Today I had the pleasure helping my son with his German homework. Since my husband and I are both German we want our kids to know German as well. The Bay Area has actually a pretty large German community and we do have a local German school with after school German classes. I would say we are lucky – my son probably not so much. We do speak German at home but it is not an easy language and I realize more and more that there are certain aspects that get lost. Today homework was to correct German proverbs: One of my most memorable of the list was “Der Appetit kommt beim Lernen” corrected to “Der Appetit kommt beim Essen”. It means that the appetite will come with the meal. It was used a lot when I was a kid and we did not like lunch or dinner – we had to eat in anyway. I guess I am not telling him that often enough (what does not mean that he likes everything – quite the contrary actually), because he had no idea what I was talking about. I actually like the idea of using it as “The appetite comes with learning” (what was the “wrong sentence”). It makes as much sense to me in this context. I keep telling myself that one day he will thank me.
Another good one: Morgenstund hat Gold im Mund. – The early morning hour has gold in its mouth.
It basically means that if you get started early you will come across the best opportunities. Similar to the early bird catches the worm. I do like proverbs and a lot are stuck in my head even if I don’t use them as much anymore. I feel like these are harder to learn in a different language since they are usually not meant literally. They are so cool though. Do you have a favorite one?
Today was a day with a lot of driving back and forth. First driving the kids to school, then driving myself to work. After finishing there, driving to pick up my son from school and back home. I dropped of my work things, researched where to get a pizza for the pot luck in the evening changed into gym clothes and drove there. One hour gym and back home I went. Changed again and ordered pizza, got everything else together (brownies and drinks) and the kids, picked up the pizza and drove us to the potluck to celebrate the end of cross country season at the middle school. I was really proud of my son that he wanted to do cross country without any nagging from my side! The teachers were great and he seemed to enjoy it. After we had dinner there I drove us back home and now I finally have a minute to sit down and finish my post for today.
At the gym I got multiple questions what the meaning of my T-Shirt was. Do you know the logo? It’s from a German company that already exists since 1826 and was started by Maria Clementine Martin a nun who lived in cologne Germany. “Kloster” is a monastery and “Frau” means woman, so it basically refers to the woman who started it since she was a nun. The main product was a tonic containing 13 different herbal alcoholic extracts one of which is lemon balm that gave it it’s name “Melissengeist”. Melisse meaning lemon balm and “geist” referring to the high alcohol content (79%). You can still buy it today (even in the US) and it is a staple in a lot of German households. It’s supposed to help with all kinds of things like anxiety, sleeping problems, stomach upset, a cold. I think we only ever used it with a headache or muscle ache. You simply apply it to the affected area. Honestly I mainly liked the logo. Blue is my favorite color and it’s white on a blue background.
Are there any household staples in your household I might not know about?
I am still sad about the election result but have to figure out first how to best process it all before I write anything down. I am so tired. Tobia wrote a great post about how to cope with it all and there were some good suggestions. If I wouldn’t have said I do NaBloPoMo this would be the time I would hibernate because I don’t know what to say.
It’s already been a week since I got back from a quick solo trip to Germany. A couple of months ago it was announced that there was a 30 year highschool reunion in the works. This year the timing actually worked in my favor and so I headed on a little Germany trip by myself. To make good use of my time I squeezed in a couple of “side trips”.
I started by meeting up with my dad near Munich to visit my sister and her husband. Even though it was already end of August it felt like summer and we spend the evenings hanging out in the beer garden at our hotel. There was lots of good food there. Since it was too hot to spend much time outside we went on one outing to the Bucheim Museum. It’s right at the edge of Lake Starnberg in a park-like setting and it was a lot of fun.
Pictures from the Buchheim Museum at Lake Starnberg
Besides the collection of expressionist paintings it also had an exhibition about Paul Maar. He is an illustrator of children’s books and almost everyone in Germany knows his drawings. His most famous one is the book about the Sams. It’s a character that shows up one day at the house of Mr. Taschenbier (Bag Beer – don’t even ask). It has red hair and blue dots on his face. For every dot (seven) Mr. Taschenbier can make a wish… Sorry, I am getting off topic a little.
Paul Maar exhibit
On another day we went on a walk near the lake early in the morning to skip the heat, visiting the spot where Ludwig II of Bavaria was found dead. He is pretty famous because he had the Neuschwanstein Castle build, the one that Disney used as inspiration for the Sleeping Beauty castle.
Cross to commemorate the location where the body of Ludwig II was found at Lake Starnberg
On my 4th day in Germany I got on the plane to Hannover in Northern Germany. Germany is not that big but it would have taken me all day to take the train there. The German train system is also not the most reliable these days so this was the safer bet. My parents in law were nice enough to let me borrow a car from the so I could drive to Nienburg where the high school reunion happened.
I stayed with a good friend from school I lost touch with over the years. It was really nice hanging out with her after so many years. Life sometimes is a weird thing. We could not even remember why exactly we lost touch or how it happened but I think it was partly we moved to different places after school and I was in a new relationship and our interests and friends groups drifted apart. She’s a school teacher now and volunteers at a printing museum where they also have classes for kids. It sounds like she enjoys it a lot and the place is awesome. She gave me a little tour before I headed off to the high school meet-up.
Good times near Nienburg/Weser
The re-union itself started out with us going on a dragon boat outing on the river that flows through Nienburg, the Weser. I had never done that before and it was really fun. One of my friends who I usually see when I visit Germany also came and it was good to catch up but most of the others I had not seen for 25 years. I talked with some I had almost never talked to in school. We all grew up in the years since I suppose. There were no major surprises. Many became lawyers, teachers or doctors. We will see if it takes 25 years again before I get to ho next time. My aunt and uncle still live in the area but other then that I don’t have any ties to the place anymore other then my memories since my dad sold the house. It still oddly feels like home – especially the wide open fields in the area but I also realized in the past years that I would not want to move back there. Visiting feels good though.
Before getting on the train to Frankfurt (where my brother and dad live and from where I was leaving), I hung out with my parents in law a bit. The time felt so short on this visit that I did not even get in touch with anyone else. I hope to see my other friends the next time around. The train ride went smoothly luckily even with a 40 minutes delay but it was fine. I kind of like riding the train. It’s more comfortable then the plane or the car and you can read while the scenery passes you by.
Visiting my brother now is almost like visiting a second childhood home. His family always has room for us and we usually pick up where we left of even if there is a year in between. My dad lives really close and he came over to hang out with us in the backyard.
All in all it was a really relaxing trip despite all the going back and forth. It still feels foreign to travel by myself and not have the kids with me but it make things so much easier if you only have to take care of your own needs and plans. Luckily they are at an age now where they can clearly state what they need/want and my husband took care of the rest. There were also no schedule change surprises this year what made the start of the school year way more pleasant.
Does your high school have re-unions? Would you go? I was talking with my colleagues and most of them said they did not know about this custom. Lots of years at my school do it every 5 years and the school invites back after 25 and 40 years I think. Granted that our grades are much smaller than here. My graduating class had about 60 students whereas my daughter’s will have about 350. Another thing I am curious about: are you still friends with people from school? I have one friend I talk to throughout the year and we stay in touch but most of my other friends are from later in life.
The best thing, that happened so far this week, was that my Secret Santa package arrived. Who knows me, knows that I love surprises, and I honestly already forgot about it. I am thankful that San from the in between is mine organized this again.
Other than that life has been busy with work, getting ready for Christmas including sending out cards, wrapping presents, putting things on various piles to take along on our trip to see family in Germany and in general just make it through the last week of school. I can tell my kids need the break. There is one more concert for each child and then we can breath for two weeks. The only thing left to decide is if we take an Uber to the airport, park there or take public transit (I think it is coming down to Uber since parking for two weeks is not cheap either) and if we are doing a pre-christmas gift exchange at home or if we wait. I kind of like the idea of doing it before. That way I don’t have to pack any of our own presents (except a special one that the kids can use on the way). There will be enough things to bring back as is. I maybe should be making a list of things I want to buy when we are there. I am curious, is there anything you would think a typical souvenir you would bring back with you? For us it’s mostly sweets (the Haribo selection at the supermarkets is insane), tea (herbal and fruit teas mostly), vitamin tablets that dissolve in water (I never understood why in Germany they sell for one Euro for a role of 20, whereas here you can pay $1 for one serving), mustard and maybe some salad dressing powder. The days where we brought back tooth paste and dried sauce packages are over mostly. I always found it interesting that my SIL will buy tooth paste in the US ever since she spend a year as an Au-pair in the country.
How are you doing with your holiday preparations or are you already right in the middle of it?
Being German I always feel a deeper responsibility to bake cookies leading up to the holiday season. My mom always made loads of Christmas cookies with us when we were little. One of my all time favorites are Lebkuchen (gingerbread – not necessarily man). Most German recipes ask for Lebkuchen spice which in Germany they will sell you in every supermarket. Because the week in Germany was so busy of course I forgot – sigh. Already last year I experimented with it and made my own. Online you can find them in various spice combinations but the main ingredient is always cinnamon. In my opinion you can’t really go wrong with that.
I almost wanted to start the baking today but a) I am still not feeling that great and b) I also have four loads of laundry waiting to be folded. But here for good measure is my go to recipe for Lebkuchen:
Technically it is a honey cake dough. First you mix honey, sugar, salt, the Lebkuchen spice and chocolate powder in a cooking pot. The butter is cut up in smaller pieces and added. You warm the mixture up on the stove until the sugar is dissolved. This needs to cool down a bit before you add both eggs and mix them under with a cooking spoon. The flour, baking powder and baking soda is mixed and then you add the honey mixture. You stir it under until that gets to hard. The dough is kneaded with both hands and when everything is incorporated well you form two flat rounds and wrap them up in foil to store in the fridge for two hours. The dough is rolled out on a floured surface at ~1/4 inch and then you can cut out your shapes. You can use forms or make your own. One year we cut out house shapes and decorated those. Baking at 400 degree Fahrenheit takes 10-15 minutes.
For decorating you can basically use whatever you prefer. My recipe uses 200g powdered sugar mixed with very stiff egg white from 1 egg white.
From years past
Do you like cinnamon or do you hate it? Do you have a favorite cookie recipe you do over and over again?
Last week was bittersweet for me. It was probably the last time I visited my childhood home since my dad will be moving before I can visit again in December. It was not as difficult to say goodbye as I feared. Maybe partly because I have been packing and re-packing my own boxes every time I came for a visit. I don’t have any close friends living there anymore and I am not planning to move back. Maybe the sadness will still come? I don’t know.
I loved growing up there and I am filled with memories. Memories of helping my grandma in the garden and my mom in her pottery studio, learning how to ride a bike and how to roller skate. I remember the tree in our backyard that we climbed with the neighborhood kids, endless games of hide and seek in the house and the garden, family gatherings, Christmas, baking cookies in the kitchen, birthday parties and the first heartache.
I also will remember the town itself. It’s small and when I was growing up everyone knew you, everyone greats each other on the street (and you better did this or your parents will hear about it if you didn’t). It only has about ~2100 people living there, but it has a supermarket, a church, a doctor, an elementary school, bus stops that take you to the next bigger city 13km away, a gas station, a volunteer run fire department, a sports field for soccer (honestly which small town does not in Germany?), tennis courts, a small skate park, a pool, a handcar you can try out and even a small heritage museum where you also can get married (also run by volunteers including my dad for a long time). It also used to have a bakery where you could get fresh rolls even before they officially opened when you went to the back where the oven was. There were summers filled with long pool days and camp from the church youth group, I played first recorder with a small group of other kids which was run by the wife of my music teacher and later trumpet with the brass orchestra from our church.
Wietzen is pretty much right between Hannover and Bremen but the next better known big city is Hamburg. So it is northern Germany. The dialect you may hear spoken there is low German. I can understand it when my dad speaks it with friends but I can’t speak it myself. My kids on the other hand will not know what their grandpa is talking about. There are certain words very different from the German you learn in school and they can even be different from town to town. My grandpa said that when the British soldiers came through at the end of World War II it was easier to communicate with them in low German because some words are similar.
So without further ado, here are a couple of pictures of my hometown before I fall asleep.
The picture is misleading. I don’t mean to say I inherited the contents of all the shelfs (I could have since the contents mostly will be cleared out by the time my dad moves out). What I want to talk about is a different thought of inheritance.
My husband always complains that I don’t express myself clearly enough and assume a lot of knowledge. So here is a conversation I had with my dad today:
“Dad, where is the painters tape.” My dad replies: “It’s on the shelf in the basement.”
Above are mostly all the shelves in the basement. I found it, but I think I understand now what my husband is talking about.
Do you have habits you picked up from your parents?
This is going to hopefully answer another set of questions I received: I’d love to know more about how you feel about living in the States. Why did you decide to stay here instead of going back to Germany? What surprises you about living here? Are you ever planning on moving back to Europe?
Walk in Berkley’s Tilden Park in 2005
I guess I should start all the way back in 2005 when we first moved here. Back then it was pretty common to do a postdoc in the US if someone wants to work in academia (my husband). We came here with every intention to leave again and go back “home” to Germany or at least Europe after those 3-5 years that mentioned postdoc work was complete (is it ever though?). Never in my life would I have thought I would move to the US one day. I got on my first flight in my late 20s and the farthest away from home I moved was in the next bigger city (Hannover) which is only an hour away from my hometown.
It so happened that my husband was offered a really great opportunity where he did his postdoc that was not that easy to beat – and so it happened that we stayed longer than the 5 years planned. I still considered myself an expatriate – a person who lives outside their native country – and I still thought we would move back eventually. We had our kids in 2008 and 2011, they started daycare, preschool, school and before we knew it they are half grown. I had a really rough time in stretches because I don’t like living so far away from family but I also knew that if we moved back just because I pushed really hard and my husband would take a job he would not be happy with just to make me happy that would not go well either. So far it was just all coincident that we stayed (at least in my thinking). In 2018 we decided to move to a bigger house and ended up talking to a realtor to also look at houses to buy. That also made us talk about how we imagined our life to go in the next couple of years/decades to come. I think that was the point when the realization set in that we were here to stay and it helped me to settle this in my mind, too. So stepping into our very own house we became immigrants I guess – people who come to live permanently in a foreign country. Yes, it is a better career for my husband but also for me the work I am doing at the University offers better pay and more appreciation I could ever expect in Germany. After having visas and then green-cards all these years we applied first to keep our German citizenship and then also applied for the US citizenship. We were able to vote in the 2020 election for the first time and it felt so good to have a say in what happens in the country we call home now, too. I am still not ruling out that we move back at some point or back to Europe in general but I think we will stay for sure until the kids finish high school. They know German but they only know Germany from our summer visits and it would be hard on them now. You can have a really good life in Germany but we also have a really good life here. We are fortunate enough that we have good salaries, good retirement through our jobs and health insurance.
One thing that really surprised me is how international it is where we live. Since UC Berkeley and I guess the whole Bay Area attracts so many international students and workers it makes it very diverse and colorful. I have friends from Ukraine, Mexico, Brazil, France, Argentina and my kids went to a daycare run by an American-Japanese family. That is something I would miss would we move back to Germany. A couple of other things I was surprised about:
Most restaurants closed at 9pm – why so early?
You finish eating and you will get the check right away – sometimes even before that. This really took some getting used to.
Learning English 9 years and then using the language every day are two very different things (subtitles were my friend and it really helped to get used to it).
You always have to add the tax to the prices.
How great the park system is. Besides the National Parks there are so many state parks.
I am pretty sure there are more that I don’t remember right now.
Are we ever moving back to Europe? I honestly don’t know. Maybe we do, maybe we don’t. It may depend where the kids end up? When I learned something in all this then it is that you can make plans and than life ends up completely different and not in a bad way at all. We very likely would have a reverse culture shock by now since time did not stand still over in Europe either. I hope that by the time we retire we still have some time to explore the world. A lot of our free time is spend with visiting family and exploring the US a little closer to home during the shorter breaks.
Did you end up in a place close to your family or do you happen to live far away, too? Are you planning to move in the coming years or do you think you will stay put?
One reason I was reluctant to sign up for NaBloPoMo was that I already knew I would be traveling to Germany for a week. My dad is getting ready to move out of my childhood home and his home for over 50 years and I promised I help a bit. So the next days will be filled with sorting, deciding what will be packed to go with him, Sorting through the last remaining things I want to keep and saying good bye to my home town (more on this to come in another post).
Solo travel feels very special to me as I usually never get to do it these days. It involves quite a bit of planning ahead since I am the family organizer. I keep telling myself they will manage without me.
Back to travel day: Bags were packed the day before so everything was ready to go besides the last chargers and some food in case the airline falls short. I left the house at 10am to be driven to the Bart station. Luckily the next train went straight to SFO so I did not have to change. I got there at 11:30am and only had to drop of my checked bags. Isn’t it amazing you can do most everything online now? It’s a nightmare for my 80 year old dad but I do appreciate not having to stay in line for an hour (or longer) to check in. By noon I was through security and went on a search for some lunch. At SFO we somehow always end up at the domestic terminal for that even flying internationally. Boarding started on time at 1:50pm. The flight was supposed to leave at 2:40pm but to no big surprise it took a little longer as we were still waiting for some passengers.
The flight itself was pretty uneventful. I am not very hopeful about food on United flights but this time the chicken curry was edible. I always wonder why they even bother with the roles as I think they are pretty disgusting (sorry). The flight to Munich takes about 10 hours and I spend my time knitting, reading,watching movies and writing back and forth with my family about a lost ID card I was sure I saw in the living room the day before. Unfortunately sleep was a short hour or so. Arrival in Munich was at ~9:50am the following day (Nov. 3rd) and everything worked like a charm. Passport control was a breeze, the new gate was posted and it was not to far and after another hour sleep on the plane to Hannover we touched down at 12:55pm. The bag was collected and my dad picked me up from the airport, hurray.
The drive to my hometown Wietzen takes another hour and we stopped for a late lunch on the way.
Jaegerschnitzel mit Pommes (Schnitzel with a mushroom gravy and fries)
We were back in the door at around 3:40pm German and currently 7:40am West Coast time. If my calculation is correct it was 21 hours, 40 minutes this time with no special surprises.
I did take a quick nap because 2 hours of sleep and fell asleep again on the couch after dinner. Wish me luck I can sleep tonight because I don’t handle jetlag very well. Any advice on that? Maybe there is something I have not tried yet but mostly I go with the flow these days.
Do you often get to travel solo and do you manage to pack light?
Any advice on how to deal with saying goodbye to your childhood home?
It really was wishful thinking that I would have more time during the summer. We are already back in the US for three weeks now and the kids both started school on Monday. The four weeks in Germany flew by. We spend good times with family and old friends. After being disappointed at the time I made piece with the fact that I could not see everyone I wanted to see but am glad for the people in my life I got to visit. Germany still and probably always will feel like coming home. Life in general seems to be quieter and simpler, but that might only be because we are usually on vacation there.
There was a lot of driving back and forth – from the North to the middle, to the South, to Switzerland, to the middle and then back to the North. We saw a lot, enjoyed good food and great company and packed up memories that will last for a while.
But I also have to say that after four weeks I was starting to look forward to coming back. Not having to pack up suitcases for three all the time and having my own bed and a day to day routine seemed very appealing and it is in some way.
It really was wishful thinking that I would have more time during the summer. We are already back in the US for three weeks now and the kids both started school on Monday. The four weeks in Germany flew by. We spend good times with family and old friends. After being disappointed at the time I made piece with the fact that I could not see everyone I wanted to see but am glad for the people in my life I got to visit. Germany still and probably always will feel like coming home. Life in general seems to be quieter and simpler, but that might only be because we are usually on vacation there.
Home here and there 