Traditions

I grew up in a home that loved family traditions. Birthdays were a big deal and our family tradition involved going around the table and telling the birthday girl/boy what you appreciated about them or saw in them over the past year. I was always the cryer of the family and mom would make sure there was a box of kleenex nearbye when it was my turn. It was such a great time of affirmation and is something I want to continue to do with my kids.

Christmas is another time of year that is full of tradition in our home. From the order of events, to the annual picture on the stairs, it was always the same every year (with the addition of new family members :) ).

As fall is in full swing in Germany I am beginning to notice a lot of German traditions. One of these traditions is the giving of the Schultute to all first grade students. In order to ease the transition for young kids as they enter the first grade, and their first full day of school, their parents send them to school with a cone filled with toys, school supplies, and sugary sweets. This way the child ends up looking forward to school so that they can open up their cone that's full of surprises in class. The cones are made of paper and cardboard and usually covered with glitter and paper cut outs.

They are also sold at most supermarkets, in case you are not handy with a glue gun.


It was a lot of fun to watch the kids walking home from school with their cones, grinning ear to ear. I think that this would be a great tradition to start in the U.S. Although, I think I would give my child the cone at home. I am not sure their teacher would appreciate me sending my child to school with a two foot cone filled with candy.

Kayaks and Teepees

This past weekend eight of us traveled to Frankonian Switzerland to Kayak down the Wiensent River. We had decided to make a weekend of it and spend the night in a 16 person teepee on the Leinen Los campgrounds. Having been told that many campgrounds in Germany were very strict with quiet hours, we were excited to hear that we could sing and play the guitar late into the night.




Saturday was a BEAUTIFUL day for kayaking and we all sucessfully made it down the river. 8 People, 1 German Shephard and 1 Black Lab.





I should add that we only took pictures in calm areas. The river was choppy at other spots.

Socks!

One thing that I really enjoy about living in Germany is that every weekend there is a festival. It seems that people in Germany just look for a reason to celebrate life. This weekends festival is a little different than the others. This weekend was the start of two week long flea market in the city square. Local businesses, restaurants and craftsman set up booths to sell their goods. The market is open to anyone which can lead to some very interesting displays. I was riding my bike around the festival and had to snap a picture of my favorite display.



Thousands of socks!
Apparently this gentleman sets up every year and is known for carrying a great selection of high quality socks that the locals look forward to every year.

I should also add that the best part of the festival is the night time entertainment. The concerts each night are a lot of fun and attract huge crowds. I have heard some of the most impressive 80's and 90's cover bands since living in Erlangen.

Birthdays in Berlin

Last weekend we traveled to Berlin to celebrate August birthdays. It just so happens that two fellow expats and I all have birthdays that fall within 10 days of each other. We had decided to celebrate together and flew to Berlin for a long weekend. We stayed in an incredible hotel (thank you husband) right in the middle of West Berlin.

One of the sites that I was excited to see was the wall. We took a 20 minute train ride to Muhlenstrasse, which is where we found the longest preserved part of the Berlin wall. It is located in East Berlin, runs just over a half a mile long and is covered in grafitti. Once we arrived at the wall we found out that Berlin had spent over a million dollars last year by bringing in artists from all over the world to repaint the existing wall. It is amazing that it was only 20 years ago that the wall came down.

I even found my name on the wall....


After the wall we took a train to Checkpoint Charlie.


Then it was on to Brandenburg Gate.


The next day we decided to check out the Berlin Zoo. I had heard that it was one of the largest zoos in Europe.
We had a great time and spent the whole afternoon walking around and enjoying the gorgeous weather.
I think he knows he is having his picture taken...


Time to feed the polar bear..

Before I end this post I want to share one last picture with you all. The night before we left for Berlin I scratched my cornea while taking out a contact. My eye was then extremely sensitive to the sun for the next couple of days. We did, however, find one thing that helped on Saturday.


It only stayed on for a few hours but definitely provided some laughs....mostly from other tourists.

The studying is over!

Yesterday was the big day....test day. We had been warned since arriving in Germany that passing the German driving test (written) was not an easy task. Being from the state of North Carolina we were only required to take the theoretical exam and were able to bypass the road test. Other friends of ours were handed a German license as soon as they arrived because they happened to be coming from a "fully reciprocal" state. Believe it or not South Carolina is one of those States. This still amazes both of us since so many of the rules of the road are so different over here than in the U.S. We don't plan on buying a car at this point. Between public transportation and our bikes we are able to get around easily. We need our European license so that we can rent cars for travel.

We began studying about 4 weeks ago and spent a lot of our free time taking practice tests and memorizing road signs. To give you an idea of some of the differences I will share some of the test questions.

1. Who is not allowed to drink alcohol while driving?

a. All drivers under the age of 21

b. All drivers

c. All drivers during their probation period

Answer: A and C. The dirver as well as everyone else in the car is allowed to drink while driving as long as the driver is over the age of 21. The driver must be under the legal limit in Germany at all times. Yikes!

2. What is the maximun speed you can drive a truck with a permissable total mass of 3.0 t on roads with one marked lane for each direction in outside built up areas?

Answer: 100km

There were several questions about driving trucks and the type of dangerous goods that I am allowed to transport on the autobahn in my big rig. I guess we should be prepared for anything and everything.

3. When driving an automatic vehicle in heavy traffic and in a built up area how can you save gas and protect the environment?

a. Drive in the gear "p" if possible

b. drive in the lowest gear possible for as long as possible

c. utilize the "kick down" mechanism, if possible.

This was a particularly hard one for me because I would assume that there was no correct answer. The answer is c although I am still not yet sure what a "kick down" mechanism is.

I wish that I could have found some examples of road signs as well, they can be pretty funny.

We had over 1700 questions to study while the test itself only consistsed of 30 questions. What makes it difficult to pass is that all of the questions are multiple choice and all can have more than one answer. On top of this if you miss more than two question you automatically fail, have to wait two weeks, pay 21 euros and try again. Now we can put all of our attention back on studying the German language as we attempt to talk with the locals.

It is so nice to be done studying road signs. After the test we both rode off on our bikes with big smiles on our faces. It is great to know that we can now drive in the EU for life since you are not required to renew your drivers license at any time.

A break from the heat

We had a great weekend in Erlangen this week not only because of the festival right outside our front door but also because of the cold front that had just rolled in. For the last several weeks we have had non stop ninety degree weather without air conditioning. This has made sleeping a little uncomfortable in our fourth floor bedroom. Saturday morning we were so excited to be able to wear jeans and t shirts. It also made me a little homesick as I began to think about crisp Saturdays in Charlotte....especially during football season. We are going to miss hosting football parties but at the same time we are excited about searching Bavaria for someone/somewhere covering American football.

Here are a few pictures of the festival right in front of our flat.

Pretzels, unicyclists and street bands....a great start to the weekend.





I am so excited about August being right around the corner. We have friends and family visiting us during the first two weeks. For the third week we will be traveling to Berlin with friends to celebrate birthdays and explore the city. I have wanted to travel to Berlin since we first arrived in Germany. Finally, at the end of the month I will be traveling home to spend time with my family. I will try to keep the posts coming with all of these new events.

God continues to bless us with one adventure after another.

Neuschwanstein Castle with Anna

I was so excited to have my sister Anna visiting us this month. There was so much that we wanted to show her. We started off walking around Erlangen, popping in and out of shops and mapping out what we wanted to do for the rest of her visit.
We made sure that Anna was able to taste her way around our little town. We tried various pastries and pretzels, langos,and a doner kabob. It was a lot of fun to introduce her to the relaxed culture here in Germany. She was also introduced to 90' weather without air conditioning.

One of the highlights of Anna's visit was our trip to Munich. Phil and I had not seen a lot of Munich so we were very excited to expolore the city for the first time with Anna. We set up a bicycle tour to Neuschwanstein Castle (the original Disney castle) which included an airconditioned bus ride to the starting point. To say that the train ride to Munich was eventful would be an under statement. The trip, which usually takes about an hour and a half, took us 4.5 hours to arrive in Munich and then 6 hours to return home to Erlangen. We all made the best of it and laughed at everything that went wrong.

When we arrived in Munich we dropped our bags off at our hotel room and headed out to find the sushi restaurant that we had heard others rave about. It was delicious and was just what we wanted for our first night in the city. The next morning we headed out to meet the bike tour to the castle. We had a wonderful time. We biked all round the town of Fussen, which is on the border of Austria. We were then given the opportunity to take a short bus ride or to hike the gorge to the castle. We decided to hike the gorge and saw some beautiful waterfalls on the way to the top. Once we arrived at the castle we had a guided tour of the finished rooms (the castle was built for King Ludwig who died when the castle was only 60% completed.). After touring the castle we also took turns going down the luge which traveled down the Austrian Alps. It was an incredible trip and we were so happy we were able to share it with family.








What a wonderful time with my sister. Anna, I hope you are able to visit again before we head home. There is so much more to see.