Nürnberg ~ gute Menschen sind gute Menschen

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Nürnberg deserves more than the short weekend we gave it. In all honesty, it deserves more than a long weekend. In 1945 the city was demolished by Allied bombers, and has since been re-built using the original stone. Today, its Medieval charm remains, with the Kaiserburg (Imperial Castle) keeping watch over the wall-encircled Altstadt (downtown).

Joe and I definitely plan to return for two reasons: 1) Good people are good people. 2) We didn’t get to accomplish everything we set out to do in Nürnberg because we were hung-over from enjoying the company of reason #1.

We have an amazing friend in the States who has recently discovered family connections in Nürnberg. The main motivation behind our trip was to visit the world-renowned Christmas Market so we arranged to meet with our friend’s family there on Friday night. The husband speaks great English, however the wife has never had any English education and has a very limited vocabulary…beyond the word “shit” that is.

So, they graciously met us at our hotel and we walked to the market, stopping at some important sights for mini-history lessons from the husband along the way. He has even brought us some tourist brochures for the main sights in town. Good people. Now, it is important to know that older women in Germany usually walk down the street arm in arm. After about 5 sentences in German (the boys have quickly sped ahead by now) she slides her arm though my elbow and we continue to walk down the street as if we have been “old hens” for years. Nürnberg Christmas Market is known for its Lebkuchen (specialty gingerbread) and “Plum People”. While we are walking I ask the wife for the history behind the Plum People. A lot of the story is lost due to lack of my German understanding, but I gathered that mothers used to make toys out of dried plums for their children.

Glühwein mit Rum

We head to her favorite Glühwein stand, which includes 1 once of Rum! “It’s medicine!” they say. Prost! During the second round of Rum-laced Glühwein Joe tells the story of how we met. Apparently, he was roller-skating in a bikini on South Beach and I was so lucky as to spot and snag him because, naturally, I have such a nice rack. Prost!

 

We walk to the Schöner Brunnen (Beautiful Fountain) and spin its ring several times so our wishes will come true. Then, all of a sudden, we are standing in front of an amazing array of Plum People. As I am ogling the selection, the wife hands me a small bag. She has chosen two small Plum People for us, as a gift. For “Viel Glück” (good luck) she says. Good people. Next we walk to the Fußbar (literally: foot cash…a “shit” name according to the wife) for a beer. Well, apparently the glasses of beer come with shots of vodka in this family, and they come by the half-dozen. By the end of the night the wife is giving sex advice (the more the wine, the prettier the baby), has named our un-conceived child (after herself – middle name only, as she is struggling to understand the logic behind the Ts), and determined its Godmother (herself, naturally). She also said she would come take care of the baby because she has experience with scheiße (shit). Prost!

The Ehrenhalle

With four hours of sleep, Joe and I head to the Document Center and Nazi Party Rally Grounds on Saturday. The information presented in this amazing museum is overwhelming. The way they have organized the exhibit is unique and there are numerous videos that make the events of not-so-long-ago very tangible. I have never been a history buff, but I know that accepting the depth and breath of history is a choice. It is easy at the Rally Grounds to choose not to realize the immensity of what has occurred here, as it looks almost nothing like what it used to. But, if you just stop, take a deep breath, let what you have learned about a place flood your mind, and choose to be “in” history for a moment, you will be amazed. I chose to put my hand on the place where a man brought millions to their feet, and changed history, because only by choice will history not be repeated.

The horrors of Hitler and WWII go without saying. His manipulation skills border on genius, albeit with mal-intent. Joe and I struggled to find a figure in history who has used such power to move the people toward good. It’s unfortunate, but the examples of people who have moved populations toward horror are plenty: Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini…

We also visited the location of the Nürnberg Trials, Courtroom 600. This is still a functional courtroom in the German legal system and has retained only bits and pieces of its post-war furnishings. The benches where dozens of NASDP leaders sat and awaited their fate are still present though. What amazed me here is that during the Trials, witnesses and defendants were housed in the same lodgings. I guess the “Witness Protection Plan” was yet to come!

Thank goodness we had time for a quick nap before meeting our new friends again. This time the son, daughter, and daughter’s boyfriend were in tow. Drinks first, of course, then dinner! After dinner we head to another bar for more “medicine”. On the way, I have the mom on one arm, and the daughter on the other. When we arrived, I thought I asked for a Rum and Coke, but what shows up….vodka shots with sugar packets! A spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down.

We are speaking half English, half German at this point, as everyone wants to practice their second language. I am talking with the son and trying to explain, in German, what the word “immersed” means. He is having trouble with the word and wants it spelled. That doesn’t work. I don’t know if it is the teacher in me, the traveler, or just the over-organized personality, but I always have paper and a pen in my bag. So I whip out a pad of sticky notes from my purse and a pen and start writing. I also explain that this is a $5 word in English. He is very intrigued by this catch phrase and asks for a $20 English word. I bust out “supercalafragalisticexpealadocious”.  As soon as I say it out loud he shouts “Mary Poppins”! I respond with an excited “Oh, you know!!” Apparently “supercalafragalisticexpealadocious” is exactly the same in German as it is in English. Maybe that is where they learned about combining sugar and “medicine”?!

Ich bin…

Joe now takes the pad of sticky notes and instructs us all on how to play the game he has just invented. Each of us must write something on a sticky that starts with “Ich bin…” (I am…) and then share out. We must guess who each person is referring to. I write “Ich bin sarkastisch” (I am sarcastic) as a tribute to our dear friend, family member, and cause of this crazy debacle. We all have a great time as the stickies get passed around and eventually soaked in beer and vodka “medicine”.

Seven and a half hours later we are tucking ourselves into bed, warm with plenty of medicine and the healthy joy of laughter. What good fortune to connect with good people.

‘Till Death Do Us Part

The next morning, all we could manage in Nürnberg was another walk through the Christmas Market and a visit to the Ehekarussel Brunnen (Marriage Carousel Fountain). This is a very interesting monstrosity of one man’s depiction of another man’s thoughts on marriage. Google it.

 

 

 

 

 

Good people are good people. Thanks to one great person, Joe and I will now forever have several more great people in our lives.

das Krankenhaus

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Moving out of the country is a big decision to make. The pro/con list can and will look very different for every person, every family. One of the biggest “cons” on our list was being so far from our families.

No one enjoys getting a phone call about a loved one that has gotten into an accident, is in the hospital, or even just had a bad day. I got two of those calls in the same week. This is exactly what I feared and dreaded…being so far away when the ones I love need help. The good news is that everyone will be ok.

Photo credit: Kevin's Emergency Photo Services ~ Model: MOM

My Mom fell off her horse on Tuesday morning and was in surgery to get twelve screws in her ankle by Tuesday afternoon. I got a super-sad message from her, which didn’t reveal any information, just the dreaded, “Please call me when you can.” Thanks to critical information from my Dad, and some Google searching, I was quickly calling her hospital room….from Germany. Holding back tears, I took a deep breath, put a smile on my face and after her feeble “Hello”, I said, “Hi Mom. Wie geht’s?” (How are ya?)  She is taking German lessons at the community college, and I could hear an immediate change in mood as she replied, “Nicht so gut, nicht so gut.” (not so good). Smiles for all.

My older sister was quickly in route back to my home town, and was soon updating me with daily calls or e-mails. Unfortunately one of the updates said, “I was going back to the house and saw an ambulance. It was Dad. He fell off.” This was Sunday. He had fallen off my horse and hit his head pretty bad. I was now calling my Dad’s hospital room. My mom answered and she told me, “I am here with der Vater (the father) and der Bruder (the brother).” “Oh yes”, I told her, “mein Vater (my Father) and mein Bruder (my brother).” Smiles for all.

Both my sisters and brother rallied for the cause, each choreographing and directing the barn chores and Thanksgiving festivities according to their personal strengths. I, unfortunately, could only listen from afar. However, thanks to technology and the cheerful laughter of my family, I didn’t feel so far away. I made it through a big “con” and it wasn’t so bad!

I love my family because they are committed to each other. Sometimes they are committed to giving each other a hard time and making each other’s lives a real pain, but they know that family is family. They know that we need to stick together, no matter how far apart. Without their love and support, I wouldn’t have the courage to live so far away and tackle each “con” as it presents itself.

One of my favorite lines from Pearl Jam: “I’m a lucky man, to count on both hands, the ones I love.”

I’m a lucky girl.

der letzte Tag

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So, the days of my first 8-week intensive German class are wrapping up. Hard to believe that it has been two months already! I can’t say that I make perfect sentences, pronounce words as they are intended, or have the vocabulary to articulate all my thoughts, but I have definitely improved since the day we landed in Deutschland. As long as I am talking to a German-learner at the same level as me…the conversation can go on all night…and it has!

Needless to say, by this time my classmates are pretty comfortable with each other and are used to using a lot of different methods to make their ideas known to all. It all must be in German, because our teacher doesn’t want to hear anything but German and has a “No Mother Languages” rule. Our favorite words: warum? (why?), ich weiß es nicht! (I don’t know it), and genau (exactly).

One day last week, we are sitting around during a break and I come to learn that several of my classmates have huge crushes on our teacher. They are explaining (in beginner German) how they could not focus for the first several days because they were smitten, how they are tired of constantly hearing about our teacher’s wife, how they stay up late at night talking about him, etc. etc. Basically, every elementary-level German verb and vocabulary word was used to describe their feelings about our teacher. It was hilarious!!

Several of us ladies planned a dinner to commemorate our accomplishments thus far. Adhering to the “No Mother Languages” rule was not going to be a problem because the Valencian spoke only German and Spanish, one Italian spoke only German and Italian, the other Italian spoke Italian, English, and German, and then there was me. We were lucky to get a table at the restaurant and there is a weird little bed in the corner near us. Warum? Ich weiß es nicht!

I’m sure that listening to our conversations is thoroughly entertaining. I know that people laugh at us…I have seen them. I see them laugh at us on the street, on the train, in restaurants. Oh well! We were all on a train together a few days prior and the Valencian was trying to tell me, “My heart beats only for you”. (“Warum” you ask? “Ich weiß es nicht”. People say weird things when they speak at a kindergarten level.) She got as far as the “you” part and then struggled. “Dir? Dich? Du?” The old lady next to us was laughing…out loud! I then proceeded to have a 5 minute conversation with her; starting with “Wir lernen Deutsch” (We’re learning German). She talked and talked and then asked where we were all from. Great! A question we knew!! We were best friends before she left.

Back to the restaurant. What is funny is that our conversations include the words “comma”, “neben satz (secondary sentence), and “bling! dativ” (a trick our teacher uses to get us to remember to use the dativ form) so that everyone else can understand what is intended. There are also hand motions that indicate to the listeners to be patient because the remainder of a verb or the past tense of a verb is still to come. The conversation eventually turned to our teacher. How sad the girls would be not to see him “jeden Tag” (every day). The strange bed next to our table had integrated itself into every topic of discussion, so of course it was used to help the Italian communicate her feelings for our teacher. Ahhh…the dreaded location prepositions. Was she in the bed, on the bed, over the bed, under the bed, or at the bed, with our teacher? Ich weiß es nicht!

So I ask the waitress (I am the only one is class willing to ask total strangers for grammar corrections, if you have not deduced that already): “auf dem Bett”? Her response: “Genau”. Ahhh…hearing that word is like having the dentist say you are cavity-free. Sweet relief! On the bed. You are never “in” the bed in German, unless you are made of wood or got sucked into the mattress-machine. What was really funny is that during our meal we had to put our salad plates on the bed because there was no room on the table. The waitress came by and asked if she could take the plates auf dem Bett (on the bed)! Sure you can! We all had a good laugh about that…including the waitress.

Hopefully my next class will have characters just as dynamic as these. Regardless, it has been a trip!