The skies began to darken this afternoon around 3. Salome and I were jumping on the trampoline, or rather, Salome was jumping on the trampoline while she made sure I was sitting on the edge and not jumping (or 'gump-ah', as she calls it). Clouds began swirling and I could see rain beginning to fall in the valley toward St. Peterzell.
"Salome," I began, "we need to go in the house, a storm is coming."
"Chico auch!" she replied. (Chico [the family dog] also.)
The skies darkened ever more and about 10 minutes after we went into the house, the rains came and the winds blew. Hard. I haven't seen it get that windy since I've gotten to Europe. We're finishing up moving the green house (putting the plastic over it) but there were still some random things laying out by the garden. Jeff and I ran out in the pouring rain and pounding wind to pick up the pieces. It was a fun storm. Apparently the church in town got struck by lightning. The power was out for a good 45 minutes. Chico gets scared when there is gewitte. He paces and pants with his tongue hanging out and there is unfortunately nothing we can do but say his name in a soothing, calming voice.
Fortunately for the hay, we finished that yesterday afternoon before today's thunderstorms came. Making hay is probably one of the hardest jobs I'll be doing here. Dirk has 'joked' that all the work I've been doing has been training for hay making. I believe him now. I can see my main job while Dirk is sitting on the hay collector is to follow behind him on foot and dragging a giant rake. Remember, there are hills here. It's not your flat-land cut the grass, let it dray, rake it, bale it hay making. Because we have hills, there is some land which is not accessible by machine and all the work has to be done by hand. Sometimes when a machine can go in the area, it's not possible to get everything on the first try which is when we have to follow behind with the rakes. After the collector is full, we follow Dirk down to the barn and proceed to unload it. With 3.5 loads, we filled a room that's perhaps 20 feet x 25 feet and as deep as 8 feet.
When the cows are in the summer stall, they are let out to pasture everyday (or night, depending on how hot it gets that day). There is a large section (read: hillside) that is set aside for the cows. They don't get freerange of the whole section. We divide it off and when that section is all consumed, we remake the fence to enclose the next section. There is also a path that leads from the stall to the cafeteria. All of these fences are electric. I'll post pictures when it's not raining so you can better understand.
Last week on Wednesday I woke up with a ruckschmerz (back pain) on my right side. It felt like a muscle was tensed up and something wasn't allowing it to relax. I was unable to do much of the outside work so I was left to play with Salome. The next day I was taken to the doctor and he gave me some pain tablets, which didn't really help. Fortunately by the weekend things had evened out pretty good. I just hate it when I wake up and am sick. The main reason why I'm here is to work and when I can't do that I feel like I'm letting the family (my employers) down.
Jeff is visiting. He was the trainee here a year ago. The family absolutely adored him and I didn't know how to feel about him visiting. I had my reservations, especially since they called me his name the first three months I was here. Turns out he's pretty cool, though he is sitting in my place at the table. I don't know how I feel about that.
Looking forward,
Jon
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Wishing Friday was tomorrow
Perhaps I should expound upon the previous post. In 6 days I'll be meeting up with Jessica and her family in Germany and then traveling to Wintersheim. I began this experience almost 10 months ago and she was the last person I saw, being the person who dropped me off at the South Bend airport. I think I can safely say that in our 2.5+ year relationship, this is the longest that we've gone without seeing or visiting each other.
Our itinerary looks something like this:
They actually fly out tomorrow (Sunday) and arrive in Amsterdam on Monday morning. I meet up with them on May 29, when they pick me up at the train station in Bingen, on the Rhein River. Then we make the short trip to Wintersheim and my first placement with the Dettweiler's. We'll walk through the vineyard's, go to Worms, and see the vineyard operation. There's also a wine fest across the street on one of the nights. From W'heim, we go to
Langnau im Emmental. We'll stay with the Kipfer's. Near the Emmental is the Frutigen Valley, where some family history of Jessica's mom is. Hopefully the weather will be nice and we can see some of the Berner Oberland. From Langnau, we head to
Hemberg. We'll do some light hiking, visit some cities and maybe even a cheese factory. On Saturday the 6th, they head to Madrid and I'll stay here on the farm to do some work. But wait, I'm not done!
On the 10th I'll head to Munich. There I'll stay with Stief, the guitarist from Phil's band, Trivial. On the 11th, I pick up Jess from the airport and we'll see Munich sites. The next day, the 12th, she and I board a train in the late afternoon and head to
Prague. Ondra, who is a Czech/friend from Goshen will be our host from Friday to Monday morning. On Monday morning, the 15th, we fly to
Amsterdam. There, we stay with Dutch Committee Member Sarah. We haven't done much planning for these three stops, so it should be a fun improv-ed time together!
If anybody wants a more detailed itinerary, leave a comment with your email and I'll try to get one sent to you.
I spent some of my Saturday purchasing train tickets and an airplane ticket to get to places I need to be when they are here. I also spent 5 hours doing odd jobs, like turning dirt in the garden and making a new fence for the cows. We also loaded up some wood and marinated turkey and went into the forest, made a fire, and grilled. There also happened to be a small nature preserve nearby with marshes, so we also went mud jumping.
On the next blog post: Jeff is visiting, explaining making new fences for the cows, and other subjects yet to be determined.
What's that?
Jon
Our itinerary looks something like this:
They actually fly out tomorrow (Sunday) and arrive in Amsterdam on Monday morning. I meet up with them on May 29, when they pick me up at the train station in Bingen, on the Rhein River. Then we make the short trip to Wintersheim and my first placement with the Dettweiler's. We'll walk through the vineyard's, go to Worms, and see the vineyard operation. There's also a wine fest across the street on one of the nights. From W'heim, we go to
Langnau im Emmental. We'll stay with the Kipfer's. Near the Emmental is the Frutigen Valley, where some family history of Jessica's mom is. Hopefully the weather will be nice and we can see some of the Berner Oberland. From Langnau, we head to
Hemberg. We'll do some light hiking, visit some cities and maybe even a cheese factory. On Saturday the 6th, they head to Madrid and I'll stay here on the farm to do some work. But wait, I'm not done!
On the 10th I'll head to Munich. There I'll stay with Stief, the guitarist from Phil's band, Trivial. On the 11th, I pick up Jess from the airport and we'll see Munich sites. The next day, the 12th, she and I board a train in the late afternoon and head to
Prague. Ondra, who is a Czech/friend from Goshen will be our host from Friday to Monday morning. On Monday morning, the 15th, we fly to
Amsterdam. There, we stay with Dutch Committee Member Sarah. We haven't done much planning for these three stops, so it should be a fun improv-ed time together!
If anybody wants a more detailed itinerary, leave a comment with your email and I'll try to get one sent to you.
I spent some of my Saturday purchasing train tickets and an airplane ticket to get to places I need to be when they are here. I also spent 5 hours doing odd jobs, like turning dirt in the garden and making a new fence for the cows. We also loaded up some wood and marinated turkey and went into the forest, made a fire, and grilled. There also happened to be a small nature preserve nearby with marshes, so we also went mud jumping.
On the next blog post: Jeff is visiting, explaining making new fences for the cows, and other subjects yet to be determined.
What's that?
Jon
Friday, May 22, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
17ish hours on trains from Friday to Sunday
Friday morning I hopped on the 8:35 bus out of Hemberg and began making my 7 hour, 11 minute journey from deep in the heart of Switzerland towards Meckesheim in Germany. My destination was the Germany/Switzerland Intermenno Spring Retreat where I'd meet the 6 other D/CH Trainees, plus the committee and Tim, Heidi and Gustav. At past retreats in Meckesheim, Heidi has cooked for the weekend and she (and Tim and Gustav) didn't disappoint this time. It was a fine balance between family and trainee time, and unfortunately, trainee time cut into family time whenever an interesting discussion began. I did get some Uncle Jon time with Gustav:
One of the purposes of the Intermenno program is learning more about European Culture. What better way to do that than tour a brewery? That's exactly what we did on Friday night after supper. Aside from it being a FREE tour, in ENGLISH, at the end we got to sample the product for FREE. Alone, those are good, but combined it was fantastic!
It's always a good time when the trainees get together. Everyone tells stories from their respective travels and placements, which are always nice to hear. There is usually always wonderful food to snack on (the trainee from Bavaria works on a strawberry farm and Friday was the first day of the season so her hosts sent a couple baskets of berries). We also do interesting activities.
Saturday we were turned lose in Heidelberg with the aim of completing a photo-scavenger hunt. These are becoming ever more popular with the advent of digital photography. We met back with the committee for a picnic lunch on the banks of the Neckar River. Fortunately the weather cooperated for our day outside.
That night we went to a 'Jugend Gottesdienst', or youth church. As one might guess, there was a worship band who probably pulled out all the English P&W/throw up music that they knew. This was evidenced as Charles and I single-handily rescued a male/female call and response song for the males.
On Sunday, everyone slowly left between 1 and 3 pm, with Alyssa and I being the last trainees to leave. I have the longest journey (7 hours) so I wasn't looking forward to the late leaving time. Luckily I made all my trains (with a close call at the Basel Badischer Station) and returned to Wattwil and a ride from Dirk at 9:26 pm.
Last week Maya was gone on a retreat for the school that she teaches at, so Dirk's mom came down from Limburg a.d. Lahn for the week. This meant that I got to work outside all the time, since she was able to be with Salome and cook all the meals. She was fun to chat with and later in the week, I brought up that Heidi was a trainee but couldn't remember where she had been placed. Inge had remembered a Heidi in the 2000/2001 group that was near Limburg. Showing how small 'Die Mennonitisch Welt' is, Heidi had indeed been a trainee there. I love the Mennonite Game. In Inge and Gerhardt's time as trainee hosts they had a few people from Kansas. One name they remembered was Leroy Penner (their first). If anyone who reads this might know of trainees from the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s, it'd be interesting to hear about that.
On Thursday of this week is a holiday of which I forget the name of. I plan on working a normal day, gaining an extra day off of work while not feeling like I should be taking advantage of a three-day weekend and traveling somewhere. This will also save money for the long awaited visit of Jessica and her family. They arrive on the continent next Monday and I'll be meeting up with them in the Wintersheim vicinity next Friday. It'll be the end of a long 9 and a half months of waiting!
Keep it up,
Jon
One of the purposes of the Intermenno program is learning more about European Culture. What better way to do that than tour a brewery? That's exactly what we did on Friday night after supper. Aside from it being a FREE tour, in ENGLISH, at the end we got to sample the product for FREE. Alone, those are good, but combined it was fantastic!
It's always a good time when the trainees get together. Everyone tells stories from their respective travels and placements, which are always nice to hear. There is usually always wonderful food to snack on (the trainee from Bavaria works on a strawberry farm and Friday was the first day of the season so her hosts sent a couple baskets of berries). We also do interesting activities.
Saturday we were turned lose in Heidelberg with the aim of completing a photo-scavenger hunt. These are becoming ever more popular with the advent of digital photography. We met back with the committee for a picnic lunch on the banks of the Neckar River. Fortunately the weather cooperated for our day outside.
That night we went to a 'Jugend Gottesdienst', or youth church. As one might guess, there was a worship band who probably pulled out all the English P&W/throw up music that they knew. This was evidenced as Charles and I single-handily rescued a male/female call and response song for the males.
On Sunday, everyone slowly left between 1 and 3 pm, with Alyssa and I being the last trainees to leave. I have the longest journey (7 hours) so I wasn't looking forward to the late leaving time. Luckily I made all my trains (with a close call at the Basel Badischer Station) and returned to Wattwil and a ride from Dirk at 9:26 pm.
Last week Maya was gone on a retreat for the school that she teaches at, so Dirk's mom came down from Limburg a.d. Lahn for the week. This meant that I got to work outside all the time, since she was able to be with Salome and cook all the meals. She was fun to chat with and later in the week, I brought up that Heidi was a trainee but couldn't remember where she had been placed. Inge had remembered a Heidi in the 2000/2001 group that was near Limburg. Showing how small 'Die Mennonitisch Welt' is, Heidi had indeed been a trainee there. I love the Mennonite Game. In Inge and Gerhardt's time as trainee hosts they had a few people from Kansas. One name they remembered was Leroy Penner (their first). If anyone who reads this might know of trainees from the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s, it'd be interesting to hear about that.
On Thursday of this week is a holiday of which I forget the name of. I plan on working a normal day, gaining an extra day off of work while not feeling like I should be taking advantage of a three-day weekend and traveling somewhere. This will also save money for the long awaited visit of Jessica and her family. They arrive on the continent next Monday and I'll be meeting up with them in the Wintersheim vicinity next Friday. It'll be the end of a long 9 and a half months of waiting!
Keep it up,
Jon
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Send happy thoughts
I'm not usually one to make a request like this, but I'll do it without getting too specific.
Alyssa really needs some happy thoughts sent her way. She's going through a rough patch right now and really needs them.
Thanks,
Jon
Alyssa really needs some happy thoughts sent her way. She's going through a rough patch right now and really needs them.
Thanks,
Jon
Sunday, May 10, 2009
We summitted
On one of my previous posts, I asked for people to contribute their ideas for cooking green beans (thanks to Erica and Kate for responding). The reason I did that was because I wanted to find out if the way I made it a couple weeks ago was indeed a correct way. I made it the way Kate described:
"...as for the green beans i´m boring and just boil them until they seem the right texture... then add a little chunk of butter for good measure?"
That's exactly the way I did it, yet at lunch, Dirk said they weren't good. I said they tasted fine to me but then he said that they should taste good for everyone. (By the way, I'm not saying Kate's way is wrong, just that maybe I did in fact do it wrong, but that's unlikely.) This didn't put me in a very good mood the rest of the day. Maybe I'll try something different next time.
On Thursday, I woke up to some splendid fog throughout the valley below the house. I'm particularly proud of the second picture. It might deserve getting blown up when I return home.
On Friday, the main work of the day was working in a trench. As the snow was melting, a pipe broke for the drainage at the other stall. It was a long morning of carrying 30-40 foot long pipes down a hill and then filling the trench back up with dirt. It was exhausting. As Dirk says, all the work I'm doing now is training for when it's hay-making time.
Friday evening I made my way to Basel. Alyssa and I planned another Super Awesome Swiss Weekend, this time XIX. On Saturday we made our way down to Geneva where we spent most of the day wandering around looking in the windows of shops we'd never set foot into. We joked that we were there for a summit meeting, because that's about the only time you ever hear about the city. I was also surprised to hear that the UN is based there. I always thought that it was in New York.
Edit: So I did some research and my good friend Wikipedia tells me that the UN's International Territory headquarters are in NYC. So I wasn't wrong at all. There are offices of the UN in Geneva.
They also have a really tall water fountain. Fast facts about the water fountain:
-It can be seen from the air as you fly over the city at 33,000 feet.
-132 gallons/second are pumped to a height of 459 feet, leaving the nozzle at a speed of 124 mph.
-At any one time, there are 1,489 gallons of water in the air.
That's the only evidence I have of being in Geneva.
Today, we walked around Basel and sat on the riverfront of the Rhein. It was pretty lazy.
---------------
Train Travel
I am going to miss train travel so much when I leave. Think about it. I can get onto a bus here in my tiny village of Hemberg, and I can go anywhere in Europe. It might take awhile and cost a lot of money, but eventually I could get to Moscow or the far reaches of Northern Scandinavia. The US is not that connected. Sure, we have the Interstate System, but just think of all the pollution that causes. A lot of the rail lines in Europe are powered by electricity, yet that electricity still has to get made at power plants so I know it's not a perfect system yet.
I also really like my travel cards. I have a German BahnCard 25, which takes 25% off of most fares. I enjoyed that card but I like my Swiss Rail Card a lot more...it saves me a lot more money. I have what's called the Halbtax and the Gleis7 card.
Halbtax:
The Halbtax card cuts any fare in half, just like that. It also can give you discounts on certain gondolas and ships.
Gleis7 (Gleis Sieben): This card allows me to travel for free, on any train after 7 pm. I have used this card many times, specifically for forays into Germany. I'll go to Basel in the evening and stay with either Debbie or Alyssa, and then get into Germany. This saves me about CHF 35 each time.
With the combination of these cards, the trip to Geneva on Saturday cost a quarter of what it would cost the average tourist. We used our Halbtax cards to get there in the morning, which cost about CHF 33. Then we went back to Basel after 7 pm so that trip was 'free'. I am very happy that I elected to purchase those two cards (which are on one card, but are two different things) when I came to Switzerland, they've saved me a LOT of money.
------------------
On my walk home from the bus stop tonight, I was listening to music. Suddenly this flashy red sports car flew by. I immediately recognized the sidepipes and contoured lines as my favorite car, a Dodge Viper. Thinking that it had gone ahead on the road and out of Hemberg, I was happy to discover it at the school. It was dropping off a kid at the boarding school. The Viper's plates were from Liechtenstein. I gawked.
Enjoy the show,
Jon
"...as for the green beans i´m boring and just boil them until they seem the right texture... then add a little chunk of butter for good measure?"
That's exactly the way I did it, yet at lunch, Dirk said they weren't good. I said they tasted fine to me but then he said that they should taste good for everyone. (By the way, I'm not saying Kate's way is wrong, just that maybe I did in fact do it wrong, but that's unlikely.) This didn't put me in a very good mood the rest of the day. Maybe I'll try something different next time.
On Thursday, I woke up to some splendid fog throughout the valley below the house. I'm particularly proud of the second picture. It might deserve getting blown up when I return home.
On Friday, the main work of the day was working in a trench. As the snow was melting, a pipe broke for the drainage at the other stall. It was a long morning of carrying 30-40 foot long pipes down a hill and then filling the trench back up with dirt. It was exhausting. As Dirk says, all the work I'm doing now is training for when it's hay-making time.
Friday evening I made my way to Basel. Alyssa and I planned another Super Awesome Swiss Weekend, this time XIX. On Saturday we made our way down to Geneva where we spent most of the day wandering around looking in the windows of shops we'd never set foot into. We joked that we were there for a summit meeting, because that's about the only time you ever hear about the city. I was also surprised to hear that the UN is based there. I always thought that it was in New York.
Edit: So I did some research and my good friend Wikipedia tells me that the UN's International Territory headquarters are in NYC. So I wasn't wrong at all. There are offices of the UN in Geneva.
They also have a really tall water fountain. Fast facts about the water fountain:
-It can be seen from the air as you fly over the city at 33,000 feet.
-132 gallons/second are pumped to a height of 459 feet, leaving the nozzle at a speed of 124 mph.
-At any one time, there are 1,489 gallons of water in the air.
That's the only evidence I have of being in Geneva.
Today, we walked around Basel and sat on the riverfront of the Rhein. It was pretty lazy.
---------------
Train Travel
I am going to miss train travel so much when I leave. Think about it. I can get onto a bus here in my tiny village of Hemberg, and I can go anywhere in Europe. It might take awhile and cost a lot of money, but eventually I could get to Moscow or the far reaches of Northern Scandinavia. The US is not that connected. Sure, we have the Interstate System, but just think of all the pollution that causes. A lot of the rail lines in Europe are powered by electricity, yet that electricity still has to get made at power plants so I know it's not a perfect system yet.
I also really like my travel cards. I have a German BahnCard 25, which takes 25% off of most fares. I enjoyed that card but I like my Swiss Rail Card a lot more...it saves me a lot more money. I have what's called the Halbtax and the Gleis7 card.
Halbtax:
The Halbtax card cuts any fare in half, just like that. It also can give you discounts on certain gondolas and ships.
Gleis7 (Gleis Sieben): This card allows me to travel for free, on any train after 7 pm. I have used this card many times, specifically for forays into Germany. I'll go to Basel in the evening and stay with either Debbie or Alyssa, and then get into Germany. This saves me about CHF 35 each time.
With the combination of these cards, the trip to Geneva on Saturday cost a quarter of what it would cost the average tourist. We used our Halbtax cards to get there in the morning, which cost about CHF 33. Then we went back to Basel after 7 pm so that trip was 'free'. I am very happy that I elected to purchase those two cards (which are on one card, but are two different things) when I came to Switzerland, they've saved me a LOT of money.
------------------
On my walk home from the bus stop tonight, I was listening to music. Suddenly this flashy red sports car flew by. I immediately recognized the sidepipes and contoured lines as my favorite car, a Dodge Viper. Thinking that it had gone ahead on the road and out of Hemberg, I was happy to discover it at the school. It was dropping off a kid at the boarding school. The Viper's plates were from Liechtenstein. I gawked.
Enjoy the show,
Jon
Thursday, May 07, 2009
The cows are enjoying their summer home
As the winter stall was being cleaned for the last time, I couldn't help but think that the classically styled song on the radio was a song from a soundtrack to a movie. The song comes from a part of the movie where something extraordinary is going to happen, but only the viewer can feel that something is coming and the people on screen are oblivious.
Sadly, the cows were not walked up to the other stall. We converted the work truck into an open-air box truck and the cows were loaded up 3-4 at a time and taken to their summer home. It was a big to-do. Since they hadn't seen their newly remodeled sleeping quarters, they started freaking out: probably at what such a good job we did on it. My job was to guard a small opening meant only for the calves to go in and out. I didn't do much. Salome hung out with me for a little while so that kept things interesting for me.
It was weird waking up today and NOT going down the stairs to the stall. That's what I've done almost everyday since I got here in mid-February. Instead, Dirk and I went to another piece of land that they have and we repaired the fence there. The land is a little higher up than the house is and we had a better view of watching the sun brighten the valley. You could hear cowbells echoing as well as the cuckoo call of a bird. Dirk called today a 'summer day' and the high was close to 25-26C (75-80F).
My main job today was to clean out the hay boxes in the winter stall. There are 11 boxes, 4 on one side and 7 on the other. The cows do everything but eat in these boxes: sleep, stand, pee, poop, and lie. When we did the stall, we only removed the poop from the top and added a thin layer of fresh hay to it...and that was twice a day. If you haven't imagined it yet, there was 4-5 months of compressed hay held together by 4-5 months of cow pee. This reddish brown mixture had to be removed by me. It was hard work and I have the callused hands to show for it. I had the side with four finished before lunch and finished the other side after lunch.
Tomorrow we get out the pressure washer and, well, pressure wash the crap out of it. Dirk joked that it will be so clean it will be their new living room. Some Swiss farmers even rent out their clean stalls in the summer time to hikers who sleep on fresh hay, but Dirk doesn't do that.
'til later,
Jon
Sadly, the cows were not walked up to the other stall. We converted the work truck into an open-air box truck and the cows were loaded up 3-4 at a time and taken to their summer home. It was a big to-do. Since they hadn't seen their newly remodeled sleeping quarters, they started freaking out: probably at what such a good job we did on it. My job was to guard a small opening meant only for the calves to go in and out. I didn't do much. Salome hung out with me for a little while so that kept things interesting for me.
It was weird waking up today and NOT going down the stairs to the stall. That's what I've done almost everyday since I got here in mid-February. Instead, Dirk and I went to another piece of land that they have and we repaired the fence there. The land is a little higher up than the house is and we had a better view of watching the sun brighten the valley. You could hear cowbells echoing as well as the cuckoo call of a bird. Dirk called today a 'summer day' and the high was close to 25-26C (75-80F).
My main job today was to clean out the hay boxes in the winter stall. There are 11 boxes, 4 on one side and 7 on the other. The cows do everything but eat in these boxes: sleep, stand, pee, poop, and lie. When we did the stall, we only removed the poop from the top and added a thin layer of fresh hay to it...and that was twice a day. If you haven't imagined it yet, there was 4-5 months of compressed hay held together by 4-5 months of cow pee. This reddish brown mixture had to be removed by me. It was hard work and I have the callused hands to show for it. I had the side with four finished before lunch and finished the other side after lunch.
Tomorrow we get out the pressure washer and, well, pressure wash the crap out of it. Dirk joked that it will be so clean it will be their new living room. Some Swiss farmers even rent out their clean stalls in the summer time to hikers who sleep on fresh hay, but Dirk doesn't do that.
'til later,
Jon
Sunday, May 03, 2009
What is cuter than one lamb?
If you guessed "three baby lambs," then you're correct.
On Friday, one sheep gave birth to two lambs, one of which we found dead later that day. However, this morning two more lambs were birthed. All but one sheep (the male) are/were pregnant, so now it's just a waiting game for all of the lambs to pop out.
We're also extremely close to finishing the work on the cow's summer home. We've been adding new places to sleep, gates, and other finishing touches for when the cows finally leave the stall for the summer. Neighbor cows are out and about and I'm sure they can hear the bells echoing throughout the valley, spawning a longing feeling to eat fresh grass and poop even more freely. From what I understand they'll be heading there tomorrow or Tuesday.
The gate's to freedom; the high road or the low road:
Wednesday I had a relatively free afternoon. I say 'relatively' because it didn't involve any work. Instead, I went with the family to "Sinnorama," which reminded me of a Halloween haunted house, except the theme was the Old Testament made so 5-10 year old's could understand the Bible. It had trapdoors, a light show, and our guide was named Johannes. I think I would rather have stayed home and worked than go.
On Friday, Dirk and I spent the entire day (it seemed like) planting three trees, an apple, pear and walnut. It's quite an intensive process which I won't bore you with, but keep in my head for the next time I plant a tree.
As I was finishing the stall in the late afternoon, the skies were darkening and the wind was blowing harder. Suddenly the skies opened and the thunder crashed, with rain coming down in sheets. It made a part of me miss those wonderful Kansas thunderstorms that you can see rolling in from Colorado.
You might be able to notice the yellowness on the hillsides. Daffodils are beginning to bloom and die, releasing their seeds. The hills have been many different colors since February. First white with snow. When that melted, it revealed green hills. As soon as the snow was completely gone and everything was green, they immediately turned brown with poop farmers spread over their fields. After a couple of rains and some grass growth, the grass turned a brighter green and less brown. Now they're greenish-yellow. I look forward to seeing what other colors the hills will turn. (And if one of you even thinks of singing "The hills are alive..."...)
This weekend I had no plans, so I woke up at 10 am on Saturday and stayed there for 30-45 minutes. It was fantastic. Then I got out of bed for lunch which was at the school where Maya teaches. She teaches at a home for troubled youth and they were having an open house with free brats for lunch. I had two. While there, one of the girls from church came up to me and asked if I wanted to go to the youth group (Jugi) meeting that night. I had nothing else going on so I said yes. I'm kind of glad I did. What I thought was going to be a night of intense experience sharing (which I couldn't dream of doing in German), turned out to be a pleasant night of game playing. I did speak German. They're happy to help and understand when words might get misplaced (and quick to correct). I got a compliment or two about how good my German is considering the only class I've taken is a beginner 9 week course. At church today, I was asked if I wanted to come over to someone's house for a spaghetti lunch and an afternoon playing soccer. I borrowed some shorts and now have some nicely reddish shoulders. I also got another compliment on my German, this time from a teacher of German. That really made me feel good.
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READER PARTICIPATION!
How would you cook frozen green beans?
Respond in the 'comments' section.
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Have a good week,
Jon
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