i'm a bit of a nail biter, i suppose.

i have to confess: i'm nervous about tonight. it's no surprise to any of you who know me or have even so much as glanced at this blog which candidate i'm supporting, so i won't bother beating around the bush about it. i never thought i would witness this moment.when i was in first grade, i remember voting for clinton (let's be honest. elementary school students vote for whomever their parents are talking about most favorably. we're not that well informed. however, if i'd been 18 at the time, i totally would've voted for him in a real election, too.) in a mock election at school. the concept fascinated me: everyone should have a say in how things are run. i remember thinking, however briefly, that i would like to be the first woman president. i never thought i would see the day. even so young, i had the feeling we would always have rich white men running the country (thanks for making me a dirty hippie so young, mom and dad!)

i remember the first time i actually got to vote, and how isolated and betrayed i felt when watching two presidential "elections" go so horribly wrong (which i intend to be more of a statement on the process, not the outcome. while i detest the 43rd president of the united states, i fully support the basic right of the nation to choose its leader).i was in germany when the democratic candidate was selected, and i was convinced there was no way a black man could win the presidency. i was certain all was lost--without hillary, how could we avoid another republican candidate?

and yet...i'm hopeful. i hope we have moved past the 1950s. i hope we have moved past selfishness. i hope we have moved past apathy. it terrifies me that at the end of this day the country of my birth will be sending a major message to the world, and i'm not confident yet of what that message will be. will we refuse to continue to be paralyzed by fear and hate? or will we say, no, thank you, but we won't take more of what we've seen in the last eight years, we'd like something new? i wish i could say all of this in non-partisan language. i wish i didn't constantly feel like i'm toeing the party line. my dad jokes that he raised us to think for ourselves, as long as those thoughts ended in us voting a straight party ticket. but the more i see of this world, the more i simply can't support the kinds of government the republican party now stands for. i can't support big business at the expense of the majority of the american public. if we really ignore all the campaign promises and the attack ads and get down to the root of it, that's what they stand for. that's how they behave. i believe in standing up for what's right, not what stands to make me the most profit.

i want my president to recognize those who are disenfranchized,

those who are in need,

to forge ahead into uncharted territory,

and to frankly address our shortcomings while remembering our strengths.

i got this email today from a member of the quaker community in columbia. mostly i started this post with the desire to share these words:

This message is from Peter Storey, former Methodist Bishop of Johannesburg. He was also the chaplain at Robben Island Prison during the time Nelson Mandela was a prisoner. A good friend of mine’s father did a pulpit exchange with Peter years ago and they have remained friends. I met him many years ago when he came to South Carolina for a conference on race relations. Thought you would enjoy. --Julia

Subject: Our Prayers are with you all for tomorrow

Dear Friends in the United States,

Warmest greetings to you on this momentous evening. You have been much
in our minds and on our hearts over these past few months as we have
avidly followed the progress of your Presidential election campaign. As
we've said before, what happens in your election profoundly affects us
all.

And what a campaign! I recall a dinner table conversation in Atlanta way
back in May, 2007, in the home of good friends Jim and Fentress Waits.
Those around the table were talking with a deep sense of interest and
hope about an exciting young Senator named Barack Obama. Back then, the
possibility of Obama's even gaining the nomination of his own party
appeared so remote that it seemed more the stuff of dreams than reality.

Yet here you are, on the eve of an even more 'impossible' breakthrough
tomorrow! Think of it: the nation whose original sin was to to buy and
sell Africans like chattels, that legislated them less than human, could
well elect an African-American tomorrow to be its First Citizen! I
wonder if the people of the USA have fully realized what a liberating
moment this could be? For African Americans, who hold their breath, not
yet quite believing what might be possible tomorrow, this may be a step
beyond even what Martin Luther King Jr saw from the mountain-top, but it
is also more than that: it will be a day of liberation for all
Americans: whether deeply conscious, as so many thoughtful people are,
of this great burden of historic guilt, or defiantly denialist as too
many on the shrill right wing remain. All - the good, the bad and the
ugly - will take a giant step toward liberation from one of US
history's most burdensome shackles.

I say this because that is the experience we discovered the day Nelson
Mandela took the oath of office as the first black President of South
Africa. Millions of his exploited compatriots danced with obvious joy at
their new freedom, but less expected and perhaps more amazing was the
sense of liberation that came upon their erstwhile oppressors. White
South Africans testified in large numbers to a new lightness of being,
as if some invisible, dragging weight, was gone, and something new could
be born.

Now I know that the USA is not South Africa, and your story is not
identical with ours, but there are enough echoes for me to assure you
that if the voters of America break this barrier tomorrow, you will
experience what I'm talking about!

Of course, like so many of you, we are anxious as well as excited.
Having seen how deep are the currents of fear and prejudice that still
run across the length and breadth of the United States, we too hold our
breath. Be assured that the hopes of the vast majority of the people of
the wider world go with Senator Barack Obama. There is no question about
this. I doubt that even 5 percent of South Africans of any race group
have any desire to see anyone of George W Bush's party near the White
House. However, we have seen how easily US elections can be stolen and
we are praying, as so many of you are, that tomorrow, the American
people will march to the polls in greater numbers than ever before,
determined to expunge eight of the most shameful years in US history.
President Bush has brought America's reputation so low, that from our
point of view, another such blow from the US electorate would be almost
impossible to understand. Eight years of arrogance and ignorance hav
been done deep harm in the rest of the world and to the image of a great
nation. Surely they will be declared as enough by the people of the US?

But let us be hopeful! Just as tomorrow offers the opportunity for a
great sense of historic liberation in the US, so it also offers a chance
to radically alter the world's current perception of America, and to
open the door to new possibilities of healing and transformation for US
foreign relations. If Obama is announced as your President-elect, there
will be great rejoicing all around the globe. We will see new hope of
the might of the United States being bent to works of justice and
compassion and cooperation. We will see new possibilities for the poor
of the earth: for the first time, Americans will have elected someone
who knows what it is like to be on the outside as well as in the circle,
who has actually worked among the poor, who has lived , however briefly,
outside the American bubble, and who has the blood of the world's most
oppressed continent in his veins. Everyone of these factors speak of
change.

You will recall that the day following September 11, 2001, France's most
famous newspaper ran the headline: 'Today, we are all Americans!' Well,
please know that around the world there are so many people whose hopes
ride on what you will do tomorrow, that I guess we wish we were all
Americans! What a privilege it will be to vote in this election!

Our prayers are with you.

Warm regards,
Peter Storey

...yep.

overcompensating.com

bleed, baby, bleed.

thanks, heart. i knew you hadn't abandoned me.

friday was our first community day. if i haven't explained this before, what that means is that i get a day off work to hang out with my five roommates and the ladies that live in el paso, either just to chill and be together, but more likely to learn about something relating to our positions, or just being on the border. this month we decided to go to the national border patrol museum in el paso.

although the museum itself isn't funded by or related to the gov't at all, they seem to have a good relationship to this branch of homeland security. two officers gave us a presentation on what the border patrol does, what their goals are, and how to become a border patrol member (turns out, this is pretty rigorous. widely considered the toughest law enforcement/paramilitary station).

[for the record, i spent much of friday saying, "i just don't understand how you can think that!?!" which is unfair. i will attempt not to say that here, or anywhere else in the future. your opinions are your own. i struggle to reconcile many conservative policies with my own morals, but it is my struggle and not yours.]

at the start of the presentation, the officer asked, "who's here to pick a fight?"

becca pointed at me.

at first i was mad, but i guess i can't blame her. that's kind of been my role thusfar in the bsc. to get outraged. to rant. to cry over the women who can't get vawa visas b/c they haven't actually married their abusive partners.

and, i did want to pick a fight w/ him. i want to pick a fight with the world. not b/c he was a bad guy. to the contrary, he seemed really nice. he seemed like he cared about his job in a human way. he claimed he was more concerned about keeping people safe than "keeping the mexicans out" and i wanted to believe him, even if i wasn't completely sold. maybe he just needed a good job, and that one offered $60G a year and health benefits (no, that's not a typo). maybe he really believes this is what it will take to keep america safe.

i do want a safe america. for all my revolutionary tendencies and che-fangirl giggles, safety is very important to me. i wish i could travel and not wonder if it would be better to pretend to be canadian in this airport. i wish i could put a flag on my lapel in good consciousness. but when a man stands in front of me with an american flag on his shoulder and a gun at his hip and says he's being proactive about the things that threaten this country, i wonder if he ever thought about what happened before 9/11. it pains me to be a part of a country so proud and so certain that it doesn't pause to wonder why people might want to blow up a piece of us. we are a country so holier-than-thou that it takes 3,000 dead civilians for even some of the most open-minded and considerate pieces of the population to consider the way people worldwide might consider us.

i am trying, perhaps too hard, to be calm in this post. i am angry. i am terrified. i am indignant. but i cannot fix the world. and that makes me the saddest of all.

EDIT: ps. wtf, economy?

aww craps

this morning for breakfast, i ate the last of the blueberries i picked this summer in aunt carolyn's yard. they were delicious, but now they are gone.

dearest david, and others who might happen to see this

you might or might not have seen the lengthy comment david left on my last real post. in case you missed it, David said...

First off, did you always not capitalize things and I'm just now noticing it?

I feel like German encouraged rampant use of capital letters for me.

I am really curious how our experiences will overlap cause of being Americorps members. Did you have to read that incredibly long and ridiculous contract? We had it read to us by this guy in the office, who is almost as toneless as me. I'm half convinced it had nothing to do with the contract; it was just a test of our mental endurance.

Sidenote, semicolons? They're quickly becoming my favorite form of puncuation cause nobody gives them love. I mean I had to look them up to see exactly what they're used for, and I'm still not sure I'm doing it right.

I hope once you get into your job a little bit more that it becomes more fun and exciting. I definitely prefer the "working" world to college, and I put "working" in quotation marks not cause we don't work hard (I was in the office till 8:30 last night), but it's not really a work atmosphere. I mean I pulled my team aside yesterday to play Big Booty just cause everybody looked bored.

I am worried about you working/living with a bunch of girls. I know what it's like to be around mostly female coworkers from last year; there are definitely aspects I didn't enjoy, and you've always struck me as a guy's girl i.e. you're comfortable hanging out with guys, and they're comfortable with you.

i thought that some of this might be things other people would want to hear about (read: i didn't have a real post to make today but felt obligated to write something and this gives me an excuse) so i decided to share my comments out here, rather than in the comment section where few dare to tread.
note: there was also a comment about a molestache in there. i'll leave that one alone for the sake of clay's pride.

i tend not to capitalize things unless i feel like someone might be reading who would be offended by my laziness. maybe this is because i read too many e.e.cummings poems in high school. maybe it is because i grew up on instant messenger. maybe it is because i want my parents to cringe every time they think about paying for my english degree. you be the judge. long story short, i struggled with whether to use capital letters on this blog initially, but came to the decision that it's my blog. it's about me. and i don't really like capital letters. i don't think i'm going to use them.

i, too, love semicolons. so much so that i used them all the time in high school and made my a.p. teacher explode (again, i lovingly blame e.e.cummings). since then, i have invested a good deal of time in learning how to use them properly; i believe i understand it now. but i do so sparingly, for dramatic effect and whatnot.

if you don't know, david is a senior member of city year in columbia because i am an amazing friend and i changed his life by peer pressuring him into applying and he loved it. i don't really think that my experience "with americorps" will be the same, though, because although what we're doing here in new mexico is under the umbrella of americorps, our work placements are in outside organizations, and not within a structure set up by the americorps program. also, i don't have any co-workers who would be willing to play "big booty" with me. ever. no matter how bored we got. i work in a non-profit work atmosphere. there is a lot of time in front of a computer and answering telephones (which, by the way, i am so tempted to do by saying, "dunder-mifflin, this is pam.") and filing things. this will probably change some once we start building (in two weeks! eek!) but we'll see.

and finally, david weatherly, master of all insight, has struck upon my single greatest fear about this year: living with five other women. i don't really do girly things. if given a choice, i would rather not watch a romantic comedy. i hate nicholas sparks novels. i prefer belly laughs over giggles. generally, girls make me suspicious. i was raised with brothers--and even the girl cousins i had weren't exactly lady-like--and barbie-resistant parents, i spent all my free time with boys in high school (thanks drum-line!) and in college (thanks habit!), and it wasn't until jennifer brackett grover forced me to be friends with her that i had any real relationships with girls, ladies, or women. i relate to guys. i can talk to guys. i am petrified of this year. but so far, things are going well. maybe we're finally getting to the point in our lives when the petty girl things don't matter as much. maybe i'm starting to relate to people on the basis of being human, rather than sex. maybe i just don't know another living soul within 100 miles. no matter what the reason, and despite my not-so-miniscule hesitations, we're getting along as well as roommates can be expected to get along. sure, we argue or get stressed out every once in a while, but i mean, come on. there are six of us. working stressful jobs and not making any money at it. what do you want?

p.s. i am so glad to have friends that know me so well, who can anticipate the things that will make my life unpleasant before i'm fed up, that love me even though, historically, i could have gotten along better with a mountain lion than five girls. i guess what i'm trying to say is, at least my crystal gayle shirt hasn't been ruined. yet.

you can thank caleb for that allusion.

also, i found out this week, only 7 months behind the rest of the world, that the format broke up. i'm so sad.

aww crap.
what do they say about good intentions?

alright. let's review, shall we?

got to new mexico on a wednesday. i figured for sure there would be people here already, and i was right in a way. i was the fifth person to show up, but two were in el paso, one was the returning volunteer in the las cruces house but was home for the time between the two terms, and one was staying with some other friends for a while. so, really, i was the first one to get to the house. i stayed there by myself for two days, and i was trying to get settled, used to the time change, etc... so i didn't explore much.
buuuut it wasn't long before everyone showed up and things went crazy!
becca (last year's habitat volunteer, now working at the church) showed up on friday, and we hung out, went to barnes and noble and whatnot. saturday we got up and went to the farmer's market, which was pretty awesome. i'm pretty sure we did something else all afternoon, but it was a while ago and i forgot... whoops.
most people came on saturday, which was becca's birthday, so we made calzones and went to high desert, the local brewery/bar, with all but one of the people in bsc.
sunday i went to the quaker meeting, which has an amazing worship space, but is a bit smaller than the meeting in columbia and doesn't seem to be quite as active in the community. overall, i like them, but i am thinking about going to the unitarian church to check things out.

monday training started, so i spent the whole week with all nine of the ladies and ryan, our director, talking about our tenents and rules of being an americorps member, visiting our worksites and all that... we visited juarez, which was really awesome but deserves its own post. i'll get to it... i hope. i think we learned a lot, about each other and what it is we are really striving for down here, but it was a little overwhleming to be with everyone non-stop for a whole week. saturday and sunday we were in silver city for a retreat, which couldn't have come at a better time because i was starting to get really upset about how flat las cruces is, and silver city is a little bit more hilly. it was a cute town, too, with little antique/thrift shops and a gelato cafe. yeah. i was pretty happy.
on the way back we drove through gila national forest, which was GORGEOUS.

i put in one week of work already, but i'm still not exactly sure what they expect/anticipate from me. this week they sent me up to albuquerque to this habitat for humanity international leadership training conference. on the one hand i'm glad to be here, to see what other affiliates are doing and to know that other people are facing the same kinds of challenges that i am, and to kind of re-focus my efforts. on the other hand, this training is put on by the corporate heads, and it's not the side of habitat i've been involved with in the past. it's not the grassroots effort to change the world. it's a pragmatic organization with rules and guidelines and pr.


i guess all i can say for now is that i'm doing fine. it's still weird to me to be here, away from everyone i know and love, with a (kind of) real job and no homework. it's a transition. i'm not sure i like it?

i'll put pictures up when i can, but my camera's broken right now, and i haven't convinced my roommates to let me steal theirs yet.

bah.

this is getting out of hand, and i know it. i'm sorry. i promise that once things are settled here, i will be writing. and there are plenty of things to write about (finally!). but this week is orientation, and i'm trying to get to know my roommates, and locking yourself in your room w/ your laptop isn't exactly the best way to do that. please believe me when i say that this step is really really important to me--not that all of you reading aren't. but for this year to work out the way i want it to, i think i should invest all i've got in being a part of this community to the best of my ability.

like i said, though, getting settled at the moment, orientation... going to mexico [briefly]... work starts on tuesday. i hope to update on monday, since we technically have the day off.
xoxo

flickr game

1. Cordial & Miriam, 2. Hot Hummus, 3. Throw Down, 4. a gaggle of olives, 5. Glen Hansard Polaroid, 6. Mojito?, 7. county galway, 8. Peach, Blueberry & Blackberry Cobbler, 9. Authors 1, 10. .endless stillness., 11. anachronistic.jpg, 12. Group in San Diego over New Years


Wanna play?
The concept:
a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.

The Questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name.

discovered via elsie marley

alles gute, meiner!

Conrad, one of the Quenzel's sons, turned thirty this week, so today is the big party. This is the moment the whole family has been waiting, for, apparently, b/c it's the debut of the renovations they've been doing in the "garden house." I'm realizing now that I've posted like no pictures of their house. Sorry.

Anyway, basically, their house is one of those that line the city walls, with big front doors to garages and bigger gardens. These were originally built for the city-dwelling peasant class, who needed to pull carriages off the streets, house horses, etc. So, we've got an awesome three-tier back yard - the main "Hof," a terrace, and the garden plot that sits right up next to the city wall and what is now the lowest part of the park. The Quenzels have lived here for a couple hundred years, and the house has taken on a couple different financial endeavors. The house in the garden was built during the time that Louisa had a brewery and bar here. When Christoph's grandfather became a doctor they cut out the brewing, but the house is still there, and has mostly been a workshop/storage space since Ruth and Christoph took over. Originally, they thought that when they got old and one of their children moved into the house they would move out to that second house, but it's fairly impractical since the ground floor doesn't have real living space, and they're worried about not being able to use stairs (although I know very few old Germans that can't tackle stairs), and are now planning on living in the first floor that is currently my apartment. So now, the garden house has become a party house. First Conrad's birthday, then Ruth's (next week), and Phillipp and Marion wanted to have their Polterabend (the party the night before their wedding) there, but have now changed their plans.

Well, I never saw the upstairs of the house before they started fixing it up, b/c it required climbing a scary looking ladder at least 15 feet and then doing a pull-up into the window, but it looks awesome now, and since the building was built just before the civil war, I'm thinkin' they had a lot to do. They built a new external staircase and porch on the back side, and it stays sunny up there until about 21:30 at this time of year, even though it's pretty shady in the garden by 20:00. We've been hanging out up there every evening this week, and tonight I think there's supposed to be 40 people or something coming to the party.

Been a while since I posted a recipe. I've basically been eating the same things over and over, or else I've been out of town and therefore not cooking for myself. SO.... The Quenzels asked me to bring a salad, which is not a big deal except that then they started saying how they're going to tell all the guests it's an American delicacy, and I felt pressured to make something quintessential. I thought about making homemade ranch dressing for a regular tossed salad, but I've never even thought about that before and it seemed like a daunting task. Then this salad was born. The Quenzels really like tex-mex, and I started off thinking about a bean salad because of that. The white limas (which, here at least, don't have that sweet taste the green ones do) take away from that a little, but I was trying to add color and size variation, and I think that although not typical tex-mex, I'm pleased with their addition.

Kat's "Ach, LEUTE!" Bean Salad
1 large can sweet corn
1 large can red kidney beans
1 small can jumbo white lima beans
2 small red onions
juice of 1 small lemon
1/2 head iceberg lettuce
cilantro, white pepper, sunflower oil to taste

Rinse beans and corn thoroughly with cold water. Combine beans, corn, onion, lemon juice, and spices beforehand to give the spice a chance to soak into the veggies (yes, I know beans are legumes but w/e). Let stand one hour. Chop lettuce in strips, wash, and add, with oil, just before serving.

I'll add pictures later, but I haven't made this look especially pretty yet, so I'll take pics of the final product. It's not ready yet b/c the party's not for a couple hours.

well crap.

I really did mean to do this more often. But that last post, I have to admit, kind of wore me out. Well, here goes again anyway.

I spent a good deal of time recuperating from the Americans. You know, watching junk tv, knitting, vegging out, the whole deal. And then, suddenly, I realized time was almost up. So I took off. Spring finally came to Germany (in its own little European way), and I was in Berlin when I feel like it finally happened. One of the kids from the youth group here works for a popular German band, Tocotronic, and got me in free to their concert in Potsdam. It was pretty cool, but I'm admittedly not the hugest Tocotronic fan, and so it was also a little awkward. Most of the people there knew all the words, and apparently they're more alternative than I had gathered from their music, b/c although I showed up all cute in my bright yellow dress, everyone else had on black. Exclusively. With the minor exception of the lime green screen print on their just-purchased merch. Nice. Anyway, I was basically there by myself since Katha had to work, but I made friends with a couple guys while I was trying to just find the damn place, and so at least the waiting for the concert wasn't totally lonely (but once the music started, Martin went off to mosh and I stuck to the outsides). I've developed a little bit of claustrophobia, it would seem, and I can't do crowds the way I used to. Maybe it's something about not being certain of how to express panic, but I really need to feel like I always have two ways of walking out of a situation, and that is simply not possible at a concert once people get going.

WARNING: I feel like this post is semi-picture-heavy. But I had a ridiculously hard time deciding which pictures to put up. Please see my flickr page for more.

Anyway, I stayed with Uli (my first-ever host sister from Bavaria) that night, and spent the weekend with her and her roommates. Since I was not really excited about the Berlin I had experienced so far, we decided not to do anything touristy, but rather find something to make me feel like it was a pretty cool place. We ended up in the trendy hipster neighborhood (still can't figure out the name of it?) where everyone was gorgeous and I wanted to buy all the clothes they were selling but couldn't afford the air in those stores. So we ate ice cream and took off, with a quick stop at Sonnenallee, the famous street that ran straight into the Berlin Wall, but weren't sure exactly where the wall was, so didn't exactly get to that point... Oh well. Then we headed back and while Uli baked a cake, I cut Felix's hair with a rusty pair of scissors he found in the back of the kitchen drawer. Brave soul. But he was pleased with the outcome and I'm not too embarrassed to say that I am responsible for it. Saturday night we went to a party that was nothing remarkable.
Sunday I got up and went to the only Quaker Meeting in Germany, which was nice but made me miss my Friends (ha! get it?) in Columbia. Saturday afternoon, we sat up in the park in Uli's neighborhood, Kreuzberg, with a cheesecake, coffee, and no silverware and just... chilled. It was nice. I really liked Uli's roommates, and not just because I miss young people and not living alone. They were genuinely awesome. I was really sad that I had to come back to Eisleben that evening, but it was okay because...

First thing Tuesday I got on a train to Regensburg, and seven hours later I got there, and hung out with my old host parents and Uli's sister, Maria, who I don't think I ever met, honestly, before then. It was nice and Bavarian, but considerably colder than it had been in Berlin which was sad. We went and wandered around downtown Regensburg on Wednesday, and although I confirmed the fact that I do like the city, I don't know if I'd keep it on my top five favorite German cities list anymore. I think I was mostly excited about it that summer I was there because I was seventeen and had never been to Europe and it was big and exciting but not so crowded and touristy as Munich. What I mean is, it's cute, and I could live there probably, but I'd much rather hang out in Erfurt. Then again, maybe I just can't get over how much money they have in Bavaria and Phillipp has been getting to me with his East German propaganda.
[mom and dad, I'm sorry, but I didn't take a single picture of the Schäfers. However, they got these knew "garden gnomes" and I thought you would like them, ma.]

Uh-huh. Well, Thursday I went on a 13 hour train ride to Rome to visit Audra, who lived in Preston with me and is an awesome girl. Her exams started on Monday so it was another laid back weekend, but I did all the main things, some with her - Vatican, Trevi Fountain - and some while she was in class or studying - Coliseum, Palatine Hill, the Parthenon. My general feeling on Rome, however, was indifference. The phrase that kept coming to my mind was "TOO MUCH!" There was so much stuff to see, but Rome is infuriating with its lack of explanations. Even though almost everyone who works anywhere public in Rome speaks English, all the museums were exclusively in Italian, and there are few directional signs for the major events. Don't even get me started on the way everything is built like a maze that has no right or wrong directions, so that you can wander and wander and have no idea where you are until you think "I've been here before," but don't know which way you left so you don't know where to go this time. I liked Palatine Hill, mostly because it was largely an outdoor park and I have gotten to where I really like places where people lay around in the grass, but I apparently missed an archaeological dig site b/c it was Roman and confusing and I didn't know there was a way into that part. But the Coliseum is significantly more impressive from the outside (except, of course, for the idea that people stood there so long ago - but that's true of the whole damn city), the Vatican Museum looked like some grandma had shoved as many of her trinkets into one room as possible, even though they rarely made sense next to each other (and I was so frustrated that we waited 4 hours and paid 8euros for the damn thing with so few actual important pieces of art that were usually hidden behind some other, equally old but significantly less well-known), and the Sistine Chapel was over crowded and smelly and even though they obviously don't use the space for worship anymore - it's an empty room with an undressed altar - they kept trying to make people be quiet. What for? So everyone can hear themselves think, "That's it?" in their own heads instead of letting them say it out loud? Alright Vatican City, you got me on St. Peter's Basillica. I don't think I had my mouth closed the whole half hour we were in there. It's huge and ornate and oh so catholic, which is only a little sad because the Pieta gets lost because of its simplicity (it, too, was smaller than I imagined). But my all-time favorite thing there was what Audra and her friends had decided they weren't going to go see at all - the Mouth of Truth. Old movie fans will definitely know it from the Hepburn film Roman Holiday. It's basically an old stone tablet with a giant face on it, the mouth and eyes of which are holes. Legend has it that anyone who lies with their hand in the mouth will have it bitten off by the stone jaws, but either my skin is green or it's not true. So that was a cool thing to see, a little more off the beaten path, but then the exit takes you through the church, which has the relics of St. Valentine, and it's just a cute, smaller chapel that looks, unfortunately, like all the money got spent on the cathedrals. The frescoes around the tops of the walls were in disrepair, the ceiling was raw and didn't look like it was very well taken care of. But something about it was more real than the rest of the city. Then, of course, they went and proved me wrong by putting a souvenir shop in the damn corner. Whatevs. I had a good time being with Audra, reliving the good ole days of Preston gossip and politics and eating gelato (every day! shh...). But now I miss that place and those people more than ever.

I signed my contract for Border Servant Corps today, though, so hopefully that roommate situation will work out as a good substitute for being on campus. I'm starting to get really excited about being out there - I found a couple forums and such, and have been getting good tips on yarn shops, book stores, and farmer's markets. There's if not two at least one Quaker Meeting, and I simply cannot express my excitement about that, and three Jazzercise centers. I can't stand myself.

Well, I've got less than two weeks here now. The only place I haven't gotten to travel to that I thought would is Prague, but Franzi can't go, and I don't think I want to go alone. People keep telling me to just suck it up and go alone, but I don't want it to be a half-ass experience because I'm by myself. Also, maybe it'll be more incentive to come back if I don't make it there. I'm also quite simply worn out from spending the last two weeks on the road, and there are several parties going on here, so I think I'm just going to hang out in Eisleben until it's time to go home, unless I run to Köthen one more time. Because I thought I would see Franzi again, I didn't really feel like I said goodbye to them, and I didn't even see most of my other friends last time I was there because I decided so last minute and they were all out of town. hmm...

Anyway, I will probably post again early next week since this weekend should be exciting, but if not it'll most likely be when I get home...

buchenwald, die welle, and american schools.

I apologize in advance if I assume you know a lot less than you do. As you see, a lot of the emotion going into this post is frustration, specifically directed at the American educational system. Knowing that people reading this didn't learn German [which is really the only reason I know any German history], didn't study history, or grew up during DDR-times when little information was coming out of this place, I may end up over-informing.

Everyone knows about the famous "Work will make you free" inscription that was over the front gate to many concentration camps (most famously at Auschwitz-Birkenau and Dachau). I was still shocked, however, to see this at the front gate of Buchenwald:A literal translation? "To each his own." Conversational meaning in German? "Everyone gets that which he deserves." This seems so much crueler, somehow, than that infamous promise of freedom. Remember that the prisoners at Buchenwald were not so literally marched to their deaths as was true at some of the more well-known camps. These were mostly political prisoners, sometimes given menial jobs, but mostly left to freeze, to starve, to rot in the middle of the woods near the single most important cultural capital of the German people. A simple google search of this phrase, and you'll also learn that this was the state motto of the Prussian empire. Although it was a part of the Holy Roman Empire*, Prussia was really the first attempt to unite the "German" people, and had (approximately) the current borders on the west side, but also included Denmark, and reached up along the Baltic Sea through most of current day Poland and. That is, that's how far it spread before Hitler started marching all over the place. So, then, what does this mean? Is it a political statement? Some kind of call to return to the past? Or is it really as backhanded as it seems - a command to shut the hell up? I'm not certain...

The whole time we were in Buchenwald, I kept thinking over and over: why didn't anyone stop this? I mean, even of people didn't want to see it themselves (and that I totally understand), doesn't there come a time when the desire to look away is overcome by the knowledge that another human being is suffering? Of course, there's a well-known poem (with many many variations) to this effect, from Martin Niemöller:

When the Nazis came for the Communists,
I remained silent;
I wasn't a Communist.

When they locked up the Social Democrats,
I remained silent;
I wasn't a Social Democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I didn't protest;
I wasn't a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn't a Jew.

And when they came for me,
There was no one left to speak out.

Regardless of what people then did or didn't do, the monument that finally knocked some sense into me (which I couldn't get a good photo of, but Zach might've?) reads: "So that the generation to come might know, the children, yet to be born, that they too may rise and declare to their children" (Psalm 78:6).** It hit me that I was somehow lucky to be able to see this. Too many Americans will never be able to go there and to look at those spaces where people suffered and died. Too many kids don't hear about the Holocaust (let alone all the things the Soviets did at Buchenwald) save for one week in the year during history class - that if they're lucky, too. My overwhelming sense is that we want too badly to be the heroes of history. The version of WWII that's most popular seems to be Oh, yeah, they were doing some fighting over there in Europe, but we marched in and put an end to all that crap. God Bless America, right?! God forbid we discuss the massive numbers of Russians that died during that giant mess, so that we might look like heroes. And then what of Mussolini and Stalin? Why is Hitler the only example we're given, when he is not the only face of fascism? Why were the events at Abu Ghraib laughed off and then so easily forgotten? What isn't my government telling me about what happens at Gitmo, and why, exactly, are they so opposed to me traveling to Cuba (don't give me that crap about economic embargo. I'm not buyin' it.)?

Monument for women and girls: No one took their goodbye. No one erected a cross or a stone. But you shall live, as long as people keep your memory. [my translation]

And then, of course, German film... Oh, will you never tire of capturing all the scary, scary things that happen in America? [I hope not]

When I was in Köthen, Jan gave me a bunch of movies to watch. He said it was homework, that these were the things I needed to know about Germany. Admittedly, Jan had a very particular view of what was important about his culture, and a lot of his slant could be attributed to the fact that he worked/works for the German Army. So I watched a lot of movies about Nazis and Punks and being in prison and getting in knife fights. It was exciting. One, in particular, that struck me was Das Experiment. You might've seen it, actually, under the title The Experiment. It was subtitled and released on video, if not run through theaters. It was based on a Stanford U experiment about power, authority, and the sociology of prison interactions. 24 men were paid to take part in a mock-prison situation, randomly assigned as either prisoners or jail keepers, and given minimal supervision. Essentially, things got way out of hand, and the proposed 14-day experiment was called off after only 6 days. Hmm. Stanford University. That's a respectable place with intelligent people. And yet, they allowed men to humiliate and torture each other for six days. Had you heard of it? I hadn't. But every high schooler in Germany learns about the experiment, as well as many of the investigator's buddies' experiments, in their Social Studies classes. Even though it happened in AMERICA - not here.

Take two: Die Welle. Read about this one in the newspaper. It's a German movie with German actors that plays out in Germany, but it's baed on an American high school teacher (Ron Jones) in Palo Alto, California who put his history class to an experiment based on the premise that the Holocaust would never happen in America. People wouldn't go along with the Party, was the claim. And yet, the students created their own Party (the Third Wave), uniform, salute, icon, manner of behavior (including being drilled on entering the classroom quickly and silently), and followed their teacher like good little Hitlerjugend within three days. Heard of it? Nope, me either. There's a movie about it - made in America in 81 but apparently swept under the carpet - and a book, which most German high schoolers read, naturally. Fair enough, I'm sure German kids are sick and tired of hearing about all the awful things their grandparents allowed to happen more than 50 years ago. I get that. In fact, Die Welle did an excellent job of addressing that boredom; at the start of the conversation, which is prompted in the film by a project week on forms of government, one student says, "I'm sick of these damn Nazis. Autocracy. Fine. Can't we talk about the Bush Administration?" Hmm. The Bush Administration, you say. I dare you to find a cross-section of American high school students who would be able identify the ways in which the current government could be considered autocratic or fascist. Anyone think that has anything to do with the fact that we don't talk about autocracy or fascism, or even what real democracy might look like - psst. here's a hint: America's not one! I cannot believe our inability to be honest with ourselves. The first steps to recognizing and putting an end to unhealthy government policies is learning about past mistakes. Allowing a majority of citizens to be and remain disenfranchised, struggling, and hungry, on the other hand, sounds like a fast-track to fascism to me.

Well, this has gone on long enough. Sorry for the rant.

Hearing: Ben Harper.
Reading: Lessons for next week (practicing, really, more than reading...)
Making: Intrelac scarf from baby alpaca yarn.

*PC, remember when I said things in Weimar looked Prussian, and not German? What I couldn't figure out how to articulate then rests here. Prussia was essentially Roman, and not "purely German."
**Without being able to read the Hebrew version, the feeling of the German text on this monument had a different feel to me. Naturally, they used some translation of the bible that they felt was fitting and accurate to the original text, but it was the German that struck me. I would translate it like this: "So that the Generation to come, all the children yet to be born, they too will stand and tell this to their children."

PS. I know, Zach, I know... Just... save it.

photography

I discovered two photographers today that I love: Albrecht Tübke and Diane Arbus. Both are "street photographers," meaning their subjects are just every day people, not models. Tübke's are also German, so of course they hold a special place in my heart. Some of my favorite examples: They have such awesome attitudes about them. I don't know if Tübke is just good at spotting attitude or if he poses them (I really hope not but I suspect so, since many have similar postures) but they all look like they think they're the shit.
Of course, this woman actually is:I want to model my entire wardrobe after this photo.

I'm no expert on photography, so all I can do is go with the stuff I read, which cites Arbus as a predecessor of this style. However, Arbus became best known for photographing "outsiders" in the middle of the 1900s:

Her unrelentingly direct photographs of people who live on the edge of societal acceptance, as well as those photographs depicting supposedly "normal" people in a way that sharply outlines the cracks in their public masks, were controversial at the time of their creation and remain so today....
Arbus's pictures are almost invariably confrontational: the subjects look directly at the camera and are sharply rendered, lit by direct flash or other frontal lighting. Her subjects appear to be perfectly willing, if not eager, to reveal themselves and their flaws to her lens.
She said of her pictures, "What I'm trying to describe is that it's impossible to get out of your skin into somebody else's.... That somebody else's tragedy is not the same as your own." And of her subjects who were physically unusual, she said, "Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. [These people] were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats." artphotogallery.org

Alright, make that three. Shortly after I started writing this entry, I checked facebook, and one of the things on my news feed was that Tamera had posted a link to the Wellcome Collection, a series of photos taken of people shortly before and then just after their deaths. Quite different, but also striking.

Tübke photos via http://www.tuebke.info/
Arbus photos via http://www.artphotogallery.org/02/artphotogallery/photographers/diane_arbus_01.html
[discovery via bits and bobbins.]

oh yeah.

I actually did cook a tiny bit while the groups were here... One recipe doesn't have a picture, though, and the other one came out gritty and grey. Sorry.

Mexican Tortellini
1 portion tortellini
1 can black beans
1 can sweet corn
1 small tomato
2 tsp cilantro

Cook pasta, drain. Warm beans, tomato, and cilantro over medium heat. Add corn but do not heat. Serve with sour cream, cheddar cheese, and salsa.
***

Indian Tuna Casserole
1 1/2 cups cooked pasta, any kind
1 can tuna in water
1 small can sweet corn, drained
1/2 small can sliced mushrooms, drained
2 cups light sour cream
2 slices Gouda cheese
curry powder, to taste

Cook pasta, drain. Fluff tuna with fork and add to pasta. (I decided to mix up the tuna and pasta before adding anything with liquid that would make the tuna sticky and clumpy again. If you like big ole chunks of tuna, skip this step.) Add vegetables and sour cream and stir over low heat. Add curry powder until sauce is just slightly yellow. Place cheese on top and bake for 25 minutes at 100*C.

Whatever. Not like you're gunna cook it anyway.

phew.

Well, that was exciting.

All the groups are home (more or less without incident), I'm back in Eisleben for a quiet little week of recuperation, and spring has come! [knock on wood]. Yep, that's right, although it snowed less than two weeks ago, I've been running around in shirt sleeves and skirts for the last three days. Well, running around may be an exaggeration. I've been wearing them. I haven't been running anywhere, and really haven't left my apartment much except to fraternize with my host family in the garden. I can't tell you how excited I am. I'm a little mad at myself for not sending more of my bulky warm clothes home with my parents, but whatever. It's like, 12*C!! Good times.

Hokay... Catch up.

Erfurt is pretty much my favorite place on earth right now. Alright, that's an exaggeration, but it was the only place I got to breathe for the last month, and so I have a little bit of an attachment. It's also just a cool place - big enough that stuff is going on, but very laid-back at the same time. Additionally, it has the best street art/graffiti I've ever seen. I actually "collected" it, it was so cool. Dang, I need to get that up on flickr.

With the UniLu group I got to go to Weimar, a place that everyone in this region raves about. It's been a center of German culture, art, and intellectual thought for a long long time, and in many ways is considered the "heart" of Germany. Buchenwald, a Nazi and later Soviet work camp, is just outside the city walls, which means less to us, maybe, than it does to Germans. It was a shock to many people, after the war, that such a thing was happening so close to an important city. In reality, much of that shock was probably about being forced to look at the things they had been ignoring for such a long time, and its proximity to Weimar was just the salt in the wound. Buchenwald was not a death camp in the way that Auschwitz was, and housed more political prisoners and dissidents (including Ernst Thälman and Dietrich Bonhoeffer; Elie Wiesel was also here, but not because of politics) and than Jews. I feel I need to write much, much more about the experience of going there, but it may be better suited for another post.

I finally got to spend an afternoon in Berlin, again with UniLu, but I still haven't gotten to see the things I wanted to go back for. Mostly, right now, I want to go to the Käthe Kollwitz Museum. But of course I still have time.

Travel plans: Prague/Dresden and Italy are pretty much certain, but I need to talk to Franzi and Jon about when. I could go to Sweeden with some people from the JG and Scott, but I don't really have any particular interest in going, and I think I'd rather spend my money seeing something I'm dying to see. Will invited me to Spain, but that'll be a matter of when he could host me. I'm currently toying with the idea of going to Barcelona and Paris, then to Ireland, and flying back. Dang I wanna go to Ireland so bad. Problem is that I don't know anyone there, and I really don't want to go by myself.

The job with BSC is definite. I'll be getting my contract in the mail soon, and then I suppose it'll be time to look for a plane ticket? Man, that's weird. I may have mentioned before that I have a Rosetta Stone program for Latin American Spanish, or maybe not. Either way, I do have one, and I've been feverishly trying to learn enough phrases to not sound like an ass when I show up on the border. It's coming along, only very very slowly.

Anyway, I've decided to stay home for the summer, unless something pretty serious changes. It's just too expensive to fly back here for two more months of wasting my time. If I'm in the states, I don't have to pay rent, I could maybe earn some money, and at the very least, I'm blessed with friends who enjoy having fun for free, something that doesn't work out real well here. Best case scenario, I can split my time between the mountains and the beach and I won't get sunburned too bad. Also, re-acclimating to heat is sounding pretty pretty good right now. The prospect of leaving 18*C for a desert is not so great if you ask me.

Not a whole lot to say. I'm settling into the groove of these tours, having to think and worry less and less as things go along. So, that's exciting.

It's also finally getting warmer. It's possible of course, that it's just the Orkan we've got going on up in the north sea, but all the same, the last few days have been warmer, and I'm excited.

Just wanted you to know I hadn't forgotten about you. I just haven't had a lot of time for thought or reflection on anything, which makes for much less interesting posts. I also haven't cooked a thing in three weeks, so no recipes. I'll post soon w/ some of my craft projects, though...

call me butterrrr.

I'm on a roll.

Yeah, okay, the brussel sprouts were a bit undercooked, but it was the first time in my life I have ever even eaten fresh brussel sprouts, I think (and even frozen ones I might've had five times ever), and I had to google for half an hour before I felt confident even pretending to cook them. I was pretty happy with this stuff.

Confession: I cheated. So, I'm not going to post a real recipe. That pork was delicious, but it was pre-cooked and pre-seasoned. All I did was set it in the oven for five minutes so it was a little above room temperature. And that rice? Uncle Ben's Minute rice. I heated it up and put it in a pot. The brussel sprouts, however, I boiled with a cup and a half of water, a spoonful of butter, and one garlic clove, sliced ultra thin. Added salt and pepper. Not bad, if I do say so myself. And it sure as hell looks tasty, even if I didn't cook most of it.

Busy, busy getting ready for the American invasion of Sachsen-Anhalt. Realized last night, after working for at least ten hours on the very very detailed itinerary that we couldn't take half the trains I had planned on, so I was up till 5am fixing it (thanks, OCD!). Pretty tired, and releasing my frustrations in vanilla-hazelnut pudding (also amazing) and paprika potato chips. But as for now, I'm going to eat dinner with one of my youth and her family in ten minutes. Write more later, maybe?

edit: Check out these shoes! They're not real comfortable, but how awesome are they? Possible for Jenn's wedding, maybe? Gotta decide in the next two days if I wanna return them, though.

fish stick eater

I might've mentioned at some point that it wasn't as cold as I had expected.

I take it back. It's freezing.

When I say "it's freezing," what I mean is, it is between -10 and -2C. That's, technically, a good bit below freezing. I have a cold, and it's not fun. It's difficult to make myself go outside, b/c it really is physically painful, but it's easy to get depressed around here if you don't take advantage of the sunlight when it's there. Man, tonight, for example, I had on my thermal top and pants, leg warmers (thanks, Amanda's mom!), jeans, a turtle neck, one of dad's ultra thick sweaters from MI, a scarf, hat, and my pea coat. I still wanted to cut my face off so it would stop hurting. There's simply no relief.

I'm excited that Furman gets here in like a week. I can't wait to see Mason, to get my camera back, and to have something to do all day. Granted, it will be stressful to have people here constantly for the next month, and I won't get a break at all, but you know... small blessings.

On an entirely unrelated note, I don't think I've ever in my life eaten fish sticks. I know mom never bought them for us, and I think I successfully avoided them in the school cafeteria. However, I have become a fish stick eater. They're not that bad, really, if you get the breading cooked real crunchy and put a little ketchup on them. Anyway, I just bring that up because I ate them today with my lunch, which, outside of this little foray into the trashy, I was really proud of.

Kat's tomato tomato tortellini
1 cup dry cheese tortellini
1/4 cup sliced sun dried tomatoes
1 small fresh tomato
basalmic vinegar, olive oil
black pepper, to taste

Boil tortellini in salted water with a bit of olive oil (to keep it from being sticky) for 10 minutes. Depending on volume, cook time may vary. Pasta should be just barely undercooked. Drain.

Heat a skillet and coat with olive oil. Place tortellini in skillet and fry, stirring constantly, until crunchy. Add tomatoes (both kinds) and a tiny splash of vinegar. Cook until sun dried tomatoes are rehydrated and soft. Lightly pepper.

Serve with fish or chicken.

Serves: 1.

food, cooking, surviving.

So, I'm not a very good cook. Compound that with the fact that grocery shopping here looks very different than in the states. Add the lack of desire to stock a nice kitchen when you're only going to be somewhere for a few months. You get lots of pizza and döner take out.

However, there are a few things that I can make tastily with some variation: pasta with just about any combination of vegetables and tomato sauce; tiny spicy hamburgers (without buns); fajitas with either chicken or ground beef; eggs; things that come from cans.

With this limited background I have been attempting to prepare food for myself (which, btw, is much more difficult for one person than for ten). There have been some minor victories. For example, I can pan fry potatoes like nobody's business. I now know how many grams of cheese slices I am capable of consuming in one week. I have discovered the joys of zucchini and plain white rice. But my greatest victory thusfar, since I've mostly been spending a lot of time cooking individual foodstuffs with very little attention to spices and even less to making sure they fit together, was this soup.

Naturally, I paired it with potatoes, because it's what I love the most, but I only had one left, so I also ate some bread with this deliciousness. This was the first time I got thin-cut potatoes cooked through but not burnt, as well (I usually cook chunky potatoes). I took a regular ole can of tomato soup, added zucchini slices and some leftover gnocchi from the day before, and voila! it was delicious, if I do say so myself. And warm! Oh, boy, was it warm!

For those of you who like recipes, and ingenuity, I'm going to start adding stuff like this, so that you can try to eat like me--poor and away from home!

Kat's Rainy Day German Tomato Soup
1 can plain tomato soup
1 medium tomato
1 small zucchini, sliced not-that-thin
1/2 cup leftover gnocchi
1/2 cup lowfat milk
salt
white pepper
oregano (to taste)

Let tomato soup (not thinned) and diced fresh tomato simmer over medium heat. Heat sliced zucchini covered over low heat with a splash of water (just enough to keep it from burning) and some butter for 5 minutes or until water is almost evaporated. Add gnocchi, salt, white pepper, and milk. Cook until gnocchi is hot. Add to tomato soup. Let cook all together 2 minutes, flavoring as desired.

Serves: 2

TRY: substituting leftover rice, pasta, or potatoes for gnocchi!

kindertage

Mann o Mann am I tired!

Monday - Today we had Kindertage up at Sankt Annen. It was kind of like vacation bible school, only German. Our theme was "Kunterbunt," which means both "chaotic" and "colorful" at the same time. So we talked about creation and how there were all these different creatures created, and how we're the body of Christ and we all have different talents, and etc. etc. Anyone who ever went to Sunday school ever probably knows what went down. I'm sure it was fun--at least, the kids all seemed to enjoy it. Only, here's the deal. The dialect here, is super mumble-some. Then even more people mumble because they're too lazy to talk right (which is not an attack on this region. It's true of people everywhere). Then they speak fast. And their kids speak faster and more mumbley than they do. And kids don't pay attention when you say "oh, I'm sorry, what was that? I'm not a native German speaker so you're going to have to slow down." They either repeat themselves just as fast and unclearly as before, look at you like you have three heads, or go ask someone else for whatever it is they need (it's usually a kleenex). My brain is just about ready to explode.

I know I said I would dish, but I just can't. I even tried to post something exciting three times today already. I just... can't. I'm going to watch scrubs and fall asleep.
xoxo

i'm sorry. seriously.

I know that I promised all of you I would be updating this blog when I arrived. I'm sorry that I didn't do a good job of that. I will try to do better in the next month.

Yep, that's right. I've been here about a month, now. I won't lie to you. It's been a rough transition. Although we knew, statistically, that there were very few young adults running around Eisleben, before I came, nothing could have prepared me for the reality of that experience. EVERYONE leaves after graduating or finishing their practical training. That's not true. Most people leave. The others resigned themselves at the age of 16 to a life financed by generous German unemployment benefits and alcoholism. After living in a college town my entire life, this is a world I never imagined. It's difficult to find things to talk about with the majority of the people I meet. The students from the youth group are a welcome change--as Gymnasiumschüler, they all expect to go to college--it's weird that the closest thing I have to friends are all 17 years old. True, German kids grow up faster. But then when you sit in a bar with them, and they talk about their 18th birthday party like it was yesterday, not because they're swept up in nostalgia, but because it actually WAS yesterday... and then, inevitably, someone mistakes me for a 19 year old and I have to say, no, actually, I'm 22. You wouldn't believe the blank stares. What the hell is a 22 year old doing in Eisleben hanging out with us?

I guess I should address my apartment somewhat as well. After I got over the jet lag, this apartment started to creep me out. I mean, you saw it. It's huge. I've spent the last four years sharing a tiny room with someone. Before that, I lived with my parents. On top of that, I hated the feeling that no one would be looking for me immediately if anything happened. The people who've lived here for a while all talk about Eisleben like it's the perfect town. People walk around at night by themselves, down alleys with no lamps (granted, it does get dark at 5pm, so you don't exactly have an option all the time). But no matter what I did, I was creeped out. So, my unbelievably awesome "host parents" that didn't really sign up for host parent duty let me sleep upstairs in the attic for about a week. I've been back downstairs for 3 1/2 weeks now, and I'm doing considerably better. But this house is nearly 350 years old. It creaks. It whispers. And I'm alone. It's a weird feeling.

I went to Erfurt last week to check things out for the spring break trips. I also visited the son of the people I live with, Philip, who is finishing up his studies there. He's becoming an elementary school teacher. I had a lot of fun, and I promise I'll write more details soon.

This week we have a vacation bible school type thing going on up at St. Anne's, and Thursday I'm going to Wittenberg to scope out the city tour situation. Next Sunday I'm going back to Köthen to visit with Steffi and Franzi. I cannot even explain my excitement.

Tonight I hosted youth group at my house, since Scott is on vacation. Since I was missing home, I hosted my own little pancake supper (which is a fat tuesday tradition in my family/at CU campus ministry). It went fairly well, although all the Germans wanted to eat jam on their pancakes instead of syrup and I had to eat all the bacon myself (YEAH I FOUND BACON IN GERMANY WHOOT!) because they refused to mix sweet and salty at dinner time... Oh, German culinary rules. Will you never fail to ruin my parties?
Anyway, the point is that I'm really tired, so I'm going to go to sleep now to get ready for our last day of Kindertage. I will do my best to write more tomorrow, or at the very least this weekend.
xoxo

ps. THANKS to everyone who's sent me mail. I got 5 letters today and was so excited, I ran upstairs to show the Quenzels. They think I'm weird, but I say, keep 'em comin!

ho-o-o-o-oly crap!

So, I'm here. I'm speaking German. I have an apartment and I cook meals for myself. I went to the Metzgerei (kinda like a butcher, but with lots more gellatinous options) by myself today and I bought some kind of animal product (yep, not sure what it was) that I ate and it has not yet made me sick. I have discovered I can buy bread and vegetables--in German--and even though it quickly becomes evident that I'm an Ausländer, I get what I need. I am starting to encounter Mansfelder (the God-awful dialect of German that's spoken here) without getting completely confused. I registered with the city and got a checking account today, too. Gah, crazy stuff. Anyway, I'm kinda tired and I still have stuff to do tonight. I'll post again when I can. Meanwhile, if you want to get in touch with me, you can email me and I'll send you my snail mail address.