekends ago, on Oct 28 & 29, Karl and I visited a palace and some churches.



On Saturday, Oct 28, we visited the nearby town of Rastatt. We explored the city center and the grounds of the impressive Rastatt palace. Although we didn't tour through the impressive apartments of the palace that was once home to the margraves of Baden, we did visit the interesting museum in one corner of the palace about various freedom movements over the course of German history. Click here for more photos.

On Sunday, Oct 29, we journyed to the ancient city of Speyer. The city was founded by the Celts in about 500 BC and in 10 BC the Romans took over. Christianity was firmly established in the region by 350 AD and both the Catholic and Protestant churches have a rich history in Speyer.

After visiting the town's gorgeous Catholic cathedral (built 1680-1762) and Protestant cathedral(built 1883-1904), we went through the old city gate and walked through the pedestrian-only streets lined with shops that were suprisingly open! Germany has laws on when stores are allowed to be opened, and apparently, in Speyer, the shops are opened on an occasional Sunday! The streets were flooded with people and street entertainers. We made our way down to the building we had come to see...



In 1030 AD the construction of the Speyer Imperial Cathdral was begun. It was this church that drew us to Speyer...and it was amazing! The building is in a simple Romanesque syle...in fact it is probably the best example of Romanesque architecture in existance. Emperors and Empresses that contributed to the building of the church are buried in its crypt. It is a very simple, but very grand and beautiful church...even after a thousand years! Click here for more photos.

As we walked slowly back over the cobblestones along the pedestrian street, we ate one of our favorite German foods--the Turkish Doenner Kebab--with the streets still full of people enjoying an extra day of shopping. We stopped to watch a one-man-band street musician sing a folk song (joined by an old Frau taking over his song) with little children prancing around him like horses. We were surrounded by this festive atmosphere, having just filled our eyes with ancient and spectacular beauty, filling our tummies with our favorite local food...life just doesn't get better!

Happy Halloween and All Saints Day!

The holiday Halloween is also known as All Hallow's Eve, which is the day before the holiday All Hallow's Day, also known as All Saints Day. The holiday we now celebrate as Halloween originated as a pagan festival when spirits contact the living and magic is especially potent. All Saints Day celebrates the dead as well, but insteads honors the Virgin Mary and Christian martyrs.

In the US Halloween is, of course, a widely-celebrated holiday. Germany has gradually felt the influence of the US and Great Britain celebrations of Halloween so that it is now a tentatively celebrated day...not an official holiday but you'll see people throwing Halloween parties and a handful of carved pumpkins here and there.

Karl and I have never really done much to celebrate Halloween. Usually we'd stay at home with a movie and a bowl full of candy. And since we never got any trick-or-treaters in the apartment buildings we lived in, we'd eat all the candy ourselves. This year for Halloween we are in a country that really doesn't do much for the holiday so we had a yummy dinner at our local Biergarten, learned how to play our new board game, Carcassonne, and watched episodes of Lost we had downloaded off of the internet. And then imagine our surprise when we got trick-or-treaters at the door! Actually, they were just the kids who live downstairs who had been having a little Halloween party with some friends. They were dressed in warm clothing, scarves, and some homemade, non-descript masks...and we didn't have any candy! (We ended up giving them some oranges!)

But, although, Halloween is not an official German holiday, November 1st, All Saints Day, is a holiday! So today, Karl had the day off! We decided to do a little more exploring in the Black Forest.

We first visited a ruined castle I discovered last week overlooking a town about 20 minutes south of us: Schauenburg. This ancient fortress was founded in the 11th century and overlooks the German town of Oberkirch. The lord of the fortress oversaw trade passing from Strasbourg (now in France) into the Black Forest. We could just see the tall church spire of the huge Strasbourg cathedral in the distance. But as we explored the grounds surrounding the old castle, we discovered a plaque at the foot of a path with a very Halloween appropriate legend about the castle and the White Lady of Schauenburg...



There was once a Knight of Schauenburg who wanted a son for his heir. His wife, however, bore him a daughter. He was very upset, and soon after his wife died of neglect. He gave the infant daughter to a maidservant and left. The knight returned 20 years later and invited his daughter to return with him to Schauenburg where she would be married to a wealthy cousin. The daughter, who had no idea of her true identity, accepted her father's offer, and left her husband, a poor miller. After a few years, she saw her first husband, whom she had treated so badly, at a festival and she instantly feel down dead.

Since then, she appears every 50 years as a women all in white in an effort to redeem herself. Those who see her must do whatever she asks of them, or else they will die after three days! Once she appeared to a young herdsman and asked him to fetch her some water with her shoe...he ran in fright and died three days later. Another time she appeared to a man, asking him to show her the way to Schauenburg. He obeyed and she rewarded him with an old coin that later disappeared from his pocket.



The Schauenburg was very neat! Click here to see more of the ruins.

After leaving Schauenburg (seeing no sign of the White Lady!) we drove deep into the Black Forest (a beautiful drive!) until we came to the ruins of a monastery called Allerheiligen...the word means All Saints, so it was the perfect way to celebrate All Saints Day!

The monastery was founded in about 1200 when hermit monks were looking for a place to open their remote monastery and a donkey found a water source and tossed a bag of money off his back. This was the place! The monks thrived deep in the forest until the monastery was secularized in 1803. The monks were forced to leave and plans were made to turn the monastery into a prison, but before the prison could be created, lightening struck, and a fire burned it to the ground leaving only ruins of the cathedral. (Locals claimed it was divine intervention!) Now the ruins, set in a forest valley with a pretty stream and waterfalls, enjoy the visits of tourists like us! The weather was cold and we had to hang out in the little museum about the monastery to avoid a short hail storm, but it was beautiful! It was easy to see why, for hundreds of years, the hermit monks felt closer to God here. We will definitely return in warmer weather to explore the many paths and eat in the Biergarten next door to the ruins. Click here for more photos.



Happy Halloween and All Saints Day!