First Emergency Room Visit

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to experience a visit to the emergency room in Germany. As far as emergency rooms go, this was a pretty painless visit in all respects.

For a few weeks I had what looked like an infected hang nail. However, on our trip to Portugal, the finger took a turn for the worse and became really swollen and painful. When we returned, I finally went to the doctor. He put me on some antibiotics but told me to go to the emergency room by Saturday if it wasn't any better.

Jim and I decided to go early in the morning to avoid the crowds. The Elisabeth Krankenhaus is only about 7 blocks away so we walked there. We were surprised to find the hospital virtually empty. I guess the times I have been to the emergency room (and was actually conscious when I arrived) the hospital was chaotic with long wait times. Here in Bonn, there are a number of small hospitals in the area so rather than everyone ending up at the same hospital, the emergency patients are spread out. Or maybe since Germans seem to be more law abiding, there are fewer "misunderstandings" involving knives, guns and other weapons.

Somehow I was surprised that I wasn't required to fill out any paperwork before seeing the doctor. I don't know why that surprised me because it really isn't any different than seeing the doctor or dentist here in Germany. They take your name and address and trust you at your word that you'll pay the bill. I guess since most everyone else has the public insurance, there are very few people who have private insurance so it doesn't pose that great of a financial risk.

The procedure itself was pretty quick. The doctor simply had to cut open my finger and release some of the infection juices (not really a medical term but doesn't sound as gross as pus) out. I had to go back every day for a week for the doctor to check the wound for infection and every day the hospital was just as empty. I'm not sure I'd want to go to that hospital for a gunshot wound or something serious because the doctors don't seem to get a lot of practice with emergencies.

Here's a picture of me with my injured finger.

No- I'm not giving you the finger, just showing it to you.

Thankfully, Jim and Sylvia were around for a few days after this because one handed diaper changing is a little challenging.

Litigation File

I finally attended my "to be filed" stack tonight. It is never a good thing when you realize that you need to create a litigation file.

I thought that the U.S. was over-litigous but we had to move to Germany to get sued.

Back in January, I received a bill for the swimming pool membership. Since I didn't want to have a membership once Sabine was born, I ignored it. In the U.S. when you join a gym, they are meticulous in going over what the member's obligations are to cancel the membership. In this instance, it was a community gym and I filled out a form that had my address and name on it to join. I must have missed the small print at the bottom of the page. I've learned my lesson that I must translate everything I sign. I guess as a lawyer that is something I should already know. Thankfully, one of our German friends is about to take his bar exam and was able to help us clear up this little misunderstanding.

This past month our landlord also threatened to sue us. We've been fighting with him over how much to reduce our rent due to the repairs being made to our winter garden i.e. storage space off of our bedroom. This process has once again proved that Germans may know how to make cars but building repairs aren't their thing.

A Rabbit? Really?

I have gotten accustomed to seeing dogs everywhere in Germany. People bring their dogs into restaurants, stores, offices; there is really no place that seems to be off limits for dogs. I am a dog lover so this doesn't really bother me and I hardly notice it now.

However, today was a first. While walking through Galleria (a big department store with a grocery store in the basement) I was shocked to see a women with a rabbit. At first glance, I thought she was holding a stuffed animal wrapped in a blanket. That would be strange enough considering she wasn't with a child. I then realized the thing was alive which was even odder. Who brings their pet rabbit shopping with them? She had the rabbit clutched to her chest like a baby and wrapped in a blanket while she browsed the jewelry selection. Was she looking for a broach to go with her rabbit?

Google Translate - a life saver

About a year after living in Germany, I finally discovered that you can have Google translate German websites into English. Before this I was forced to sit next to my computer with a dictionary making very slow progress deciphering German sites.

This revelation has made my life so much easier. I always had used Google translate when writing emails or planning out my phone conversation to doctors, plumbers, heating specialists, dentists, or hairdressers, but it took me a year to figure out I could set up a toolbar to have sites always translated. I'm obviously not that bright or computer savvy.

Although the translations are far from perfect, they enable me to get the general gist of an email or website which is better than I am able to do on my own.

It is also a great source of entertainment to see how Google translates some things into English. Our weather forecast for today is:

In Bonn the morning rain falls and the temperatures are 5-7 ° C. In the further course of the day it is open for lunch and dinner covered at temperatures 7-11 ° C. Towards the later the sky is overcast, the sun is not visible. At night, parts of the sky covered with clouds with lows of 5 ° C.

Of course, knowing the translation from German to English is so off makes me realize what an idiot I must sound like in my emails to our landlord or neighbors when I do the translations in the reverse - English to German.

Explosive Discovery

It's been an explosive week with bombs in Times Square and bombs in Popplesdorf, not to mention a few explosive vomits and poops courtesy of Sabine.

Yesterday just a few blocks from our house an old 500 kilogram WWII bomb was found when an empty lot was excavated. The fire department evacuated about 4,000 people and shut down the highway coming into Bonn while they removed the bomb.

Unfortunately, I missed all the excitement because I was downtown running errands and getting a coffee with a friend.

Successful 1st Turkey Day

Last Friday we celebrated Thanksgiving with a Swedish couple from Jim’s work. I decided that for my first time entertaining on Thanksgiving I’d invite a couple who didn’t know anything about the American Holiday. That way if anything didn’t turn out, they would have no idea what it was supposed to taste like or compare it to their great Aunt Bessie’s recipe. Plus we only have two additional chairs so our entertaining is generally limited to one other couple.

I decided to go the route of a turkey breast rather than the whole turkey. I figured that most people like the breast meat the most and with my tiny oven I’d have to have a rather small turkey. I also didn’t want to have another overcooked turkey like last year’s Thanksgiving attempt.

I brined the turkey in a salt and brown sugar solution at my mother’s recommendation, and it turned out beautifully. After brining, I slathered it with some herbs and put it in an oven bag to cook. I couldn’t believe how flavorful and moist it was, even the next day. I’d definitely recommend the brining technique.

The rest of the menu was pretty traditional and basic with sage stuffing, sweet potatoes topped with caramelized pecans, green beans with toasted almonds and a warm cranberry sauce but surprisingly everything turned out really well. I think it was the first time entertaining that I was pleased with everything I served.

I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin pie. My slice is generally slathered in so much whipping cream that you can’t even tell there is pie under there. So for dessert I decided to make a French Apple Tart from cooking light. It looked quite pro for the non baker that I am and was very tasty along with some vanilla ice cream.

All in all it was a successful Thanksgiving. Jim said that it was the best Thanksgiving he’d ever had. I’m not sure though if that was because I had a knife in my hand at the time or that he is smart enough to know that he should tell his very pregnant wife who has cooked and cleaned all day that it is the best food to ever touch his lips.

Pregnancy German Style

I thought I’d document my pregnancy for a few of reasons.

1) I think it would be fun for our little girl to be able to read this when she is older to see what my pregnancy was like.
2) I’d also like to be able to compare this pregnancy with the next one.
3) I want to see how the entire German pregnancy / birthing experience might be different from where ever I am for number 2.

I first suspected that I might be pregnant during a weeklong cycling trip in Provence. Obviously, this put a damper on my ability to enjoy fine French wines and stinky soft cheeses. However, I was excited by the prospect of being pregnant and relieved that it only took us 3 months before one of Jim’s little guys scored. I was concerned that all of those years of tight Lycra bike shorts might have done some damage.

As soon as we got home from France, I peed on a stick to get confirmation that I was indeed pregnant. Since I bought the cheapo pregnancy tests from Wal-Mart, the first one wasn’t quite clear. However, it could have been operator error. I had already thrown out the directions so wasn’t sure how long I was supposed to wait for the little pink line or plus or whatever sign might signal a positive result. After about 3 other tests, I was pretty confident that I was pregnant so made an appointment with my doctor.

At my first appointment the doctor obviously confirmed that I was indeed pregnant. She did a wand ultrasound and I got my first picture of what looked more like a bean than a baby.

Most of my appointments so far have been similar to this first appointment. I arrive and am handed a plastic Dixie cup with my name written in marker. I then use the downstairs bathroom and place the cup on a tray out in the open with a bunch of other urine samples. I wait an hour before getting called into the hallway, then I am weighed and my blood pressure is taken as well as any blood samples for various tests. Then I go back in the hallway to wait for the doctor to call me in. She generally asks me how I’m -feeling, goes over any results of past tests and then I get an ultra-sound. I’ve been shown the baby at every appointment except one.

My first trimester was a breeze. After witnessing my sister’s terrible morning (excuse me, all day) sickness, I was quite worried about how sick I would be. However, I was lucky enough to dodge the morning sickness bullet and felt pretty normal other than my gargantuan itchy boobs. Save for some musty tasting mangos, I really had no food aversions and the only food cravings I experienced were for sweets. Thankfully, I was able to continue my normal work outs during that first three and a half months so despite my ice cream addiction I only gained about 4-5 pounds.

I was so thankful that I was neither sick nor fatigued because I had an enormous amount of travel planned for the first trimester. After returning from Provence, my mom and sister arrived for a two week visit. During those two weeks we went to Amsterdam, Bruges, Copenhagen, Cologne, Beilstein, Bruhl, Rothenburg, and finally Frankfurt. I had four days to recuperate from that travelling stint before Jim and I were off to Tuscany for a week. Finally, I ended my 1st trimester with a weekend in Stockholm.

15 Weeks

Jim has come with me to the more important ultra-sound appointments. His first visit to the gyno was entertaining for me. When we first got into the doctor’s office, he made sure he was far across the room. He wasn’t so sure about the leg stirrups and kept eyeing them suspiciously. However, as soon as the ultra sound started he was right next to me peppering the doctor with question after question. He was amazed by the fact that there was a real baby inside me. I’m not sure if he thought that I had been growing an alien or a puppy in there all this time, but seeing it made it very real for him.

The beginning of my second trimester was really more of the same. I felt pretty good and was able to continue biking, running, hiking and swimming.

I was able to continue wearing my regular clothes until about week 23 or 24. I didn’t really start to grow until I went home to the States in mid July around week 20.

I decided to stop riding my road bike at about week 23. It was becoming just too uncomfortable. About a week later, I had to cut down on my running as well. I ran 6 miles and found I was worn out the rest of the day so shortened my runs to 4 miles with breaks in between if I felt any discomfort or pain.

24 Weeks

In my 25th week, I was wearing maternity pants but still able to get away with some of my regular shirts. I’m not sure why I was in so much of a rush to start showing. I guess in the beginning, I wanted everyone to know that I was preggers. Now, I’m realizing that along with the big prego belly comes some discomfort and awkwardness.

In Germany, the doctor who you visit for all of your pre-natal exams is not the doctor who will deliver your baby. The doctors who will deliver the baby work only at the hospital and do only deliveries and other gynecological surgeries. It is almost more comforting to know that delivering babies is what they do day in and day out.

Unfortunately, that left finding a hospital completely up to us. My doctor wrote down 4 names of hospitals on a sticky note but her assistance stopped there. All of the area hospitals have one or two informational evenings every month for expectant mothers and fathers. We visited 3 of those hospitals. When you can’t understand a word the doctors are saying, it makes for a long, boring evening. However, we did get a tour of the maternity ward to see the birthing rooms and nursery. By our last tour, we got smart and brought some reading material and sat in the back.

28 Weeks

On one of the tours of a hospital we saw a very, very pregnant woman outside on one of the available decks for the maternity ward smoking a cigarette while leaning against a gigantic, no possible way you can miss it, No Smoking sign. The woman was fully decked out in her maternity support hose and a pair of floppy old slippers puffing away her contractions. Not surprisingly, our tour guide neglected to say anything about this but allowed us to go check out the deck for ourselves. There was so much wrong with that vision that we tried to capture it in a photo, but unfortunately couldn’t get the shot without being too obvious.

In Germany, midwives play a major role in the birth. All of the hospitals have midwives and you have the option of having a midwife before, during and after the birth. Before the birth, the midwife will come to your house and bring her equipment with her for any fetal monitoring that needs to be done in the last stages of pregnancy. Some midwives will also perform acupuncture which is supposed to help speed up labor and reduce the amount of pain during labor. They also often teach the birthing classes and post natal exercise classes.

With midwives at every birth here in Germany, there are far fewer C-sections and more natural births. Germans are generally in favor of less intervention and going a more natural route. I just hope that if I need the epidural I can get it. According to someone from Jim’s office, when his wife asked for the epidural the nurses and doctors seemed to be horrified and made her feel guilty about it.

33 Weeks

You can also have your midwife assist you after the birth. She will come to your house every day after the baby is born for a week and then less regularly in the following weeks to answer any questions you might have, weigh the baby to make sure it is gaining weight and that the mother is recuperating.

Thankfully, I have a few friends who have delivered babies here so have gotten a lot of information from them. They let me know that you don’t get a hospital gown during the labor which I hadn’t even considered. I will need to bring my own nightgown or outfit to wear for the delivery unless I want to be naked as the day I was born. Granted modesty might not be an issue I’m all that concerned about when I’m squeezing a baby out of my you know what. The hospital also doesn’t provide towels which I thought strange. However I’ve never actually stayed in the hospital in the US, so I don’t really know if they have towels there either.

I had my first appointment with the midwife last week. She came to do a “birthing” class with us in English. It was pretty disappointing. She answered a few questions we had, gave us a list of things we need for the baby and also did the first acupuncture session but overall it wasn’t that helpful. When I asked her about breathing techniques she said that deep breathing was all I needed to do. I guess I was looking for something a little more structured and informational.

It was interesting to see the list of “must haves” for the baby in Germany. A sleep sack was number 1 on the recommended list. Germans go the route of a sleep sack rather than swaddling babies. Also on my list was a cherry stone pillow and fennel tea for the baby to ease gas pains rather than using gas drops. There was actually no medicine at all on the list of things I should get.

36 Weeks

I am now in my last 4 weeks of pregnancy but have decided to post this bad boy now as I will most likely be consumed with getting everything ready for the baby in the next few weeks and won’t have time to blog.

I will do another blog on the end of my pregnancy and birthing experience after we come home from the hospital. Although I have a feeling that it will be quite delayed as we get used to our new role as parents.

German Elections

The German federal elections take place at the end of this month, and I know almost nothing about the candidates. It feels so strange not to be familiar with the candidates and their platforms. However, I don’t watch local news, read a German newspaper or have any German friends so it makes sense that I would be in the dark on the ins and outs of German politics. Also considering that I can’t vote here and the elections will have very little bearing on my day to day life, it would be an exercise of futility to spend the time learning about the candidates. Nevertheless, it makes me feel a bit like an outsider in Bonn.

There are political posters all over the city. If (like a large section of the American population) I based my vote on the physical appearance of a candidate, I know exactly who I wouldn’t vote for. I would have eliminated a lot of people based solely on their pathetic posters. I don’t have a lot of confidence in a candidate who isn’t smart enough to surround himself with people who can put out a decent political poster in which the candidate doesn’t have a heavy drinker’s red nose, grey teeth and pasty white skin or have a pose that makes him look like a complete idiot. I mean how hard is it to use a few Crest Whitening strips and some self tanner?

I saw one poster the other day that is a complete copy of the Rosie the Riveter poster from the 40s when women began working in factories to take the place of men who had left for the war.

Another political candidate actually compared her cleavage with that of Angela Merkel’s saying that they have more to offer! I’m not sure what if anything saggy old boobs will do for German politics but she obviously things it gives her a leg (or should I say boob) up on the competition.

Namenstag (Names Day)

I recently discovered a new holiday. Europeans celebrate their Name Day just like they would celebrate a birthday. Birthdays tend to be more intimate affairs with just immediate family while your Name Day is more widely celebrated. Logistically this makes sense. Obviously more people can remember your first name whereas they might not be able to remember your birth date.

Common first names are assigned to a particular day and are generally based on religious figures with that same name. For example, someone with the name Peter or some derivative of Peter would have their Name Day on the day that St. Peter died.

Today's Name day names are Ingrid and Emmerich. So Happy Name Day to anyone with those unfortunate names. If we name our little girl Sabine, her name day would be August 29th.

Beach Volleyball in Bonn

Last weekend was the annual Smart Beach Volleyball tournament in downtown Bonn. I had seen this event last summer right after we moved into our apartment. Although I knew that we’d been here now for a year, it didn’t hit home until I saw this tournament for the second time.

The best part about this event was watching them set up a few days before the weekend. There were truckloads of sand dumped into Münsterplatz to transform the cobblestoned square into a beach. The huge piles of sand created a dune like sand scape in the middle of the city. It was essentially one giant sandbox for kids. They were having so much fun playing in the dunes that I was even tempted to kick off my sandals and join them. I saw a few kids trying to have a sand ball fight (with marginal success) in some of the wetter sand. Seeing the kids have so much fun, it made me sad to think that in the litigious US kids would never be allowed to tumble around in the sand for fear that someone would get hurt and sue the city or the event promoters.

On the day of the tournament, the weather was absolutely perfect for beach volleyball. It was in the high 80s without a cloud in the sky. It was so hot in fact that we were only able to watch for a few minutes before moving on.

Unfortunately, I erased the pictures that I took of the event but maybe you can imagine the picture of the Münsterplatz below filled with sand while Beethoven’s statue presides above.

One thing that confuses me about beach volleyball is the attire. Why is it that the women essentially wear a bikini while the men wear long shorts down to their knees? These poor women have to stand with their back to the fans while getting a sandy wedgy.

If I remember correctly, the next event in Bonn after the beach volleyball tournament is the wine festival. Sadly, that won’t be as fun for me this year.

Leadfoot v. Johnny Law

Jim received his first speeding ticket last week. We were driving back from a hike in the Eifel over a month ago when we saw the telltale flash. In Germany, police officers don’t waste their time pulling people over for speeding. Unfortunately, unlike France where there are warning signs for the speed cameras, the German police use hidden cameras.

We had heard that by law you received your ticket by mail within two weeks. So after two weeks, we thought we were in the clear. Unfortunately, our elation was premature.

Surprisingly the ticket was only 20 euro. In the U.S. parking tickets can be more than that. We know someone here in Bonn who got a 60 euro ticket on their bike so we were shocked by our 20 euro speeding ticket.

It’s ironic that Jim never got a speeding ticket in the U.S. where there are speed limits everywhere but got one instead in the land of the autobahn.

Euro Toilets - 101

All of the toilets here in Europe are wall mounted toilets. The the tank is actually built into the wall. This gives the bathroom a streamlined look and saves on space which is necessary in smaller European bathrooms. It also makes cleaning the bathroom easier. You can easily get under the toilet to clean the floor and there is less actual toilet to clean which is always a good thing.

The prevailing brand seems to be Geberit throughout all of Europe. They all have a two button flushing system. At first this confused me. I was unsure of which button to use and why there were two different buttons. After thinking about the two main uses for the toilet, I’ve concluded that the big button is for big jobs and the little button is for little jobs or a button each for number 1 or number 2.

Overall, I prefer the look of the European toilets and the environmentally friendly flushing system. However, recently our toilet has been running more often which has started me thinking about what happens when you have a problem with your toilet? Do they have to tear down the wall to fix it? It seems like an awfully labor intensive process to fix something simple like a broken ballcock. Do the Euro toilets even have a ballcock? Odds are that the mechanics of the toilet are different. Maybe they have something really cool that I don’t even know about?

Yes, this blog has officially got to pot and yes, I couldn’t resist the temptation to use the word ballcock three times during the course of this posting.

Easy Like Sunday Morning

Is there a Lionel Richie comeback that I am unaware of? In the last week I have heard more Lionel Richie songs than I have since the 80s.

It all started last week. We heard the song "Easy Like Sunday Morning" on the radio station driving home from Italy. We both laughed at the eclectic mix of music this radio station was playing. However at the end of the song, Jim decided that "easy like Sunday morning" was going to be his new catch phase. So the rest of the trip and the following week whenever I'd ask him something, his response would invariably be, "Hey, I'm easy, easy like Sunday morning."

Then on Wednesday night when we met some friends from Munich up in Cologne for drinks / dinner at a swanky spot, we heard the song again. This time it was a band singing it live. We both cracked up and started singing the chorus which only encouraged the lead singer who came over to us and made us sing with him.

On Saturday we drove up to Maastricht, Netherlands for some shopping and dinner and heard the extended version (the original is already like 5 minutes long). I was able to pick out some maternity clothes, try them on and put them back on the rack and the song was still playing when we left.

If any of you have listened to European radio, you know that the European's love cheesey music (Germans especially- just look to Hasselhof's popularity here for confirmation). So I understand that Lionel was very popular here in the 80s and maybe even the 90s, but today? If you walk into any H&M store here, it is obvious that fashion is taking a turn for the 80s, but is 80s music making a comeback?

Gay TV

I've recently found a new channel on our T.V. which occasionally has shows in English. It is an all Gay TV channel called Timm. It caters to gay men rather than gay women. It is now my favorite channel. Now I can add Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and The Next Top Male Model to my TV repetoir. Considering that my only other options are CNN and the mind numbing programming on MTV, this new Gay Channel has really improved my TV viewing options. If you have watched MTV lately, I'm sure you can sympathize. I think I actually loose brain cells while watching shows like Parental Control, Next or Flavor Flav's version of The Bachelor, but it is like a car accident. It is so bad that you continue to watch more out of disbelief that people like this exist and that some producer thought it was a good idea to broadcast it.

May Day German-style

May 1st in Germany is a public holiday. It is Germany's Labor day to celebrate workers' rights so there are some protests throughout the country. Bonn, however, was really quiet.

The first weekend in May is also a celebration of spring and a reason to drink beer, have barbecues, and fireworks. This past weekend felt a lot like Memorial Day weekend with a bit of 4th of July mixed in.
In the Rheinland, young men profess their love by putting up a maypole next to their loved one's house. They strap these ribbon ladden birch trees to drainage gutters or lampposts or anything they can find in front of the house. Some of these trees are so tall that this can't be an easy task. Of course, the trees also have a heart with the girl's name on it so the guy gets credit for it and it isn't confusing when you are dealing with an apartment complex rather than a house. Where they get these tall birth trees, I have no idea. I didn't see anyone selling them, but we saw tons of boys lugging them around on the evening of April 30th. The first weekend in May is also when Bonn sets off a huge firework display. Throughout the summer, there are firework displays along the Rhein which they call "Rhein in Flammen" (Rhein in flames). Saturday was Bonn's Rhein in Flammen. Along with the fireworks was a huge fair in the Rhinaue Park south of Bonn. I have never seen so many people in Bonn. Apparently about 270,000 people come to the festival and watch the fireworks. I had envisioned setting up a blanket and watching the fireworks in the park. However, after a bunch confusion as to where to watch the fireworks, we ended up on the bridge with traffic between us and the fireworks. Although it was not an idyllic spot, it still gave us a pretty good view of the fireworks.

German Scoldings

I started this blog a couple of weeks ago after getting yelled at about 3 times in one week. Up until this point, I had somehow evaded reprimand. My friends had all complained about being yelled at for not following the rules, but my Teutonic blood must have caused me to be a rule abider until a few weeks ago. Germans feel that when someone breaks a rule, it is their duty to point it out. My three indiscretions were that: I didn't wear a swim cap in the pool; I crossed the street when it said don't walk in the presence of a child; and while biking, I stopped ahead of the line at a light, and I was wearing headphones.

I came across this article this morning in the Herald Tribune and was motivated to finish this blog posting. This article captures the German psyche so incredibly well.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/05/weekinreview/05KULISH.html?_r=1&scp=4&sq=financial%20rules%20germany&st=cse

Germans and their Ice Cream

Last summer I saw millions of Germans lining up at the gelato shops all over Bonn to get their ice cream fix. Of course then it was sunny (well maybe not exactly sunny but not raining) and warm-ish. Knowing that the winter would bring cold and rainy weather, I thought to myself that it must be hard for all of these ice cream shops to stay in business since most of them did not have indoor seating.


Germans, however, do not seem to be phased by the cold in the least. They ride around town on bikes without hats and gloves, while I am bundled up in wool sweaters, hats, gloves and countless scarves.

All winter long, I saw people eating ice cream walking around downtown. When I was craving hot chocolate, hot tea or soup, they were strolling around with frozen treats. It is such an odd sight to see someone in a hat and gloves eating an ice cream cone outside. You just don't see it in the US. Sure, someone might go to Baskin Robbins and sit inside and eat ice cream in the winter, but they aren't wandering around in the cold.

Has growing up in America made me soft? What happened to my hearty German genes?

Thai Massage (sans happy ending)

I have walked by a Thai massage place about 20 times and have been really curious as to what it would be like. Since I was in serious need of a massage and the price was right (only 28 euro for 60 minutes), I decided to give it a try.

I didn't exactly know how Thai massage would differ from the traditional Swedish massages I've had in spas. I had heard that they use more pressure points and use the weight of their bodies more. Of course, I've also heard about the happy endings but according to my German teacher you only have to worry about that if you go to someone advertising for erotic massage in the newspaper. He assured me that it is a legitimate massage place if they have an actual store front.

I would give the massage a 5 out of 10. The ambiance was definitely not there. I was told to undress in front of the older Asian lady and she put a thin blanket over me once I was laying on the futon. I couldn't help wonder how many other naked people had been under the same blanket. I'm sure they wash that stuff regularly, right?

The room was absolutely freezing which didn't help with the relaxation. Plus after massaging my back, the woman put Tiger Balm on me. It is just like Icy Hot so I was even colder than I had been.

A lot of the massaging was typical to Swedish massage but just a little faster. She did crack my back, fingers and toes which was definitely a departure from most of my massages. I'm not sure how much I enjoyed that.

I was pretty sore for a few days after the massage. I'm not sure if that was because she got a bunch of the knots out of my back or she just didn't know what she was doing.

I haven't decided yet if I'll go back or not. I might wait until the weather is warmer so I don't freeze. I don't think they heat the massage rooms.

Nice Neighbors

When I got back from Colorado I was disappointed to find that our new downstairs neighbors had not yet moved in. I was looking forward to meeting some new people. However I didn't want to get my hopes up too high because Germans can be a bit reserved and not overly friendly to strangers so I wasn't sure what to expect.

On Sunday morning as Jim was leaving for his ride, he found a vase of flowers with a handwritten note (in German) just outside our door. Our neighbors had been at the house when we were not in and left the flowers for us. In their note they let us know that they wouldn't be moving in until the end of April or beginning of May but would be around now and then working on the apartment to get it just the way they want it. They gave us their contact information and even a website so we could see what they looked like. Of course, I had some difficulty reading the handwriting so took the note to my German teacher to make sure that I had everything right. I was quite proud that I was able to understand the generalities of the letter.

Then last night our neighbor rang our bell and came up to introduce himself in person. He was very nice but when pressed to speak German I struggled a bit so it was a short introduction.

Now I am even more motivated to take my German to the next level. I want to be able to have a meaningful conversation with our nice new neighbors.

A Canadian Moose Singing Spanish Christmas Songs in German?

Now that I have been to about 4 different Christmas Markets - Koln, Bonn, Siegburg and Bad Honnef, I feel that they are all pretty similar with regard to what they offer. Typically one can find Christmas ornaments, carved wooden handicrafts, felt hats and bags, pottery and blown glass, your typical craft fair items with a little Christmas flair. All of the markets also have dozens of stands which sell gingerbread cookies with messages written on them. I’ve seen people wearing these big cookies around their necks. I’m not sure why they wear them. Maybe they are trying to make sure everyone knows that there is someone who loves them enough to buy them a stale cookie for 5 Euro.

I think the Christmas market is mostly about the food and the drinking though, much like your typical State Fair which has rides for the kids and beer and lots of fried food for the adults. At the Christmas Market, the food generally includes your brotwurst of course but also reibekucken (fried potato pancakes), flammkuchen (flatbread pizza with ham and onions), waffles, and some strange sweet dumpling with hot berries which I haven’t been brave enough to try yet. I have tried to like the Gluhwein, but I haven’t yet warmed up to the idea of steaming hot slightly sweet red wine.

My favorite part of the Bonn Christmas Market is a big fake moose on one of the Gluhwein stands. He talks and sings Christmas songs. I love how he tells you he’s from Canada and then proceeds to sing Feliz Navidad in Deutsch.