The Schlachthaus

Bettina and Georg went on an overnight trip to Regensburg and guess who took care of the cows the whole time? Ha! I did! I am an expert!  I had to milk them three times on my own.  The first time was a fiasco, but mostly because I think the cows just sensed that Georg wasn’t coming and they felt like messing with me.  

Somehow, four of the cows that we don’t milk ended up in the group that gets milked.  I have no idea how they did it.  There are gates that stop them from going into the other section.  They must have done magic. It’s the only explanation.  Luckily, Opa helped me drive the four out of the mangled group of 35 or so and into the right section again.  Then, the whole time I was milking, the stupid cows kept dropping mud pies all over.  All of them.  Usually one or two will do it during a milking, and that's messy enough as it is. Then, there is one cow that always tries to kick me 18 times when I’m milking her.  I was getting mad at her and as she tried to stomp her foot down on my arm I grabbed her leg thinking for some reason that I could stop her.  Couldn’t.  I felt like a substitute teacher with a class full of high schoolers.  They settled down for day two though. No one pooped and no one ran amuck and all were milked in perfect harmony.  Except the kicker.

Sofie was also sick for the two days her parents were gone, so I hung out with her during the day.  We read together and did some of her math work book, but she said it hurt her head.  So we switched to cartoons.  Then she would run around hyper for about five minutes and want to play all sorts of games.  Then she would get droopy eyes and wrap herself up in a blanket and lie down and claim that she was dead. Ich bin tot! If death is just a cold and a headache…might not be so bad.

Anna took on the role of mother when she got home from school, cooking dinner and then breakfast the next morning, and laying out a note for me about the contents of my plate.  

Dear HLLEY (sorry!) HALEY, (still owes me an apology for that one)

--Do you want a cup of "Ceylon Lemon Honey tea"?  Over there is sugar!

--On your plate is your bred; it's not warm, but you can toast it! (perfect usage of the semi-colon, by the way)

--We have not butter, only fresh cheese and cherry jam.

--You can eat a strawberry muesli.  Watch out! You must shake the yoghurt, before you open it! But I don't know, if it good yet!

--I wish you a nice day with Sofie!

Anna and Marlene

Anna likes to practice her English with me.  It makes me wonder what my German sounds like. She is great.  That night, we all watched The Pirates of the Caribbean 2 together and Johnny Depp still looks good with a German-Pirate accent.  I tried to leave to go shower, but Marlene hooked her arms around me like a little koala and wouldn't let me go.  So we cuddled for the last forty minutes of the movie.  Kids are fun sometimes.

Today I tried to spray water at a cow with a hose to get it to move and ended up spraying myself in the face because the nozzle was faced the wrong way.

I also had to help Opa get two pigs into a trailer today, because guess where they were going? To the slaughter house.  When I found out, I just stood there, cool, calm, and collected on the outside, but horrified on the inside, because there they were, just enjoying life, being annoying, stupid pigs, and in a few hours, they would be dead.  They didn’t even have a clue.  I had spent three weeks hating them, and if I were staying longer, I would also probably spend a week eating them.  It was the last true farm experience I needed to have:  going to the slaughter house.

Two pink pigs, probably 150 pounds each, loaded up in the trailer and Opa drove us all of 8 km through the snow and backed up the trailer to the double doors of a barn.  The butcher came out in all white. Like a bride on her wedding day.  We opened the door for the pigs to run out into the large, white room with green flooring and stainless steel gadgets all over.  As the pigs ran in, I saw the butcher holding a big clamp in his hand with pokey teeth on the end.  He chased after the pigs, at which point I thought, this does not look like something I want to see, and turned away.  Opa told me I could come inside the room if I wanted to watch.  No.  No, I do not.  He went in and I heard some squealing.  Then he came back out and explained to me that the clamp thing was just to give the pigs an electric shock so that they couldn’t feel anything anymore.  So they’re dead? I asked.  No, still alive.  I peeked inside and saw them both lying on the ground, one was shaking a little bit, and a big pool of blood lay in between them.  So, as it turns out, I could never be a farmer.

 There they were, still alive, lying in their own blood.  I shut the door again. The door had windows, which were foggy except for right around the edges.  I looked through the centimeter gap and saw that the pigs were being raised up by their back legs and hung from those devices you always see on television, and then the butcher pushed them over to the other side of the room to wash them and it got too foggy to see.  I just kept thinking, how the heck does this guy spend every single day killing animals?  I understand it’s necessary for food, but to actually be the person that has to do it?  You would have to be so detached from them.  Maybe a chicken or two is one thing, but cows, pigs…things that look more similar to dogs and cats than a bird.  That’s where my farming career would end. I would accidentally set all the animals free.

Brighter things are ahead.  I’m taking the day off tomorrow and heading down to Salzburg! Over two years later and I will finally be back.  I shouldn’t say finally.  Some people don’t go back for 20 years, if ever.  Some people can’t even go back because they’ve never been there a first time.  And I get to say I’m going back tomorrow.  Brighter things. 

PS: The first link for the Sofie video never fully loaded.  I think this one should work:  http://youtu.be/OOMQjrVB8MM

The Americans

Last night Sofie thought I was cool because I showed her some really tricky dance moves. The kind of moves that would leave you dateless at prom.  In some cases, that probably would have been the better option, looking back. But Sofie loved it, and she can now slide back and forth on the wooden floors of the loft by doing a little heel-toe-swisherooni action.  Hard to describe.  It’s so advanced.  Anna did not want to participate, but that’s what happens when you become a teenager.

This week has actually been fairly identical to the last one, minus cow trampeling, add in cow chasing.  For some reason the cows kept getting out yesterday.  Also yesterday the grandparents had their kitchen painted by this guy and he was terrible! There was paint everywhere.  I just kept wondering to myself if maybe he was some kind of charity case or family friend or maybe they weren’t even paying him…I don’t know.  It was bad.  They also picked that day to clean the whole kitchen in detail and they’ve got a lot of crap in there.  Helping them was like payback for all the times I didn’t clean my room as a kid. 

Sofie took me on a tour of the farm last Friday and I made a video of it all.  I figured that would be a cool way to show you all around, instead of just pictures.  The trouble is that it’s taking forever to upload to YouTube, so this link may not be ready yet, but give it a shot: http://youtu.be/maRxyKP1kcs. By tomorrow it should work.

Here's some random pictures for your viewing pleasure:

Sofie helping us bake bread

Monster, snake, HAYLEY

Here's the brick oven..

Oma

Demeter is a certification in Germany that all of your products are organic

In they all go!

Looks exactly like me.  After this picture, Sofie and I cut me in half and ate me.

They're ready to come out and go straight over to the store!

Here's an angry cat

Just follows me around sometimes

Today, I basically get the day off.  Which means I just help with the morning and evening milking, and have the whole rest of the day free.  I’ll take it. My chocolate supply is fresh out and I need to bike into town to reload.  If you think I’m kidding, I’m 100% not.  That is the only reason I will be going into Burghausen today.  Plus the biking cancels out the calories.  I didn’t say it canceled out all of them, Mom, you head shaker. The plural form of calorie can mean as little as two.

I had an interesting talk with Georg the other day as we were milking.  I feel like he had a bone to pick with Americans.  It seems like a lot of people I meet do.  Not that they are picking specifically at me, but using me as an instrument to confirm or deny their suspicions.  Georg was talking about how there are a lot more Americans that are full of themselves than Germans.  I told him right away that he was correct, but it’s because we are actually better than them, that’s why.  If it’s true, it’s allowed.

I actually just stood there and listened, waiting to see how he would make his argument.  He said that one American woman that emailed them about WWOOFing basically just said, “Oh I’m really good at this and I do this well and I’m super good at this…etc.” And his second body of proof was how Steve Jobs made a speech one time where he commended himself for being Steve Jobs.  Of course, we both agreed, Steve Jobs can probably say what he wants, he’s Steve Jobs.  Georg may have had more experiences than that, but he didn’t share them with me.  I kept thinking back to the email that I sent them to introduce myself and ask if I could stay with them, wondering if I sounded full of myself, self-centered, or like I was bragging. I came to the conclusion that my German probably isn’t even good enough to be able to sound conceited. It was definitely an unfair generalization to make about Americans, about any people, and there’s obviously no way to prove either side, but as I sat there and mulled over this conversation in my head, what bothered me the most was thinking about all of the important people in my life, “the Americans”, and wondering how anyone could just peg them as one thing without considering any other aspects of their lives or personalities.  And when did opinions become facts?  When did “I think” become “There is”?   

It’s difficult to understand different cultures and how they contribute to people’s behavior or personalities.  I get that.  It’s easy to say these people are one way, and these, another, and then go to bed and feel good about yourself because you’re in the better group.  Bullshit.  People are people. Let’s leave it at that.

On a less rant-y note, Heidelberg is only a week away!  I keep thinking about how weird it’s going to be to live a “student” life again. I feel like I’ve been past that part of my life for the last year or so, besides the whole, “going to classes” thing.  I’ll be living in an apartment with three other German students (probably weirdos, nobody else would sign up to live with an international student because they all have other friends, but my dad told me I could just teach them how to say bad words in English, so I think it’ll be fine).  I’m excited and ready to get to it.  Not that I’m overly-confident or anything, not that I’m better than anyone else or anything, not that I—well, you get it. 

I bet someday Georg is going to be like, see Hayley?  Americans are so full of themselves.  And then he’s going to pull up my blog on his stupid iPad that Steve Jobs created and I’m going to say, that girl sounds like a catch. 

The Koibee

You’ve seen the movies, you know the scenes where the cow girl jumps over the iron gate, no big deal, super smooth.  What you probably don’t know is that every time the cow girl does that, the crotch of her pants rip.  That is one of the many things I have learned during my first week at the Schacherbauerhof in Mehring, Germany.  I have also learned, many times over, to walk in the new fallen snow instead of the snow that has been packed down and is now slippery.  Sometimes I just get cocky and think that I’m above the ice, that I can walk on it—but no one is above the ice.  There have been many awkward foot slides and arms jutting out to grab things that aren’t there for stability, even a few windmill motions.  I am sometimes quite positive that Georg thinks I am the strangest, clumsiest person he’s ever met.

Okay, introductions.  I am staying with the Stadler Family, which consists of Oma and Opa, parents of Georg, Georg’s wife Bettina, and their three children, Anna (13), Marlene (10), and Sofie (7). When I first arrived last Thursday, I could barely understand a word anyone was saying. That’s because they live in Bavaria, the most southeastern German state, where they have their own special dialect that is much, much different from the German you learn in school.  At first it was overwhelming, but after almost a week, I am fairly settled in and really loving my time here.

Every day I am in the stalls by 6:30 am to begin the morning milking.  There are currently 33 cows that we milk, twice a day. Each one produces about 15 liters each time they are milked, some cows can produce up to 40 liters, but those are the black and white ones.  The ones here are brown and white.  Who knew?  Color really does matter.  The cows come through the “Milking Parlor” and fill six stalls at a time.  They are milked using a machine, but first you have to get those teets revved up first and ready for business.  Meaning you have to start by hand.  At first, this was difficult for me.  I could get milk to come out of 1 or 2 of the 4, but then Georg would have to help me with the others.  After about three days, I could consistently milk any cow with no help, thank god.  It was getting embarrassing. Now it’s like a challenge every time, can she do it, can she milk them….YES SHE CAN…(it just might take a little longer than we expected….) (that one was for you, Dad).  So then you stick the little suctions things on them and they have to stand there for a few minutes and then they can go eat. Fiiiiinallllly, they say.  After they’re all finished, Georg goes and takes care of other duties on the farm, and I clean up the milking parlor.  This is the less fun part, but I’m just glad I can finally do something on my own and not need direction anymore, so I’m happy to do it.  Plus, I get to use a pressure washer, and I feel like I’m right back at Stone Creek Golf Course, so experienced.

The Milking Parlor is just six of these stalls.

 This is the view standing right at the side of the cow, they are about three feet higher than us so that it's easier to milk them.  

At 8:30, we fruhstück. That means we have breakfast. I like the fact that two hours of work are behind me by the time I sit down for my first meal.  And Georg always brings tea for when we are milking, so that tides me over until breakfast. The second milking is at 4:30.  Depending on the day, I either continue working with Georg the full day, or I take a few hours for myself to go explore or relax.  Lunch is always at 12:30.  Half of the week Georg’s mom cooks, the other half, Bettina does.

My first day of work was a Friday, which is a busy day here because it’s the only day of the week that the Hofladen (it’s a little farm store) is open. They sell all kinds of organic products, along with their own milk, eggs, bread, and meat.  Every Friday, Georg’s mom bakes bread in their huge brick oven.  40 big loaves and about 200 or so rolls. This Friday I got to help.  It was fun and delicious, and his mom speaks really slowly for me so that I can understand what she’s saying.  Comically slow. I love it.  She is so sweet, and once she gets going with that dough, whew! Watch out. She’s on point. After we were done with bread, I helped ground and package some meat that was fresh from the slaughter house.  Adjusting to that is a little weird, but I’m just trying to go with it.  Georg was like, yep, we just got one of our bulls back from the slaughter house…moment of silence for the guy…annnnnnnd switch on the grinder. After I packaged it, I brought it to the store to be sold.  I do have to say, it is cool seeing the process of how everything happens and watching it go straight from the farm into people’s grocery baskets. 

Another exciting thing that happened on Friday was a calf being born! It’s little hooves were sticking out as we walked into the barn that morning.  Georg got the big long gloves and some other tools and told me to hop in the pen and help out. Roger that. It’s difficult to describe the exact process of getting baby out, but a lot of pulling and then a rush of blood pretty much explains it I suppose.  Since then two more calves have also been born.  They are so cute and soft and they suck on your finger.  There are also baby piggies and some of them are so small that they can scoot between the bars of the pen and run be free! But then when they see any kind of movement they go squealing back to their moms. Whoever says that pigs are smarter than dogs are just as dumb as the pigs, if you ask me.  Then there are three little Shetland ponies and one is meaner than hell. Along with at least 50 or so cows, that concludes the inhabitants of barn number one.  Scattered throughout the other three buildings are horses, goats, chickens, cats and a dog. Oh, and peacocks. 

Looking out my bedroom window, peacock.

Front door of the cow barn--not sure what it all means, but  I like it.

Here is the first calf that was born! And the second one is on the other side of the mom, tryna get a drank.

Here is where the cows eat once their done milking.  In the summer time they can go out on the fields, but they mostly stay inside during the winter.

The view straight out from my bedroom window.  That's where the coweys are!

On Saturday I got to go for my first outing to Burghausen.  It’s about a 15 or 20 minute bike ride away, depending on if you’re going to the Neustadt or the Altstadt. This time I went by foot.  Georg’s parents drove me into the Altstadt and left me smack in the middle of this beautiful scene:

I walked around for a while and took a few photos, sat and had a coffee at a café, and slowly made my way back to the house.  On Monday I went back into town to explore the castle.  It’s been named Europe’s longest castle, spanning 1.3 km (or thereabouts).  Here’s what it looks like from above.  I took a helicopter ride up so I could get a better angle. Just kidding. Got this on the internet:

To the right of it is the Salzach river, which is the same river that flows through Salzburg (which is only 57 km away from me right now)! And, if you cross the bridge to the very right, you are officially in Austria.  But more on that later. So I parked my super cool ride and strolled through the very empty castle walls.  Here’s some pictures:

It's not Knight Rider, but it does the job.

Took a picture of myself, not lame

I then walked down these steps into the Altstadt:

Once I was there, I crossed the Salzach and sat down for a nice cup of coffee and cookie in Austria.  Delightful.  Except I was alone.  But it was better than being with a cow I guess.  As I was hiking back up to the castle, a woman stopped me and asked if I was from Burghausen and if I knew any good places to eat and we had a whole conversation in German without any confusion and I was so proud of myself. 

"Ach" is the name of a town, so great

Speaking with the kids actually helps a lot, because they don’t know much English (Anna knows some) and so we have to figure everything out in German.  Even better, it's Bayerisch German. The sound of it is actually starting to grow on me, especially the word for "calf".  In German, it's "das Kalb" pronounced like, "dahs Kahlb".  But in Bayerisch?  No.  It's a Koi-bee, the girls say to me like I'm dumb for saying, das Kalb. Koi-bee. Yep, I have a new favorite German word. And, here's some of my other favorite things the girls say:

Sofie: “Komm mit!” (Come with me! She says this as she tugs on my hand and drags me off to her room or the table or anywhere where she wants to show me something).

Marlene:  „Es muss so sein und nicht so sein“.  (It has to be like this, not like that.  She uses this sentence often when she’s explaining to me how to do something, like drive a tractor for instance.  Yeah, a ten year old taught me how to drive the tractor.  Well, the small one.  She can’t drive the big one yet, but I can, neener, neener!)

Sofie: „Zuerst ist er nett und dann wird er böse!“  (At first he’s nice, but then he's bad!  She said this, and the opposite of this, during the first five minutes of a movie we watched the other night, as all of the characters came on the screen. Thank you Sofie, I no longer need to watch the rest of the film.)

Anna: “SAH-fiiiieee!!” (That’s how she says Sofie, especially when Sofie does something wrong.)

Sofie: “‘Tschuldigung…” (In this context, I’m going to translate it as “Oops, sorry!”.  Sofie responds in this way all the time, so quickly, and it’s so funny.  She just says it and then goes on with her business.)

On the third or fourth night, Sofie drew me a bunch of pictures.  The next day, she ran out to me in the barn and showed me  a little piece of wood, in which she’d carved my name: H E L I.  Out of allllllll the different ways I have seen people misspell my name, this was by far my favorite.  I wanted to die of laughter, it was so adorable, and actually, I am quite fond of the new spelling.  Sorry Mom and Dad. 

I am growing very fond of the whole family actually.  I love the way all three girls are so capable of doing everything themselves.  It was the first time I’d seen a seven year old brandish a huge knife at face height to try to cut an apple by herself on the kitchen counter, and succeed.  And when she was struggling, nobody ran to help her, they just let her do it.  The girls drive the tractors, they milk the cows, they can all do pretty much all of the farm work.  I feel like Georg teaches me the same way he teaches his girls, and I think it’s really cool.  He shows me how to do something and then just lets me give it a shot.  If I can’t do it, he gives me a few tips and I try again, but he never does it for me, even though it would be much faster most of the time. 

One example of this would be on Tuesday, when we went into the forest to cut down trees.  First he sat me in the big tractor and showed me all the important things: clutch, gear shifter thingy, ignition, pulleys and lever thingys for the attachements, and then he goes, okay meet you down by the forest.  Sweet.  I have driven a stick shift all of one time, but I guess Kevin did a good job teaching me, because it wasn’t so difficult this time.  The only problem was at first, when I started to pull away, and then Georg wanted to put something in the tractor, he asked me to stop, but I then realized I didn’t know how.  I just kept stepping on the brake and the thing kept rolling along.  Yeah, I know, step on the clutch Hayley, I know that now.

So we got to the forest and then Georg goes, have you ever used a chain saw? Um, does watching someone use one count? Good enough! So he explained how to use it, and how to cut down a tree, and then said, here, you do this one.  Okay, it was a pretty puny tree, the trunk was no more than 10 inches in diameter, but still! Then we went on to cut down much bigger ones (Georg did, I watched and then pulled it down using the tractor if needed).  It was so exciting to watch them fall down with a huge whoosh and crack.  Especially the anticipation of seeing if it was going to fall the right way.  It was like being at a baseball game and thinking every foul ball is going to hit you.  At one point Georg was like, hm, I’m not sure exactly where this one is going to fall.  Do you have special health insurance for Germany? Ha, great, now my mom is going to freak out, because I DON’T. But don’t worry, he was just kidding.  I was probably safer there then I was when we were trying to move a couple of cows the other day.

Here's my chainsaw proof outfit

The boots probably would have fit my dad...even with two pairs of socks and newspaper stuffed inside, they made me twenty times clumsier than I already am.  But they were chainsaw approved!

Anyway, we had to rope and gate off everything and then try to get these four cows to go through a small passageway, with two or three steps.  Not easy. Georg and his dad and I were all trying to herd them in, all had pitchforks in our hands, and the cows just would not go.  They kept trying to double back and I didn’t have the exact know-how to anticipate when I should try to keep blocking them or when I should just let them get by me.  So at one point I ended up stepping backwards and tripping over a small bale of hay, and falling into more hay, and thankfully not getting trampled or stabbing anyone with my pitchfork.  I am getting a lifetime’s worth of experiences here. 

It’s way too much to even try to write about all of it, but those are the highlights so far.  I enjoy having coffee with the grandparents and getting into a long discussion with Opa about factory farming.  The conversation turns to Bush and weapons and I’m out not as enthused, but it’s give and take.  Also I just found out a few days ago that Oma thought I was from Switzerland this whole time, not America.  I’m still confused about that one.  Today the three girls plus one of their friends and I went to go see the sequel to the movie we watched the other night.  We all biked together to the movie theater, which was stressful at times because they have no concept of other people/cars yet, but we all got there and back in one piece and I think the girls had a lot of fun.  It was about four friends and their dog and all of their adventures together.  It was a kid’s movie, so I could understand it, and I was getting super into it.  I love my life. Week two begins tomorrow, and I can only imagine what kind of things I will encounter.

Die Schweiz

Rewind to last week, Tuesday.  I have been up since 5 am and finally I arrive at Zürich Hbf at about 8pm.  My cell phone doesn’t work still, I don’t have time to stop at a pay phone and let Anja know I’m there before I catch my next connection which will take me closer to her house. 8:12 I get on the S-Bahn line that should take me to Rapperswil.  I think to myself, hm, hopefully there’s a payphone at wherever I get off.  Once I’m settled in my seat for the 30 minute ride, I look up and all around me are signs saying that if you don’t have the correct/validated ticket you will pay a fine of 100 CHF and however much the ticket was supposed to cost.  I think to myself, hm, does my Eurail pass work on an S-Bahn? Frantically search my Eurail for any information and it tells me the names of certain trains I can take, frantically search the train to see what kind it is…whew, safe.  Headphones in, relaxed.  Look up again and see ANOTHER sign.  It has a big number 1 on it and then says, if you don’t have a valid ticket for first class you will be fined and you must also pay for the ticket, blah blah blah.  So now I’m weighing the options in my head. I have all three of my bags that I’ve been lugging around all day and the only way to second class was up some stairs.  Do I risk the fine and stay where I am for another 15 minutes, or do I move? Well I stayed where I was, hoping for the life of me that nobody came to check my ticket, because I was pretty sure crying and saying I was American would only get me a bigger fine if I were caught. 

Well, you guessed it.  I am now down an extra 200 dollars.  

Ha! Just kidding.  I made it out of there without a problem.  The real problem came when I got off of the train at 8:48 in the dark and rainy night and realized there were no payphones at the stop.  I was looking around, trying to find one, when all of a sudden, a figure appeared in front of me.  It took me a few seconds to realize it was Anja! She saved me.  It turned out that her house is right across the street from the stop so she ran out to check if I was there yet. Gott sei Dank!

So I came in and was received at the door by both Tom and Olaf and they had even waited for me to have dinner, so sweet!  After dinner I was shown to my lovely room with a huge window overlooking Lake Zürich and mountains and the small city of Rapperswil.  Holy moly.  After living on a farm in the middle of nowhere for three weeks? It was wonderful.  I slept in till 10 am…every single day I was there.  So.  That’s slightly embarrassing, but it was also very enjoyable. Waking up to that amazing view every day never got old.  I just laid in bed and looked and looked and looked.  I spent a lot of time just relaxing around the house, trying to help Anja out with errands and meals (although I may have just got in the way sometimes…),  and enjoying sitting around the table with the Gierhake family and laughing. 

Here’s a few highlights:

On my first full day, Olaf took me out to Rapperswil and to their favorite pizza place for lunch.  He toured me around a bit and explained a few things about the city, which was very nice! He was our German police during the whole week.  Anytime Anja and I were in the kitchen and switched over to English, Olaf would come in the room and say, “What is that strange language you’re speaking?” At first it was really weird speaking in German to Anja, since we’d ever only spoken English, but I found that I could understand her and Olaf’s German better than I could anyone else’s so far.  They all helped me a lot and made sure I understood conversations, which was a nice change from being at the first farm.  Also, the best part of every night was when out of nowhere the music was cranked up and Olaf nonchalantly danced into the kitchen. Just with a big smile on his face.  Hilarious. You’re welcome, Anja, for sharing this information with everybody who reads my blog.

Anja and I also went for two long walks during my week there.  The first was around the hills surrounding her house.  Once we’d hiked up enough, we could look down and have an amazing view of the lake.  It was so gorgeous.  There were also a few small farms, so here is a baby cow we saw. 

The second walk was into Rapperswil and down by the lake.  I saw a Carnival parade with a bunch of people in costumes and all too elaborate floats.  One float was the Costa Concordia (cringe), one was of a water park (with full water slide into a small pool and shirtless guys), and many other creative ideas that I wish I could have replicated for Homecoming again and again and again.  But hey, at least ours had a rocket with REAL flames on it. The next exciting thing happened when Anja and I asked an older gentleman to take a picture of us together.  He got one shot in, then said he’d get one more and turned the camera the other way.  We stood there and smiled while he situated the camera juuuuuust right, and then finally he moved his hand to push the button, and down fell my camera onto the concrete, bouncing to its death.  You’ll be happy to know, it can still take pictures, the lens just can’t close all the way.  Good enough for me! And the second picture he took was way better anyway.  I’ll let you see for yourself.  We needed the vertical angle.

Take One

Take Two
Much better, right?

Here's some more pictures.

 There are also parking spots in parking structures that are painted red and have a white figure of a woman in them.  So only women can park in those spots.  They’re closer to the elevators.  That’s pretty cool.

I can’t even begin to talk about the food.  TWO nights of the best Indian food I’d ever had, amazing Greek dinner, a whole fish (first for me…chopped off that head like it was nothing), and Swiss Fondue.  And none of that was at a restaurant.  Anja is the Top Chef, as far as I’m concerned. On top of that, there was breakfast.  Fresh, warm bread with meats and so many different kinds of amazing cheese and ah! Heaven. And coffee, and espresso, and wine, and CHOCOLATE.  How much chocolate you ask? I’d suffice it to say I took in the 10 kilograms that any normal Swiss person eats within a year (or so I learned at the Chocolate Museum).  But seriously. 

One night, Tom let me tag along on a night out in Rapperswil.  We went into a faux Castle that they had built specifically for Carnival and inside it was all bright lights, loud music, and people in costumes.  I had to laugh.  And then I had to have a few drinks.  We also had a mojito at the pizza place, which was really good, but I’d still call it second best in my mojito category.  La Nuestra Cocina just can’t be beat.  It was cool because with each different person that took me into Rapperswil, I got to see a different side to it. 

On my second night in town, Anja, Olaf and I watched a Deutsche Krimie together (hopefully I spelled that right…).  It’s like a crime/detective series.  The episode we watched was all about a horse farm.  The vocab was totally up my alley.  We watched  it with German subtitles, too, which made it much easier for me to understand.  A few nights later we watched a talk show about the Catholic hospitals in Germany and abortion/birth control.  That got interesting and I could follow the bigger picture for the most part. Do not get drugged and date raped and then try to go to a Catholic hospital for the morning after pill.  Lesson learned.

Most of all, I just enjoyed being with someone who knew me/got me for a while.  It was a good break from this farm business.  And there’s even inside jokes that I’m going to write now so that Anja can laugh at them and nobody else will know what it means: you’re digging yourself a hole, NOISES, should we have more chocolate? (okay, everyone will probably get that one…),  “Okay, now say it in a full sentence…” (story of my german), fighting with kitchen utensils…etc.

I am so thankful that they let me stay with them and interrupt their lives for a week. P.S. THOSE CRAZY GERMANS. That’s what I was supposedly going to write about them in my blog, but I went soft.  They are nice people, what can I say?

I left on Thursday afternoon and made a 9 hour journey to Mehring, which is right on the border of Austria, for my second three-week farm adventure. I had my first full day today, and there are already stories to tell.  I’ll save the details for another blog entry, but just to keep you coming back for more, on my first day at the farm, did I:

a.)    milk a cow?

b.)    chase a tiny piglet?

c.)    birth a calf?

d.)    bake bread in a brick oven?

e.)    All of the above?

YOU DECIDE!