MY BOGGY BLOG: find your way through the murk

Our First Few Days

Saturday was our first full day in Germany. For the record, we are staying in a small town called Neumarkt (pronounced noy-marct) outside of the bigger city Nurnberg, about 25 miles away, in the region of Bavaria. In the morning, I went out with T. to the baker and butcher-- she was making for us a traditional Bavarian breakfast. There's a special saussage called Weisswurst that is only eaten before noon, a white sausage with a mild flavor. When everyone was up, we had weisswurst, other sausages and salamis, giant pretzels (fresh baked, so much better than the States) and other rolls and breads, yogurt, jam, mustard, Nutella. A very satisfying breakfast! And quick for the cook to make too... after the time spent running to the butcher and baker!

In the afternoon our hosts were packing for their trip and we tried our first solo excursion in their van, which we would be using throughout the month ( as they will be using ours). Driving is a bit confusing and stressful, probably no more so than any other foreign country where you can't read the signs and aren't used to the traffic customs. For instance, if you come to an intersection where there are no stop signs, the car on the right will always have the right-of-way. But you might not realize a car is coming on your right if you are driving around one of the many curvy streets in the neighborhood areas. And there are no right-turns at all at a red light. And you see intersections that have a green light AND a stop sign. If the light is green, you go-- the stop sign is for if the traffic lights go out.

In our first excursion, we found a cash machine and used it, drove around Neumarkt (thank goodness DH has an excellent sense of direction-- he learns new areas very quickly, unlike me!). We parked and got out and walked around the central area of the town-- saw some churches, walked down an outdoor mall area, stumbled through our first transaction in German as we bought ice cream cones (eis) from a stand on the street. The streets were full of people even though all the stores were closed by the afternoon-- in this area, no shopping is done on Saturday afternoons or on Sundays at all.

After more walking, we went back to the car and drove to the local castle ruins-- of the Wolfstein family, about 1200 A.D. The castle is on a hill and there are two houses right next to it-- I mean, within a few feet of it actually. The ruins are just sitting there, no attendants, and tourists come and go. There are several walls standing, a great view, and lots of construction equipment so I guess someone is trying to repair it. Our host T said that when she was a kid, she and her friends used to play at the castle all the time, before they put up signs telling you not to climb. Our kids liked it a lot, too.

On Sunday, our hosts went off visiting relatives and we got going late but we managed to figure out where the train station is in Neumarkt and we took the train to Nurnberg (poor B., figuring out how to buy a ticket from the machine, very confusing). There we managed to stumble our way into some big music festival weekend in the streets of the city. Again, stores were closed but cafes and restaurants open, and we walked around for a few hours-- the streets were crowded and around every corner was live music-- we must've seen about 20 different acts. It was very diverse-- Irish music, big band, American rock, whatever. Some of it was in large plazas with crowds of people listening and the band on a stage with sound equipment; some of it was one or more people standing in front of a building, just singing or playing with a hat out. We heard a high-school-age group of kids singing and dancing to a Beatles medley and then songs from Grease. We also heard 2 girls and a guy on guitar performing-- the guy sat on the sidewalk playing Simon and Garfunkel and REM while the girls, dressed in boxes made to look like jukeboxes, sang along without knowing the songs very well, looking at books of lyrics and fumbling along. Any one can perform!

The one place we did see that was open was the church of St. Lorenz (Lorenzkirche) of the 15th century. It was our first really big impressive church (of which there are many across Europe, of course). You could spend all day in a place like this, examining all the exquisite details, sculptures, paintings, etc.

When we got back, DH and I stayed up late sitting outside on their patio, talking to our hosts and a few of their neighbors until late. Luckily, T and K speak excellent English, and one of their neighbors also did, and the other neighbor spoke some English (still much more than we speak German!). So the conversation would go back and forth between English and German, with someone filling us in if the German went on too long. That has been one of the great things about this trip, really getting to talk to our hosts and their neighbors, talking about the differences between Germany and the US, asking questions about customs, discussing politics, families, traveling, weather, you name it. We have been lucky we all get along so well!

Yesterday was Monday, and our host family left for America around noon, for our house, which is a strange idea indeed! They will arrive on Tuesday. We left behind a booklet for them all about our house and how everything works-- not an easy task to put it together, all those things that you just know how to do or where to find everything, having to think of what other people will need to know. We hope our house hasn't melted in the 101 degree weather on Monday in Minnesota. We were sooooo glad to leave the heat and humidity we'd been experiencing our last week before we left. We were working hard to get our house ready before we left and the heat would just wear us down-- we have fans and window a/c units that are usually quite satisfactory, but when the heat is relentless for day after day, the house just never cools off. We hope it will be better for the G. family!

After they left, we had a low-key daz. We left the house to find a grocery store, a bank that would exchange the kids dollars for Euros, the butcher and baker. We came back and just had down time. Everyone had time on the computer and watched TV and read and lazed about. A much needed rest!

Posted by sapphire at August 1, 2006 12:03 AM