Round and round we go ...

It's Spargelzeit - asparagus time.  Again. Frankly, I can't believe it.  Has it been a year already? Obviously it has been a year, but still it is hard to believe.

This is not in fact our first Spargelessen (asparagus meal).  Our first was earlier in the week when our veggie ladies had the first small stalks and I bought some to make a salad.  It was yum (cooked the asparagus, cooled, tossed with a walnut oil vinaigrette).

But this was dinner, so it was white asparagus, smoked ham, boiled potatoes- the traditional Spargel Essen.  But, not butter sauce this time, rather a hollandaise with Bärlauch (ramps).  

What a disaster.

But that 's later.  First, the ribbons.  We're cooking ribbons!?  Yes, we are.  The white asparagus is not nearly as tender as the green and you do really have to peel them.  Fresh, they tend to be crispy enough to break as you are peeling them, so it's good to lay them on a surface - and you get all these lovely ribbons!  Wow.  What do do? You can't throw them away, of course, so you cook them into a lovely base for soup (with potato peels - adds to the flavor and moderates the bitterness of the asparagus.)  Tomorrow, we'll have soup with the couple of stalks saved from dinner.

 Isn't that pretty?  Wrapped bunches of peeled asparagus, ramps finely sliced.  The ramps, garlic-y flavored fresh green early-in-the-springtime so welcome, are the last ingredient in the sauce that is, we learned, not to be tackled by newbies like us.  It was lumpy and not smooth and, well, ugly.  Thank goodness, it tasted fantastic!

Smoked ham, boiled potatoes, asparagus with ramp/hollandaise sauce. 

Once again, I have to say, we eat like royalty here.

Affinghausen Shrimp

Well, if that doesn't sound like an oxymoron, I don't know what does.  It's Germany, it is NO WHERE near sea water, it's in the middle of wheat country, and they do shrimp?  Yes, we can.

Once there was a farmer in Affinghausen who had a business renting large farm equipment. That business was drying up but he had these huge "garages" and a biomass energy generator.  He decided he needed to go another direction.  And of course shrimp was the logical next step.  Wha'?

Who knows how he jumped from A to Q, but he is now selling shrimp, raised from larvae imported from Florida (where else?).  You can even order them by mail, but we've decided to make our first purchase in person.  Maybe next week.

Read all about it.  This was in our local paper (German of course) but if you want a really bad translation, do the automatic Google page translator and you might - or might not - understand what they're talking about.  

Cultural Week

 

It was an unusually busy week for us.  Sunday luncheon with Mutti, Easter Monday Brunch at friends', Tuesday to Emden for a museum exhibit on Realism, Wednesday a class (hey, work!), Thursday, a class and the Cirque du Soleil, Friday to Hamburg with a different group of friends for yet another museum exhibit.  I'm exhausted, but it was all fun.

Tuesday with the old standbys (Klaus, Johanna, Ulli, Ilsemarie) by train to Emden.  It's a lovely little town with a very nice museum.  The entrance has changed since our last visit, and certainly challenges reality! Everything about this boat is real, except of course you cannot sail it.  If it were warmer here, I'd say it looked like the thing had warped in record heat.

Sunny and cool, we cultured ourselves for a couple of hours.  It was an excellent exhibit, well-arranged with art from various media illustrating different aspects of Realism.  Photographic Realism is amazing to me - it seems the artists use brushes with a single hair to achieve the effect of no brush at all.  

Afterward, we took a walk around the town.  Seems Mexican is loved everywhere!

Of course, there are no pictures from the Cirque de Soleil performance on Thursday, but if you want a taste of it, here's a link to their promo of the show.  The artists are simply incredible and we thoroughly enjoyed it.  But man we were home late!

Then it's Friday and we have to get up EARLY and catch the train to Hamburg for the exhibit on Pop Art at the Hamburg Modern Art Gallery.  Wow, that was fun.  Andy Warhol is of course the patron saint of everything Pop and he got first billing.  But there were plenty of others to gawk at (sometimes "admire" is too grand a word....).  The music in the video was played in several of the rooms - you could dance and look at the same time.  I don't think that made us cool.  But we try.  

Bedroom Re-Do

On our last visit to the US of A, one of my major goals  - outside of family time -  was to choose some fabrics to re-do our bedroom furnishings.  I'd last done curtains, bedcovers and pillows in 1992 when we lived on Beard Street in Tallahassee.  Granted, they still looked pretty good, but after constructing the headboard last year, the colors were not quite right.  Besides, after 18 years, I didn't think it soooo extravagant to redecorate.

Getting started is always the hardest part for me.  I needed a block of time without other obligations - classes, dinners, appointments.  The Bremen school Easter break was ideal.


Start from the bottom and go up - that seemed a logical progression.   So the dust ruffle was the first part to tackle.  This time not a ruffle, but rather a bit more tailored with pleats at the corners and midway along the sides.

The coverlet was  next and a bear for several reasons.  First, it's just a lot of fabric!  I'd bought extra-large piping to trim it but then nixed that - way too tricky without extra tools.  But then the top was done, the batting tacked in, the backing sewn on and then I did a bias edging over the piping rather than the piping itself.

After all that, I mentally shut down on the pillow covers - one set was simply done with purchased cording and a second set of slip-on cases with a crocheted trim I'd done years ago, just waiting for the right porject!

Werner pleaded for simple curtains so I kept to the tabbed-curtain style from the earlier set.


Done!  Hey, we don't count the hours when the outcome is pleasing!

Friday Good

Fair warning:  This is not the usual  cheery posting.

I read recently that all of 8 % of west Germans attend church regularly (only 2% in the former East Germany) though a majority of Germans identify themselves with a church and pay taxes to support the church.  Regardless there seems to be a deep and abiding relationship between public (civic) holidays and the Christian church calendar:  a day off for Good Friday, Easter, the day after Easter, the day after Pentecost, Corpus Cristi, Ascension Day, Mary's Ascension Day, Day of Repentance, All Saints' Day, etc (depending on where you live), is seen as almost a constitutional right even when the vast majority of recipients of these days off have no personal connection to the church and often little understanding of the meaning of the day. I am not a church-goer, but I figure, hey, if you get a day off work, you should at least be able to explain the meaning of the holiday.  I am in a minority on that question. 

THAT said, today is Good Friday, a federal holiday.  That means no shops or markets - financial or vegetable or liquor or clothes or department - are open.  Offices and businesses are closed, and public transportation operates on a reduced schedule. It is socially unacceptable to do any kind of obvious work on this day - no gardening or  heavy house work or clothes washing or sidewalk sweeping or window washing or shed painting. (But restaurants and movie houses are open - it's a holiday after all.)

With limited options for activities, I chose to do something I have intended to do since before I moved to Germany.  Today we visited a memorial to a Nazi concentration camp.

I didn't undertake this as a casual outing or day trip, but rather a pilgrimage, perhaps appropriate to this day.

Bergen-Belsen is not far - less than an hour and a half by car. Strange. There are no big signs to direct you to the site - you have to be looking for it to find it.  And when you find it, it's bit incongruous:   a lovely setting, the heath and the juniper trees on gently rolling slopes where you know unspeakable evil was done.

Bergen-Belsen began operation in 1939 as a forced labor camp for construction workers. Then in 1941 it was converted to a prisoner of war camp for Russian soldiers and in 1943 became a transfer and labor camp for Jews, mostly women.  Unlike Auschwitz, there were no mass cremation ovens here; death was by hunger and disease.  But that by the thousands.

At least 30,000 Jews, 40,000 prisoners of war and  20,000 others died here. The grounds of the camp are now a park; the barracks that housed the luckless souls were burned to the ground soon after the liberation on April 15, 1945.  Memorials mark their mass graves; a few individual markers placed later memorialize individuals who died there, the most famous of whom is Anne Frank.  Above is the marker erected to her and her sister.  And below a photo of her placed on top of another memorial and dotted with stones.

Why the stones scattered around?  We'd seen them before at other Jewish cemeteries in Prague and here in Germany.  There are various explanations for the practice, but one I like suggests that the visitor who leaves a stone is saying: I remember you.  These are souls worth remembering.

After walking the grounds, we went to the documentation center spent time watching films of short interviews with survivors of the camps,  reading the history, looking at pictures, viewing documents.  The center is a long open corridor well arranged for looking at the exhibits.  And though the space was open and there were a number of people there, you noticed that there was very little talking among the visitors.  You listen.  You read.  You look.  You try to do the impossible and understand what you see and what you hear. And I hope, we don't forget. We must never forget.

Pre-Easter

It was time for a weekend visit to Amina, so off we went on Friday afternoon so Amina could sleep late on Saturday instead of getting up with Mom and Dad.  What a joke.  Who thought that?  Mom and Dad left for work and Amina came and jumped on our bed and played diving under the covers and in general NOT sleeping late!

Oh well, that's what week days are for!

We spent the day walking to the store and painting pictures and baking banana bread.  We were supposed to do Easter Eggs but somehow never got around to that ...

But there was time for Hula Hoop!

Friday night we brought dinner and gave the hosts a day off.  Our meager offering was eclipsed by Saturday's feast.  

Carpaccio.  Raw meat.  Well, there's always a first time, and this was mine.  And since I'm older now I figure it's not going to kill me and if I don't like it I can not eat it, I ate it.  And it was good!  Who'da thunk it?  Certainly not me, the person who has consistently made fun of people who eat raw meat.  Of course, presentation counts!

 

The main course was lamb carrée (a rack of lamb - actually several) with a pesto crust.  Potatoes, boiled and then roasted.  I have to say that was pretty good, too.  

Sunday after a leisurely breakfast, the younger folks put on their skates to enjoy the weather while the sun was out.  Rima likes the skates because she is almost regular height!  We waved goodbye and let them do the skating.  Some things are just better for the younger crowd.

Cleaning Out

Mutti had the Spring Cleaning bug this week - she just had to clean out a few cabinets.  We understand that of course, currently in the middle of spring projects ourselves.  But what it means for Mutti is that WE have to clean out the cabinets for her!  Hey, not a problem.  When you're 93, you get to ask for help.

And at 93 she frequently says  I don't need it anymore - throw it out!  Well, our recycling tendencies come into play and we can't just throw it all away.  That curling iron - wow!  We'll take that to Paris.  Same with the portable hair dryer.  The old cotton flat sheet is exactly the right size for the base for the new bed skirt.  And that carved wooden tray, umm.  Well, maybe that goes in the flea market box (not all that cute).  

And then there was the "rag" - Oh I cut that up sometime to clean up with - just toss it. I don't think so, Mutti.  It's an old hand towel.  I'll do something with it - lavender sachets maybe.

At home on closer inspection, we saw a small monogram and then saw that there were other letters woven into the fabric.  It was an old damask-weave hand towel, probably intended as a guest towel or one to hang as a decoration to cover the ones that were in use. (It's actually bright white, but I had to play with the contrast so the initials and weaving showed up).

I called Mutti.  

Who's EB, Mutti?  Oh, well that must be my grandmother. She died at 82 or so in 1942 or so.  She was born a Behrens and then she married a Niemann, my mother's maiden name.  

Good grief.   So sometime around 1880 or before Mutti's grandmother embroidered her initials into this cloth and then more than 100 years later, Mutti cuts it up to dust?  Oh well, to her it was just another cloth.  To me it is a bit more. 

The saying is:  Denke edel, handle hilfreich.  Roughly translated:  Think nobly, act accordingly. Or:  Think nice things, then do them!  One hundred years later, it sounds like something we could still aim to live by. 

It'll become a pillow cover.  The part that's left, that is.  Maybe I'll over-embroider the saying.  I'll let you know.

New Old Treasures

Thanksgiving is normally our biggest dinner event of the year and it's nice to get out the nice things for the table.  And we have nice things, but it's a mixture of things.  Not enough of one sort of dish to fully set the table.  I know, that isn't a big deal, but still, it was something that kind of sat in the back of my mind.  Then came a chance to do something about it.

Werner got an e-mail last week from a teacher he took a drawing class from.  She was cleaning out and simplifying and in the process decided to sell her grandmother's dinner service for 12, and that for a song.  Were any of her acquaintances interested? Well, yes!

Settings for meals and settings for coffee and tea are a bit different here than in the US of A.  Oh, well, isn't everything?  In the US, a standard place setting includes dinner plate, salad/dessert plate, cup and saucer.  Here, a place setting is dinner plate, deep plate (a soup bowl), and a small side plate.  Cups and saucers belong to the tea set which will include a creamer and sugar bowl and a tea or coffee pot.   The dinner set has serving pieces, the tea set, not so much.

That's all to let you know what we got - a dinner service.  For 12.  Plates, bowls, side plates.  Two platters.  Three serving bowls, two with lids.  A soup tureen.  Two saucieres.  And it certainly looks like something from your grandparents with little flowers sprinkled around.  But since we are that - grandparents -  and since it really fits with our old house, we decided to relieve the art teacher of her burden.

Such a deal!

I do think we will use them more than once a year!

New Stairs

Of course the stairs aren't NEW.  There is nothing new about this house!  But they do look a lot different now.

When we moved in, there were a thousand things we wanted to do and no time to do them all. Compromise was the word of the day and we've done that more than a few times since.  Put off.  Wait.  Later. 

Later has finally arrived for the stairs.

They were uncovered when we moved in, which is not to say "usable."  There were coats of paint and old stuff from old carpet, so the emergency solution was more carpet.  It was never pretty and the rubber edges, though practical, were always offensive, both esthetically and visually (is that the same thing?).

Some years ago Werner found some brass stair rods, those charming things that hold down the carpet where the tread meets the riser.  Time to use them!

Off with the old!  It is never ever as easy as it looks and always takes at least twice as long to finish.  The old carpet backing and the old layers of paint took scraping and whacking and sanding.  There had to be wood under there somewhere!

And there it was!  Stressed wood.  Hard to believe that people actually pay for this look when they can get it for free with a 150-year-old house and three weeks' labor.  Before and after:

Isn't it pretty? I love the way it looks and feels.

So, time to go to the carpet store and order a runner.  Here's the kicker:  our precious brass stair rods are 60 cm. wide which means we can have carpet 50 cm wide.  HARD TO FIND. One store in Bremen offered limited choices in 50 cm; we special ordered it to only to be told a week later that the manufacturer no longer makes that width - not enough call for it.  Well.  Well.  Well.

Option 1:  leave them bare.  I kind of like it!

Option 2:  buy new cute brass stair rods for a wider carpet! 

We're putting off a decision.  Maybe we'll find a compromise.

Baubles, Bangles and Beads

Today was a craft fair in Bremen. Before Easter, a bit like before Christmas, there are lots of markets where creative people can strut their stuff. I fantasize about joining their ranks, but it is so intimidating! Ideas! Execution! Commitment! I seem to lack some of the essential elements to enter the craft market.

Nevertheless, looking is lots of fun and inspires me a bit to go home and do SOMETHING.

Our friend Ursel got inspired a few months back. She got a 5-kilo bag of assorted glass beads for next to nothing, all sizes and colors and shapes and all in a jumble. But she has a great eye and before long they were sorted and organized and began turning into lovely necklaces and then she ordered more beads and then she took apart some old necklaces of hers to add to the mix and, well, this is part of what happened.

Back to the craft fair. A young friend was visiting so of course they made a necklace but the center bauble just didn't quite get it. Wouldn't you know, a glass artist was at the fair and she had the perfect bead!

So back to Ursel's where she finished the necklace for Wiebke and then said:  Well, my dear Sharon, I think you need a new necklace.  And it should be turquoise. That's a good color for you.  Well, OK!  Let's make a necklace.  

First we chose a range of colors, then set up the row, then chose the smaller beads to go between, then found a much better center bead, then restrung it all and -- ta da ! a masterpiece.

 So, is turquoise a good color for me? I vote YES. Thanks, Ursel, it is beautiful!

s No w - More

... as in, not less.  We arrived with lots of snow on the ground, but it gradually warmed and the snow and ice gradually melted.  Good.  It's March and Easter is around the corner and Spring is around the corner and, well, we want Spring.  Sadly, Mother Nature has other ideas this year about when winter will end and spring begin.  Apparently, we're not quite through with winter. 

It snowed Friday night, the most perfect snow for snowballs and snowforts and snowpeople.  So we made a snowperson, our first of the season and we sincerely hope the last.  It waits to be seen re: last snowfall since more snow is forcast for the weekend and early next week.  GEEEEZE.  It is enough.  Snow No More is my new mantra.  (However, walking to the market this morning in the brilliant sunshine with shadows on the snow and drinking in the cold clear air was quite nice.  Hummm.)

Here's the Last Snow Man.  I think the singer is saying "We just love the snow, we do, But we're up for something new ......"

Social Weekend

It's not often we have two invitations out in the same weekend - we really aren't all that social. That puts us in the minority here in Germany, or at least in our neck of the woods.  

After all this time (1993 to now equals almost 17 years, but I never could count), it is still difficult for me to reconcile the face that north Germans put on for the world at large and what goes on behind the scenes.  To those they don't know, they are serious and cool and straightforward and distant and industrious and lots of other down-to-earth words.  And they are all those things! But get to know them and no one is quicker to socialize - a party, a dinner, a breakfast, a walk, the theater, any outing - you name it!  We're trying to get with the program.

Saturday was the annual Kohl und Pinkel dinner with our usual group.  There were several modifications this year:   1. we were a smaller group since people do love to leave this gray place in the winter; and 2. most important, there was NO WALK!  Distaster!  Klaus was recovering from a broken arm, Ursel from a bad fall - both because of the ice that covered the streets and walkways the whole time we were in the US; Ilsemarie had a rare Saturday meeting.  Werner and I substituted a walk from our place to the dinner, a nice 45 minutes, but not the same as wandering along the river and drinking schnapps and eating sweets......

So here's the modest picture of the smallish group and some of the food (not a whit less delicious for the lack of walking!) 

Sunday it was Birthday Breakfast at Elke's.  (Hunter and Hannah will remember Elke and her husband Jürgen from last summer - then it was Jürgen's birthday luncheon at the hotel.)  Some of the same people were there from the night before - social means you know a lot of the same people, after all!  Conversation ranged from weather to food to ecology to politics.  Social means talking, after all!

Breakfast was delicious with a baked egg casserole, smoked trout, assorted cheeses and breads, lovely roast beef, jams and cakes.  Besides cooking, they are both avid gardeners so gifts are easy to do - bulbs to plant and later brighten the view from the window.  They'll enjoy both.

Me and the birthday girl.  My 65th isn't far away. 

USA January 2010

The blog certainly deserves its name - it has been very occasional lately.  Now that we're back home, now that the schedule is more or less under control and more or less back to normal, I'll put the fingertips to the keyboard and see what I remember.

9AM the day before we left.  See the sun?  The little round pale thing? This is not an atypical Bremen winter sky (here driving down the street in front of the main train station with the flyover to the left).The sun is low, there are often hazy clouds, it just isn't bright. We were so looking forward to Florida sunshine. 

And we found it!  The very first day!  It wasn't all that warm, but warm enough by our usual standards.  Hayden is in school during the week; either Dylan has a great memory or got a little coaching from mom and dad, but she was quick to ask "Take a walk?"  After Werner reads the paper, of course!  

We put the baby in the stroller and very conscientiously (this is serious business) took the baby for a walk to the playground and checked out the slide and then headed back home.  Dylan is still a pretty easy kid.  And I still don't understand why she is so modest in front of a camera because she smiles and laughs like a crazy girl!

Hayden has discovered the computer big time since we were last here.  There are all kinds of sites where he can practice spelling and matching - he loves it and he is so good at it!  Dylan doesn't always love to just watch, but she can be pretty patient. 

After a week of playing with the little kids, we went to Atlanta to play with the big kids.  We had dinners with Ginny and Barry and Julia and Larry, of course, and did some shopping, of course.  Saturday morning EVERYONE got together at Julia's for breakfast, and Mother made her yummy crispy waffles - of course!  We were lucky to have Carla there since she is on the road so much this time of year.  The new kid on the block, Will, was a bit taken aback by all the goings-on, but he was a trooper.  Later, Keith, Liz and and their crew arrived and we got to play Scrabble. I forgot who won, but hey it was fun!

OFF TO FLORIDA AGAIN!  It was Super Bowl Party time which means getting the table ready for all the food, the jumpy house up for the kids and football for everyone.  It's a treat to see Michelle and Joey's neighbors and friends  - it's almost like we live there!

We made a side trip to Tallahasse to see Nancy and meet her new puppy Minnie.  She's a one-eyed wonder, full of energy and personality.  It might be a tug-of-war for a while between the two of them.  I'm not betting on who wins.  

There weren't many other goings-on - the kids had school, we cooked and talked and watched a couple of movies (Akeela and the Bee, Nanny McPhee - both on the must-see list for a year or more - and worth the wait!).  Werner painted decorations for Hannah's room re-do, I did a bit of sewing.  Fun, all of it.

We left Monday for Orlando so we could have an overnight there before heading out on Tuesday.  The only problem with that plan was that our flight didn't leave until Wednesday.  That wouldn't have been a bad thing except that we didn't realize our mistake until we tried to check in at the airport!  How old-geezerish!  How embarrassing!  Oh well, better than one day too late!!  We were welcomed back for an extra night with Lee, Crissy and kids and enjoyed one more day of sunshine before returning to cold, gray, snowy Bremen. 

Next time, the adventure will be lots more adventurous.  In the meantime, I'll post some of the more ordinary goings on around here. 

Au revoir.  Auf Wiedersehen.  See ya.

Bremen-USA and almost Back

Question: What makes a vacation?  Well, being off work. That counts.  Being away from home is a plus.  Going to an exotic location - put that on the list.  Sitting, reading, relaxing, quiet dinners, a book to read, beach, sunshine. 

So, were we on vacation?  I guess that depends on what gets included in your definition.  We had a great time.  We got to see EVERYONE in the family (that doesn't always happen), played with grandkids and grand relatives of other orders, ate some wonderful food (by any measure, too much, but that is always the case). 

At the moment, there are no pictures, no videos, only a promise that when we return to Bremen, bathed in ice and snow and cold, I will post pictures and videos and an abbreviated log of the trip.  After all, a three-week gap is simply not to be tolerated.

Snow and Snacks

Sunday mornings are always quiet here at our little house, what with so little traffic on the street.  But today we noticed it was even quieter, and sure enough it was snowing again (again!) and the snow muffles everything so, so nicely.  It's  easy to pull up the covers and just snuggle in for a few more minutes.....

But then we got up and instead of sending Werner for the Sunday rolls, I went with him into the snow and to the bakery.  Funny, it is not all that cold - hovering around 0°C/32°F - so by the time we got on all the layers of clothes and got out the door, I was ready to peel something off! 

After picking up the morning rolls, we went to the river.  Here's the view from the "Vegesack Balcony."

And some empty benches - no takers in this weather!  That is not to say that we were alone out there in the white and powder.  Bikers, dog walkers, sled pullers, morning exercisers.  Lots of folks out and about.

Breakfast was leisurely, then we went about our individual things - Werner working on the stairs, me working on translations.

Then  - Tea Time!  Werner had a surprise for me - cookies.  Not just cookies but Pepperidge Farm Cookies.  Straight from the US of A.  Wow. 






He found them at our local grocery and wondered if they would be soft as promised, and chewy as promised, and tasty, tasty as promised.

They were!

Ow.
or: 
I told you so!!

We do this, don't we?  "Don't tell me what to do.  I know what I'm doing."

Yes, we do say that and No, I don't always know what I'm doing.  Just like little kids, I can can be stubborn and willful.

We wanted to use some of the left-over frozen turkey for our dinner, but not all of it that was in the frozen clump.  Werner says, Don't put your hand behind the knife!  I said, I know what I'm doing!

Ooops.

A slip of the knife (which of course he keeps so sharp!) and I have a really nice gouge in the finger.  I resist going to the doctor, but this was a necessary trip. Five stitches later my hand looks like this!

So, Werner gets to say  "I told you so!!!" (I gave him permisssion)  and I get to say:  "Sorry."
It'll be better soon. 

Happy New Year

Yeah, yeah, I know it's late, but I have excuses.  Which to use?  Scraping the stairs?  Sleeping in?  Partying?  Hard to choose, but I'll take them all. 

We have started scraping the stairs (more on that in a later post).   We have slept in.  Sorry, I am not apologizing for that.  We're old(er) and we have the right.  Partying?  Well, that too, and though we had a lovely New Year's Eve theater event with friends and a meal and a fireworks party with half of Bremen, this post is not about that.  It is about the day after.

When we're here on New Year's Day, we like to walk, and it is especially fun when there's a bit of snow.  This year we had snow and once again we drove to the village of Meyenburg to wander the town and the fields. 

And I noticed this year how much people - strangers -  speak to each other on January 1.  Happy New Year! they all say.  Wow!  We should greet each other every day with such smiling faces and good wishes!

Here's a snippet of our New Year's walk in Meyenburg. 

Happy New Year, Best of Health, Joy and Peace to us all.