Three points of Contact and Keep your Mind on your Work...

And speaking of snow,

A sleeting, freezing weekend called for a change in plans last weekend. I had planned for a drive to the French border to walk through a Roman walled city. But walking through sleet with three children was enough for even me to say no.

Instead, we went to kid nirvana that happens to be only 5 kilometers away and indoors. It's called Sensopolis, and, if you're under 25, we can't wait to take you there; if you're over 25 and still like slides, we'll still take you there! t could be called Slide Land. It has a 40-foot shoot (the photos at the top are the shoot at the top--you're at the top right looking down-- and a blurry Andy at the bottom), slides that send you shooting all over a space ship. Wide slides that you can hold ands and go down as a family, curly slides that make you feel like you're riding down a slinky.

It has a six-floor ball pit complete with cannons and a vacuum that sends the foam balls flying. The ball pit is guarded by a giant dragon slide that empties people at the entrance. It as a science floor with all the cool science stuff, a pirate ship... and food that you are actually glad to eat.

For me, the best part was a suspended ropes course. From the bottom looking up, it looked great. I had lots of time to think about how great it really was when I was up at the top, looking down from 60 feet at an unforgiving floor, waiting for my turn. I had a while to wait because the ropes attendant had to go out and pull two people off when they got stuck or just were too frightened to go on any more. While I was hanging out in my harness, trying not to look down, a Marine-looking guy finished the course and gave me a thumbs up.

"How is it?" I asked.
In drill-Sargent mode, he answered,"Piece of cake. Maintain three points of contact at all times and keep your mind on your work."

That became my mantra as I, barefooted (I had left my shoes at the bottom and didn't want to go down to get them), stretched my toe to reach the next dangling log.

Here is a view of the course looking up from the ground. Those tiny things up there are people.

We had a blast of a Saturday. Micah fell asleep in the car and didn't wake up until Sunday morning.

Crushed as cranberries

These are our friends Brad and Stacey. They are cool and fun, and we miss them. We knew each other when Andy and I lived in Florida. We were going to Vienna for Thanksgiving to visit with them and see their three kids, whom we haven't met yet.

I tried not to gloat about it in public. I just pranced around the hotel room saying to myself, "why, as a matter of fact, we're going to Vienna for Thanksgiving."

As it turns out, not gloating was a good policy. There is a forecast of freezing rain, snow and fog the latter half of the long weekend. The prudent among us (that means Andy)decided that was too risky in the Alps for a long weekend that included 16 hours on the road.

but Happy Thanksgiving to you all. I pray the day is filled with reminders, big and small, of all you have to be grateful for. We love you!

St. Martinsritt

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We have some catching up to do on our weekend activities. Sadly, the camera batteries were going for this event so the flash didn't work so our photos of St. Martins are few and very dim (sorry!).
Three weeks ago we gathered Saturday night for the annual celebration of St. Martins Ritt (read down to the section on his cloak). This is a big deal here because St. Martin is the saint of Sindelfingen. The old church in the square, Martinskirche, was built in the 11th century and dedicated in 1083. It is one of the oldest Roman churches in Wuerttemberg.

One of the teachers had organized it. The kids made lanterns as an art project the week before. We met at dusk at the school to collect and light the lanterns, then we walked, singing through the park. As we walked to the square, we met up with other children in the town; there were about 200 in the church yard by the time it started. We waited in the cold for the annual reenactment of St. Martin's kindness.

There is a man dressed in rags in the church yard shivering. It was a cold night so that part of the story was easy to reconstruct. Then a man dressed as a Roman soldier rides through the yard a few times. A children's choir sings special songs and everyone holds up lanterns. Marting then takes his sword and cuts his cloak in two and give half to the beggar.

After the performance, the church sold sausages, cookies and hot wine to raise money for mercy projects in Asia. Wonderful night. And we all survived, which was sometimes questionable when you have 200 little people swinging lighted candles around.

Reflections on the Audubon

Back in the US, the Audubon had a certain allure. The idea of driving on a highway without speed limits was rather enticing to my younger self.

It's both exceeds and fails expectations. The majority of drivers behave quite responsibility on the unrestricted portions of the Audubon. Trucks even more so since their top speeds are mechanically regulated by governors. (Being trapped behind one truck trying to pass another can be annoying since the passer is often mechanically limited to speeds that are only glacially faster than his target).

But then their are the other drivers. On the dashboard of our beloved rental car is a sticker directed at those drivers. It warns that the car is not to be driven at speeds in excess of 230 km/hr (if you're hesitant to do the math, this is over 140 mph). I have seen those drivers and have a few safety tips to pass along.

Know where your hazard lights are at all times. Traffic stops instantly and without warning and normal brake lights don't always convey the severity of the situation to the driver behind you. My friends who drive American cars that they imported from the US frequently complain about their need to replace brakes that weren't built to withstand frequent decellerations from 80 mph to 0.

Should you wish to venture into the left lanes, spend lots of time looking into your rearview mirror. The average American is not used to being passed by a car travelling 60 km/hr faster than he is when he's already cruising at comfortable highway speeds. These relative velocities make drivers approaching from the rear just as dangerous as those in the front.

Time to run. My children inform me that it's their turn to use the computer.

Coming up soon is a driving post on German street signs. Piper is collecting anecdotes. This has been quite confusing since the US relies on a staple of about 30 types of street signs. The Germans (quite literally) have over 300 types. Their are literally signs for everything (often 3 or more on the same signpost... a very precise people these Germans).

Seen and Heard, a collection of Random Comments and Observations

--So just how many Smart Cars can you fit in a parallel parking space? Legally three, but we've seen more. They just pull into the parking space, leaving room for as many more as care to squeeze in.

--"Is that boy from Argentina?" (In German. A man who stopped me in the grocery store while I was shopping with Micah. He had been to South America and swore that Micah looked like he was from Buenos Aires.)

-- Failure to yield right-of-way is a criminal offense in Germany (Drivers Handbook and Examination Manual for Germany)

-- Quiet hours are 1-3 daily, from 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. and all day Sunday. They are strictly enforced. (Our lease. This is a common clause in German rental agreements).

--New president Obama will tell Americans to stop the war, to stop running their air conditioners and to stop building big houses.(In German, DJ on a rock radio station).

--"Every woman in Europe has the right to wear a bikini!" (a European friend of mine at the pool).

--Residents are responsible for sweeping the sidewalks in front of their houses. Instead of waiting for the leaves to fall, I've seen many German housewives beating their front bushes with a broom handle to get the leaves off faster.

-- "I'm not so Michael Phelps." (a woman at the pool commenting on her lack of form. In German, it sounds like "Ich bin nich so Michael Phelps."

--Overheard: A man from Germany, from Korea and from Portugal, arguing in a restaurant in their common language of English if "kindergarten" is a word in English. The German guy insisted it was stolen. The Korean guy said it couldn't be an English word because children don't grow in gardens. The Portuguese guy said he didn't know because he didn't have kids.

--German mail carriers deliver mail on bicycles with three large, bright yellow panniers.

--It is illegal to talk on a cell phone while riding your bike. (Drivers Handbook and Examination Manual for Germany)... sorry Todd.

-- Cabbage is everywhere. In all shapes and sizes and colors.

--People actually smoke here.

-- "An American without a TV? I didn't know there could be such a thing!" Comment in my German class.)

-- Small dogs in Germany wear sweaters.

Guest Space

Yes, we have guest space. And if you need more space than you find with us, I've talked with the owner of a guest house across the street. The Waldhotel Einholz is ready to serve as our guest room. That way we can rent guest space on an as-needed basis instead of paying for a bigger house.

Now Come!

Apartment!

That's right, sports fans, we have a place to live.
We rented an apartment about a kilometer from the school so it will be easy to keep our walking lifestyle.
The apartment is at the end of a dead-end street. A short walk through the woods takes you to a big park with a soccer field, tire swings, slides, sand pit, etc.
The Wonder Woman craze continues. The park's zip lines are their invisible planes...
We move in Dec. 1

German class

I'm half way through a German language class at a community center called the VolksHochSchule. It's what you might think of a community language class . There are 12 of us. I get the whole western hemisphere to myself. One woman each from India, Kosovo, Croatia, and Kazakhstan. One man each from Hungary and Poland. One man and four women from Turkey. Most executives and their spouses get private language training as part of their package, so this group is the un- or under-employed who can spend four hours each morning for a month studying German.

I love this class.

Some of it is painful, like tossing a ball to your classmates and saying, "Guten Tag. Wie geht es Ihnen?" to the person who catches it. But great stuff comes out. I asked Chaba why he left Hungary. He said, in English: "Hmmm. Because Communist s---," he said. He will drive to Austria to hear rap concerts or Megadeath, but his all time favorite singer is Frank Sinatra.

Elhama would like to go back to Kosovo but the job market is bad there, she said. But the living is much better now than it was. We don't have the German vocabulary for political discussions. She could just say "10 years war. Bad. America comes. Now is good."

The guy from Poland has come to Germany from Ireland where he was working as a locksmith. He swears like an Irishman too so his English is pretty salty. Funny hearing a guy named Slawik say "F 'ing" with an Irish accent.

I try to talk with the women from Turkey, but they all speak Turkish so we talk together as far as our German will allow and then they switch to their common language.

Halloween and Heidelberg

I dislike Halloween. Any holiday with witchcraft and tooth decay at its core will never be a favorite. In Glenside, we treated it as a neighborhood costume party, but I was looking forward to a break in the holiday.

It was not to be.

As we got closer to the close of the month, more and more people started asking what we were doing. The kids, who had previously said they didn't care as long as they got to eat candy that night, started getting that wistful look of "I want to Trick or Treat."So, on Friday, we went on the hunt for costumes. A timely display of cheap Chinese clothes turned Micah into the King of Siam and Maddie into a Chinese princess. Tess has been a Russian princess for too many years to return to the theme. She was an Alpine hiker.

Let me tell you about Halloween on a military base. First, it's mobbed. If you try to get on base at 6 when the Trick or Treating starts, you'll be in about two miles of backed-up traffic of regional Americans and their German friends signing in to get on base. Parking is miserable. It is swarming with kids.

We were forewarned so we came at 4:30, parked, ate at an Italian restaurant and were ready to hit it when the sun went down.

It is what Andy calls a target-rich environment.

Family housing is in apartment blocks; each apartment has a large terrace at one end. Instead of trooping up and down the stairs, families in each building meet on the terrace. Four or so adults take turns handing out scoops of candy to kids who file by (four scoops per apartment building) while the rest of the adults have a cook out on the terrace. There are dozens of buildings so the haul is tremendous. There are army patrol guys every few blocks handing out glow sticks. One little girl asked the man if he dressed up as a soldier for Halloween. It's great to have the glow sticks. I also doubt that there are any smashed pumpkins on the roads.

The next morning was Heidelberg. We wanted to explore some of the city before joining friends of my sister and brother-in-law for dinner. It was one of those amazing places that makes you think, "yes, this is what I came to Germany to see." It's not just that the castle is amazing and every church is beautiful. The town itself is lovely to walk around in. It's pretty and old and well kept. We love it.

Buell and Hans Walter went to graduate school and did post-doc work together. The two have been colleagues at National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson and Max-Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg for years. I had met them in Princeton, but my now 15-year-old nephew Brigg was a bald baby the last time I saw them. They live in the M-P equivalent of a manse. Wonderful house with amazing gardens. Salmon dinner then chatting in a living room warmed by a refurbished wood burning stove from France. The kids got to watch Jungle Book. HW said he was there holding Micah for the last part because Micah got scared of the tiger, but he was also laughing at the funny bits. Good to know that brilliant astronomers can like cartoon bears. MB sent us off well fed, well cared for and with a large bag of fresh-cut herbs. ahhhh.

Overheard in the other room...

Maddie: "... fifty six, fifty seven, fifty eight, fifty nine, fifty ten"

Tess: "NO! It's sixty."

Maddie: "Oh. Sixty, sixty one, sixty two... sixty seven, sixty eight, sixty nine, sixty ten."

Tess: "MADDIE, NO! It's seventy."

Maddie: "Oh... math is really hard."

Adoption costs: $ Lots, Conversations while holding hands: priceless

Micah and I were walking down the street last week. He looked up at me with his espresso-colored eyes and said, "Mommy, thank you for going to Bangkok to get me."