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CELEBRATING INDEPENDENCE DAY IN GERMANY
July 4th, 2002
By Gordon

This has been a slow week.  We only work until Wednesday because of the 4th of July holiday so it will happen quickly.

Really not much going on.  I am waiting on Housing to accept and confirm an exception to policy for us so we can seek a Private rental from the Germany economy--otherwise we will have to wait on a house to open up...somewhere.  I spent a good portion of the week looking for a used car.  I was only inches away from buying a 1987 BMW 318i, but after it failed the inspection, I reconsidered and looked elsewhere.  I happened into finding a black, 1989 BMW 320i Wagon!  A cute little car, cheap enough to purchase and yet big enough to toss all the kids in if we need to...I showed it to Stef and we bought it on Tuesday night...we had a great experience in buying this car...$2,150.  We will have to tell you more about it later.

July 4th, 2002 - By Gordon
Today begins a four day weekend for us!  We had all kinds of plans, but really aren't sure what we are going to end up doing.

In the morning, Jen and Shawn came over.  Stef and Jen had coffee and apfelkuchen (apple cake) while they sat and talked.

Shawn took me to pick up the car we bought.  Stef will tell you more about it in her installment, but let me tell you that it has a sweet CD player that plays both MP3's and CDs!  I made a CD that has 170+ MP3's on it!  Awesome when you put it in random mode.

After we got the car, we decided to take the Strassenbahn (street train) down into Wurzburg.  It costs 1.40 Euro (the exchange rate is almost 1:1 right now) per adult and .75 Euro for Emily.  We took the train and in 10 or 15 minutes we arrived at the stop just past the Ratskeller (see the pictures and look for the large water fountain).  Our destination today was Pizza hut!  Jen has been craving it for a while so we thought we would go somewhere they wanted to go.  We got pizza and it was pretty darn good!  I also got a Julius Ectar Heffe Weissen bier--Shawn says it is like drinking a loaf of bread!

After we ate, we walked outside and went into a store that looked similar to Pier One or the Company Store (catalog).  They had some pretty stuff but nothing that we need to buy yet.

We came back outside and saw Jeremy Bennett!  What a good coincidence!  My friend Chris said he saw him the other day and I have been trying to get in touch with him, but it is hard with no phones (hence, the need for Cell phones).  He told me that he just bought a cell phone so we exchanged numbers, spent 30 minutes talking and made some sort of plans to get together for the fireworks later tonight.

After shopping in a toy store we got back on the Strassenbahn and headed back up the hill.  We got home at 4:40pm.  At 5:15 we were supposed to meet with our realtor, Mr. Burger to look at a home in Winterhausen--a beautiful town on the Main river (that is the name of the river--the Main--pronounced "mine" I think).  We packed up the kids and drove off.  We arrived only 3 minutes late (amazing for us) and we followed him to the house.

Stef and I have driven through this town many times in our search for suitable housing.  There are some lavender colored row houses and we joked that we would have to live there....well, wouldn't you believe that he pulled up right in front of them!  We looked at each other as if to say, I told you so!

We waited for the current tenants, a family of 5 also, to show us the house.  It was very pretty but, of course, lacked a suitable yard for the kids to play in.  Let me describe it to you:  outside, there is a small parking space in front of the door for one car.  The other car can park on the street which is on a largely inclined hill of about 10º.  You enter the front door and immediately see that you are in the basement.  There is a small room to the left suitable for a bedroom and a half bath on the right.  Just past the bath is a small pantry.  Continue down the hall and there is the laundry room/furnace on the left and a spiral staircase on the right.  Ahead of you is a storage room...and it is quite large. You climb the stairs into the main body of the house and come out with the dining room in front of you.  The kitchen is ahead and to the left and there is a bedroom to your immediate left.  The kitchen is HUGE even for American standards and surprisingly has cabinets--they call that furnished and assured us that the cabinets would remain.  To the right is a large living room with a door leading out to the back yard.  The stairs continue up into the top floor.  Heading out the back door, you enter a small patio that is big enough for a grill and a picnic table.  After you leave the concrete portion, you steeply climb uphill...so there is no place for the kids to play outside in the yard.  The hill heads up to a trail that disappears behind the other houses...

Continuing up the stairs you head into the top floor.  Straight ahead is a full bath and separate shower.  There are two bedrooms up there.  One left and one right.  One is HUGE and one is large.  The ceilings are dormered, but even so, the rooms are still quite large!

We left the house and walked around outside to get a feel for the neighborhood--all or mostly Germans.  We didn't see any Americans.  The lady told us there was a play ground about 100 meters up the hill so we went off in search of it.  We found it--across the street and nearby.  It has a small soccer field that is netted in...a basketball hoop and a cool spinning net/rope thing.  It also has some large boulders and a tunnel to crawl through.  It's a small but nice playground.  Stef and I sat there and talked while the kids played.

We would certainly like something with a larger yard, but we will not rule this one out.  The tenants do not leave until the 1st of August so I don't think we would be able to be in there until the middle of August.

The search goes on.  We will look at other places and compare them to this one and others that we have seen...maybe we will find something that suits all of our needs but I am quite certain that in the end, we will have to sacrifice in one area or another...

After we left, we drove all over, through the adjacent towns.  We passed through some beautiful wine fields, into some towns with small streets that wound through the buildings and took a lot of beautiful pictures.  We returned to the town where this house was and walked through its streets and to a play ground.  Eventually we left for home.  We returned home and had something to eat and talked about seeing the fireworks.  Ben and Stef and Anabelle wanted stay home so we decided that Emily and I would go to the fireworks while the others stayed and watched "Land Before Time VIII"!

Emily and I went to see the fireworks at Leighton Barracks which is one of the Army Caserns in Wurzburg.  We drove up and I thought I would be slick by parking outside the post. We parked at the University in Wurzburg.  It's a pretty place.  You can walk through fields and under trees and even see the Castle Marionberg!

We found a parking spot and walked around in the cool night.  It was dusk and beginning to slowly turn dark.  We figured the fireworks would start soon.  We could here the loud reports and feel the strong concussions from the artillery pieces firing as they saluted the flag with a 21 gun salute.  We found a trail and walked closer to the gates that surround the base and closer to the cannons.  We could hear the Army band playing in the distance and then we saw a few fireworks shoot up high into the sky!  We were in a perfect place to see the show and it appeared that we would be able to beat the crowd when it was time to leave.

10:21pm Just as the first rockets went off, my cell phone rang and it was Jeremy Bennett.  He arrived in Germany on Tuesday and we were going to meet for the fireworks...we talked for a second and figured out that since he was inside the post and we were outside, that it may be hard to get together.  We hung up and Emily and I walked around looking for a gate to get on post.  Within minutes, we found an obscure back gate that was open only for the purpose of facilitating the crowds.  A roving guard consisting of two armed soldiers with helmets and armored vests came out of the gate and we asked if we could enter here.  They checked my ID card and let us in.  The fireworks hadn't officially started yet, what we saw earlier as a salute to the US Flag.  We continued to walk in closer to the launch site and as we crested the top of a 20 foot hill, we saw the crowd and we also saw that we were on the other side of an open field from the crowd.

We called Jeremy back and tried to explain our location to him.  He was in the crowd somewhere.  Then the fireworks began.  We hung up again.  Emily and I sat on the grass, well away from the crowd and ooh'ed and ahhhh'ed as the rockets went off!  I called Jeremy one more time and a few seconds later, he came into view!  He was carrying a beer stein half full of a weissen beer!

Together, Jeremy, Emily and I watched the fireworks from a great spot!  We were all far from home but were having a fun time together.  After the fireworks were done, we walked over to a stage where a band was playing.  They played a lot of cover songs by other artists, but we enjoyed the music...it was 11pm.  Emily was dancing and jumping around and Jeremy and I were talking.  The night had grown colder but people were having a good time all around.

Emily and I decided to call it a night so we said good bye to Jeremy and headed towards the gate that we walked in....it was awfully dark as we approached the gate and we quickly discovered that it was locked!  After looking around to see if anyone was around, I decided we could climb over it, but I felt the top of the gate and found large spikes made of metal sticking up...scratch that idea.  We had to find another way out.

So we walked....and walked and walked...we found a gate that led out but it wasn't too close to where we parked the car...but we had no choice.  It was nearing mid-night.  It was pitch black in places.  Emily and I tried to find a few shortcuts, but each of them led us into places where it was too dark to continue walking (and blocked by trees and shrubs) so we had to turn around and stick with the main roads. We passed many bus stops where people were waiting and eventually came upon that gate that we entered.  We walked back to the car and drove home (and got lost a few times on the way!).

All in all, it was a nice night.  We were out later than we expected but we saw some cool fireworks and had time to bond with just Emily and me!

Something about getting lost:  I seem to get misdirected everywhere I try to drive.  It really isn't too hard to get where you are going, but it certainly helps to have someone else looking at the road signs with you...or the map.  NONE of the road signs say a cardinal direction (North, South, East, or West), but instead, they only tell you the name of the city that the road goes to.  It makes it a bit harder for navigation and I would venture to say that without a map, you would not be able to find your way too easily.  So, I spend a lot of my time stopping, turning around, finding my way back up another direction but eventually I get where I am going.  It's just another thing to get used to.



July 5th, 2002 - By Stef

Ok, well another update.  We are still homeless; however we now have a car!! Yeah!  We bought a 1989 BMW 320i touring car (translation: station wagon) It's black and has a nice trunk to put the stroller and obnoxious children in. We bought it from a one-legged German man named Kris.  Yeah, I know that little tidbit of info has nothing to do with the car itself, but it sounds crazy so I threw that in and it's true! Interestingly, we never appreciated our van so much as when the kids were kicking the backs of our seats and screaming in our ears.

Ok, another interesting and yet useless piece of information- the kids and I love yogurt and we have been trying every German brand we can get our hands on.  The yogurt from the commissary isn't very good, but the Lidl across the street from us has some that is pretty good.  Only problem is I keep trying to find chocolate yogurt and I just don't seem to be able to get what I am looking for.  Its not so easy reading German.  The first time I got some chocolate whipped cream stuff and the second time I was certain I had chocolate yogurt- even the package was brown!  Alas! It was some vanilla-ish yogurt with chocolate pieces in it.  Sigh, so for those of you who care- someone does right?  I'll let you know when I manage to correctly read the label on the yogurt containers.

Today, we took our first road trip and headed North to Wildflecken and Bischofsheim.  We cruised along in our new car, at a comfortable 165 k/hr (about 100 mph), and marveled as pieces of it fell off along the Autobahn.  First the passenger side mirror came unglued, so I had to stick my hand out the window and hold it on otherwise it would dangle by the wire and clatter on the side of the car... at 100 mph!
On the return trip we got smart and took the mirror out, but lost a piece of the body molding which fills the hole where a fog lamp would be (if we had them).  We were at this point approaching light speed, about 111 mph, when it flew off, was run over by our tire, sucked back under the floorboard where Gordon felt a sharp thunk.  It then shot out behind the car.  Gordon looked in the rearview mirror (not the passenger one obviously) and saw the car behind us swerve to avoid being hit by it.

Of course at this point we had no idea what it was, but Gordon thought the car was disintegrating.  Kris, the guy who sold us the car said it would top 200 k (120 mph) easily, but now we were wondering if he meant the car or just the engine!  But in all seriousness, Kris has been great and we really love the car.

Anyway, the area we drove to was beautifully wooded and so very green; tall pine trees, so tightly packed you couldn't see the sky.   There is a Monastery just south Bischofsheim, called Kruezberg, and we stopped there.  They run a small brewery and cafeteria type restaurant.  We tried the beer, but neither of us liked it, and since we were all hungry we decided to order some food.

We have been doing alright reading menus these last two weeks, but today we were destined to be the dumb Americans.  We had a hard time reading the menu other than to decipher that the majority of the food in this establishment was schnicken (ham).  I remembered later that Jennifer, our sponsor, told me that the ham here is much gamier than we are used to.
Well, she was right.  We managed to order 2 meals.  The house specialty -the Kruezberg Platter, and a ham plate.  We saw people walking away with huge steaming plates weighed down with gigantic chunks of ham and sauerkraut and figured we were getting something similar. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

We got some bread (brot), a pickle (gurkin), and slices of meat. ..like cold cut looking meat.  The ham platter consisted of two toned ham and some Swiss cheese.  The Kerchiem platter however was comprised of an interesting and not exactly appetizing assortment of meats.  There was some stuff that looked like procuttio (which I love), but it really wasn't procuttio. There was liverwurst (which I love) and it actually was liverwurst.  There was a big hunk of something that looked like baked ham but with a big greasy rind of fat on it.  Our teeth pretty much bounced off of that so we are not sure how that tasted.

There was some salami looking stuff that tasted ok, once you picked the veins out of it, and some of the two toned ham that Gordon got.

But by and far, the epicurean delight of it all was 2-3 slices of some head cheese looking stuff- with big gelatinous-skin-on-it-rubbery snout-looking chunks in it.  MMMMMM!
Now I always tell the kids to be adventurous and try new things, and this was about to get me in trouble.   I knew they would not try it if I did not, so we all took a little nibble, (except Gordon) although we were careful to taste around the nasty hunk-a-chunks!
But hey!  The bread was good!

As we entered the outskirts of Wurzburg, we passed Wal-Mart and decided to turn around and check it out.  Now, I hate Wal-Mart; even though I always shop there, but I am sure will not go back to this one.  You pay for your cart, a normal German custom, to insure you return it to the cart corral where you are refunded your money.  We got there and saw the parking lot full and a Roast Chicken cart outside selling halbe hunchen (half chickens).

When you walk in there is a bakerei, but it looks like a dirty 1970's Kmart, the kind you were embarrassed to be seen in when you were a kid.  We wandered around a little; the food section smelled like feet, but we got some yogurt to try and headed upstairs to the children's clothing section. There was no escalator, but a moving ramp.  It's so steep that going up, you have to shove the cart over the edge, and on the way down the weight of the cart pulls you down the ramp.   Well, when we came back downstairs, maybe 10 minutes later, some lady started calling to me and (very rudely) told me they were closed.  We looked around and realized that the upstairs wasn't the children's section, but a time warp.

We realized all the other patrons were gone.  We quickly paid for our stuff, walked outside and saw all the bread suddenly gone from the bakery, the chicken stand closed and a lone car sitting in the formerly packed parking lot.  Oh, look!  It was ours!!

So that has been the extent of our excitement this week.

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