Well, here's what I've figured out. If I am going to live 5,000 miles away from home, I might as well fill my free time with the best trips I can afford. I mean, really, what is the point of living so far away just to sit in my apartment, right? I could have just done that in my house in Colorado waiting for another tree to take it out!
So, when I found out that my friend Maura and her friend Lisa (now MY friend Lisa too!) were going to come to Europe this summer, I decided to join them for two weeks of their adventure. As Düsseldorf is a fun place to live, but not really that much of a tourist destination (not to mention the weather absolutely sucks there), we decided to meet in Nice, France where we could have some sunshine! My friend and travel buddy, Lauren, also came along as we sweated and laughed our way around the Côte d'Azur!
We found an inexpensive apartment for a week in a town called Beaulieu-sur-Mer just seven kilometers from Nice. This literally translates to "Beautiful Place by the Sea" and it was indeed. Lauren and I flew from Düsseldorf to Nice before daybreak the day after school let out for the summer. As it had been a rainy mess in Düsseldorf for the previous two weeks, we were über-excited to see the sun! You never know how important sun is when you're living in Colorado because we have it everyday. But, when you move somewhere that is GRAY GRAY GRAY all the time, you really start to appreciate it!
The Promenade des Anglais (English Promenade) in Nice.
During the late 1800s, English women would stroll this sidewalk in their
corseted dresses & parasols. Sounds miserable to me! WAY TOO HOT!
After our Segway tour of Düsseldorf and how much fun it was, Lauren and I decided to try it again in Nice. We still looked equally dorky and laughed equally as much! However, they wouldn't take the Segways off of "turtle mode" so we weren't able to go very fast, which was kind of annoying.
First.World.Problems.
SEGWAY!
Lauren got me a Segway Tour of Nice for my birthday!
Great birthday present! We're experts now!
View of Nice's promenade from the top of a hotel.
In order to be able to have a chair, an umbrella, and a waiter (this IS vacation in the South of France, after all) one must pay to use a private beach. There are free beaches just adjacent to the private ones, but as we had no beach supplies in our suitcases and love us a beach-waiter, we opted for the private.
"Kitty Litter Beach" in Beaulieu-sur-Mer, France.
5 minute walk from the apartment we rented.
We called it this because the "sand" was the consistency of kitty litter.
The view made up for that!
One thing that one notices immediately upon a visit to the South of France is the extreme wealth. This is just not evident at most American beaches I've visited (well, Charleston does has some pretty amazing beach houses!). There are yachts everywhere and though we were at a private beach, teachers are peons in comparison! We decided that this giant yacht below likely belonged to P. Diddy and he was flying back and forth on this helicopter from Brangelina's yacht or something ridiculous like that.
A helicopter landed on a yacht right in front of us!
What? Seriously.
Another life on another planet.
Going to dinner in Beaulieu-sur-Mer's harbor.
Four girls. One TINY bathroom.
Getting ready was a long process.
Each day, we tried to take a small side trip to different small towns along the coast. We became masters of the crazy, wind-all-over-the-coast-so-you-feel-like-puking-while-you-sit-next-to-a-stinky-Frenchman bus because it was only one euro. I can tell you that when you are on a super-crowded bus when it is super hot outside, it doesn't really feel that glamorous to be visiting the South of France. I'm pretty sure that Jay-Z and Beyoncé do not travel via the bus.
Villefranche-sur-Mer, France.
There is a reason all of the cruise ships stop here.
It was utterly charming.
We spent one day in Monaco/Monte Carlo just to check it out. We saw the palace and the palace guards. Not sure what they are guarding these days and Monaco is just largely a tax shelter for the super rich. We also noticed that every single yacht had the same flag on it no matter what town it was in or where it was docked/floating. So, we began the investigating via smart phones. As it turns out, most people register their yachts to the Cayman Islands. This is because though they have purchased close to a $150 million yacht (OR MORE), they are too cheap/greedy to pay taxes on it. I'm pretty sure they are the 1% of the 1%. Not to politicize- but as it is me writing this, I am obviously going to as that's what I do- but that SERIOUSLY pisses me off.
On the upside, I won €24 on a 50 cent bet in a slot machine at the Monte Carlo Casino. Yep, I am a pretty high roller. When I was in Monaco during my study abroad experience, my dad and I compared it's cleanliness level to Epcot- meaning, VERY clean. At the time, that was in comparison to France, where people's dogs poo on the sidewalk and they don't clean up after them. However, after living in Germany for a year- Germany wins the clean award- except at like 3 am on Halloween when you're wading through piles and piles of broken glass!
Standing in front of "our" yacht in Monte Carlo.
This is when we discovered that all of these ba-jillion dollar yachts
are registered in the Cayman Islands in order to avoid paying taxes.
Rude.
In the spring of 1998, I spent a semester at the Université de Nice. Mostly, I traveled and hung out at the beach with my friends, but I did learn a good amount of French because I lived with a French couple. Rue Pertinax was my street and I drug Lauren to see it because I just had to see it through adult eyes. It was never a "good" neighborhood, per se, but it wasn't totally disgusting either. It has taken a downhill turn, for sure! The funniest part to me was that there is now a "Church" of Scientology (L'Église de Scientologie) about three doors down from my old apartment. I just really got a kick out of seeing Dianetiques par L. Ron Hubbard. I wonder if Tom Cruise reads it in French?
The street I lived on in 1998 in Nice, France during my semester abroad.
The neighborhood has become increasingly janky since then.
I've said it before, but I will say it again. I can really, truly understand why van Gogh freaked out about the light in the South of France after he had lived in gray, rainy Northern Europe his whole life. For the two weeks preceding this trip, I don't think that I had seen the sun even once. We had summer-like weather in May and then went back to rainy grossness. Even the food markets were colorful in France. The light just has a different quality to it in the South of France (kind of like Colorado!) and many artists have flocked there over the years...which has really fed my ridiculous addiction to buying artwork. I managed to only buy one poster on this trip even though Lauren (because she'd been instructed to) threatened me with me life if I bought any posters. There are just so many charming artists that I cannot help myself.
Giant outdoor food market in Antibes, France.
Dried fruit of every variety.
There were also olives of every variety.
This is the Mediterranean, after all.
Each small cove had a different type of sand. On the beaches in Nice, there are rocks (not very comfortable to lay on but when I was 19, we didn't care) and we finally found a gorgeous sandy beach in Cap d'Antibes. Oh, look, again, they had waiters. And, a really nice drinks menu.
Beautiful sandy beach in Cap d'Antibes.
I was able to actually order and say the words...
"Bring me another Mai Tai!"
During this trip, it was also my birthday. We celebrated it a few times! One night we had a birthday picnic on the beach- un pique-nique, as they say in French! Sadly, our corkscrew broke off IN the bottle of wine. We stopped a French couple and asked if they had another and the old man got down on his knees, got out his pocket knife, and with expert Frenchness...he thankfully was able to open it for us! Who says that the French aren't totally delightful- especially when it comes to wine- they don't mess around!
French beach birthday picnic.
Sausage, Olives, Bread, Cheese, Chocolate, Wine, and...
CEREAL.
We were obsessed with a particular French cereal called "Fourées au Lait."
After a lovely week in France, Lauren flew back to Düsseldorf, then back to NYC and the rest of us went on to Munich- or München- as it is in German. I had a 6:50 am flight and got picked up for the airport at 4 am...always fun. We only had 24 hours in Munich and so we wanted to make the absolute best of it. Fortunately, the German national soccer team was playing (and won that round!) and so we got to be a part of a good, cheering crowd!
In front of the Glockenspiel in Munich.
The leis were to support the German soccer team in the Euro Cup.
Auf gehts, Deutschland!
Let's go, Germany!
(They lost in the semi-final to Italy. Not to worry though, Italy got clobbered in the final by Spain!)
Our only morning in Munich, we were standing having coffee just down the street from our hotel and an entire parade of decorated beer wagons from every brewery in Munich and marching oompa bands suddenly began to go by us! We discovered it was "Munich Beer Day 2012" and we were literally right in the middle of it! It was about 9 am and there were already people in lederhosen drinking beer all around us! HA! As Düsseldorf is not exactly touristy, it was so bizarre being somewhere in Germany where EVERYONE was speaking English and there were tourists everywhere.
Paulaner beer horses pulling a few barrels!
As another birthday celebration, Maura and Lisa got me a bike tour of Munich. (Segway tour AND bike tour as birthday presents...this was a GREAT birthday year!)! Of course, the bike tour stopped at all of the sites of Munich...most importantly, a giant, typical Bavarian biergarten! What's better for birthday celebrations...giant pretzels and giant beers??
Birthday lunch at the München Hofbräuhaus!
We did a bike tour that had a stop with giant beers.
The second half of the tour was a bit tricky!
Our next stop was Salzburg, Austria...the birthplace of Mozart and where The Sound of Music was filmed! I cannot lie, taking The Sound of Music tour was a main reason we decided to go to Salzburg. But, as it turned out, it was such a beautiful and interesting place even without the tour- which we did- not to worry!
Beautiful downtown Salzburg.
For my final birthday celebration (#3) we went to an Austrian biergarten, Augustiner, which was started by monks in 1621. It was a beautiful treed area with about 100 outdoor tables of all shapes and sizes and hundreds of indoor tables all in close proximity to a giant screen in order to watch the Euro2012 soccer matches. As Germany was not playing, we opted to sit outside in the nice, cool air. They had ceramic beer mugs, as you can see below, and they were VERY heavy. This, of course, did not stop us from lifting them to our mouths. This was a really fun night as we made friends with some funny Austrians who invited us to sit at their table...this would NEVER happen in Düsseldorf. We all laughed really hard in broken English and German. Basically, what we got from a drunk Austrian mechanic is that we were old enough to be called "Soup Chickens..." you know, the old chickens get made into soup. Glad to know I'm officially old. By the way, he was our age so I don't know he was talking about!
The "Soup Chicken" celebrating continued with some weight lifting/beer drinking
in Salzburg, Austria.
We had to watch everyone else for a few minutes to figure out how to even get the beers.
After being woken up by 30 minutes of the loudest church bells on Earth that were evidently IN our room, we embarked upon our Sound of Music Tour! Each bike was named...Maura was Birgitta, Lisa was Louisa, and I was "The Baroness!" On our bikes, there were pictures from the movie zip-tied to the handlebars so that we could compare the sites we were seeing to the sites in the movie. This love of The Sound of Music is completely confounding to Austrians. But, our group was about 30 English, Australian, and American people on a tour that happens twice daily. And, this was the bike tour...the bus tours are even more crowded.
Our reason for visiting Salzburg, Austria...
The SOUND OF MUSIC bicycle tour!
I think that the best part of our tour was that our guide was completely into taking ridiculous pictures of us. He encouraged us to dance around singing "The Hills are Alive" and so we totally partook because, you know, that's how we roll.
The hills are alive!
This was not in the movie but was pretty cool anyway!
The Bishop's House...or something like that....
If you were worried that we didn't sing, you fears are unfounded because OF COURSE we sang while running through this garden.
Getting ready to "Do Re Mi" through the park.
When you know the notes to sing, you can sing most anything.
We were going to make dresses out of the curtains in our room, but it was more of a "winter fabric."
Our Austrian friends from the biergarten told us that many Americans mix up Australia and Austria. This caused me physical pain. They said that they've heard people ask where the kangaroos are. If someone is that confused about geography, perhaps they should not be traveling?
Apparently people confuse Austria & Australia.
Beautiful Austrian Mountain Views!
We visited a small portion of a marionette museum...I secretly felt like they were all part of Team America: World Police as that is the only puppet-ty thing I've really watched. But, they were super creepy looking. Apparently, in Salzburg, this was a important traditional art form. The creepiness factor did not stop me from having the "Lonely Goatherder" song in my head the whole time in the museum.
High on a hill was a lonely goat herder.
The entire time we were in Austria, I had the camp song
"Oh, an Austrian went yodeling, on a mountain so high..." in my head!
This was the actual garden where Fraulein Maria and the kids ran around in the movie. It was perfect for some senior pictures!
Senior picture opportunities abounded.
The bike tour was about 8 miles and we got to see a lot of sites that the bus tour did not show because many of the movie's sites were not on a car-accessible road...bikes only. We became the queens of the bike tours (Segways too, of course!). I might be replacing my love of river cruises with bike tours. I fall asleep less on the bike tours, thankfully!
Do Me Me
Me So So
Ra Fa Fa
La Ti Ti
After leaving Salzburg, we rented a car and headed for the Deutsche Alpenstrasse- the Germany Alpine Road. Germany has a lot of scenic roads (I did the Deutsche Weinstrasse- German Wine Road- last October) and they live up to their names! We drove through the Bavarian Alps in Germany where I learned that there is a huge difference between Bavarian German and High German, which is spoken in Düsseldorf. I could not understand ANYTHING and they basically sounded like the Swedish Chef on The Muppets to me!
Adorable Bavarian Alps town.
There were so many that I cannot even remember the name of this one!
The pull-offs on the side of the road were amazing and we just couldn't resist doing some posed pictures. Driving through the countryside in a foreign country is always an adventure, even with a GPS. On one occasion, we actually drove until the road was closed by a giant pile of dirt (by driving right by a sign in German that we didn't bother to translate to learn that it said the road would be closed) and then did a 30 minute detour which led us back to the EXACT SAME SPOT. We laughed so hard while staring at the pile of dirt the second time that we were all crying.
Random stop along the side of the Deutsche Alpenstrasse (German Alpine Road).
When I tour around the US (like when I was recently in Estes Park, CO) the touristy crap makes me crazy. But, in foreign countries, I LOVE looking at cheap touristy crap. I rarely actually buy anything but that doesn't stop me from looking at every Chinese-made (probably) souvenir in the store. There were Bavarian hats everywhere. Bavaria has traditions and culture that is unique in Germany (and really, when Americans think of Germany, this is what we think of) and there was never a lack of junk to sift through!
Bavarian Babes!
One of the things that we all really wanted to do was to go to the "Top of Germany" in the mountains. We took a giant gondola to the top of a mountain (it was quite a harrowing ride up and I'm not generally afraid of heights!) and temporarily froze our butts off to enjoy the views over Germany and Austria. We were intermittently actually IN the clouds.
The TOP of Germany.
The Zugspitze.
Seeing mountain snow in summer made me homesick.
Although, there wasn't even this much snow at Christmastime due to Colorado's drought.
WAHOO!
YIPEE!!
YAHOO!!
I'm seriously cool.
More Bavarian mountains.
Another pull off from the Deutsche Alpenstrasse.
Gorgeous.
One of the things that one must do when in Bavaria is to visit Neuschwanstein Castle. It is only about 175ish years old and was built by this crazy king who was later dethroned due to his extreme nutiness and money wasting. It is a striking site- obviously Walt Disney thought so because he modeled the Disney castle after it. It wasn't as exciting as it could have been because OF COURSE, it had scaffolding on it, like all sites do when I try to visit them.
Neuschwanstein Castle.
As you can see, we gave Maura some "Bavarian Milk Maid" hair for our visit!
From Neuschwanstein Castle, we got on another of Germany's scenic routes- the Romantischer Strasse (Romantic Road) and drove north. The Romantic Road is known for cute towns and it didn't disappoint at all. One of the places we visited was a Medieval fortified village (which sadly, was like 70% destroyed in WWII but rebuilt to look the same!).
Rothenburg, Germany.
Just disgustingly cute.
Bierstein Superstore!
What a great trip!
Here's a crazy, driving-on-the-Autobahn without speed limits video from our trip!
After two weeks of a wonderfully fun, funny, constant-laughter trip, I headed back to Düsseldorf while Maura and Lisa continued on their travels. I flew back to Colorado after one night in my new apartment (that's a whole other blog post) and have been on the super-run-around to catch up with people in the short time I'm here.
Next weekend I am heading to Chicago for a girls' weekend with some old friends! Can't wait!
Stolperstein is the German word meaning "stumbling block," "obstacle," or "something in the way." Stolperstein has now taken on the meaning of being a small plaque in the sidewalk. These plaques commemorate the former homes of victims of the Holocaust. They demarcate where Jews (and sometimes where other ethnic groups who were also persecuted) lived and were taken by the Nazis.
Here lived
KARL JUNG
born 1912
Interned 1939
Gurs (concentration camp in Southwestern France)
Killed 20.2.1943 in
Dachau
Today I went on a walking tour of Düsseldorf with the 8th grade Humanities classes. They have been studying the Holocaust and each group visited different parts of the city. It was a torrential downpour during most of the trip and we had to take a temporary and warm Starbucks break. But, the kids (and I) were really moved.
Many of the Stolperstein are in front of what are now businesses and some are still apartment buildings. They specifically marked where people lived and were taken. We spent a long time discussing how sickeningly scary it would be and what it would be like to be a neighbor of someone who was just taken from their life in such a sudden manner.
Here lived
Franz Anselm
Cohen-Altmann
Born 1905
Deported 1942, Died in Izbica, Poland
The kids placed flowers at each of the plaques. The language on the plaques is very plain. It states that they were murdered, as truly was the case.
We inferred that this was a married couple.
Alfred & Meta Meyerstein
Deported 1941
Murdered in Minsk
The next one was especially sad. This was likely a mother and daughter. And, the fact that it said they were "reported" (auswiesen) lead us to believe that they were hiding but then found out and later murdered in Treblinka in Poland. This was in front of an apartment building that is still an apartment building. It is right along the Rhein River and one can assume this was likely a very expensive area to live then, just as it is now- given that it is water-front property. Pescha was only around 15 when she died and given that her neighbors just down the street were taken in 1933, we inferred that they were possible in hiding for five years.
Reisel Laja & Pescha Birnbach
Reported 28.10.1938
Taken to a Ghetto
Murdered June 1942 in Treblinka
Small but significant.
At each Stolperstein, our directions were to look at the building and infer what it must have been before the war compared to now.
You can imagine people looking out that bay window as the people they'd been hiding were taken.
These plaques are small and only provide an outline of information. But, they help us remember. They put a name and a place to someone's life that would otherwise be forgotten. It makes me so sad and at the same time makes me glad that we are still speaking those names and still remembering- the victims deserve at least this.
Just earlier this week there was an NPR story about Stolperstein.
I've done no blogging since spring break but have had lots of fun. If you are friends with me on Facebook, you've probably seen some of these pictures but for my non-FB people, I was encouraged by my friend Kir (who IS a FB person now!) to not let my blog go!
So, here's a little slice of life from The Traveling Teacher....
My cousins from Denmark, The Lauritzen Family, came to visit me at the end of April.
We spent a day at the Cologne cathedral...the Kölner Dom...
The short American-Dane mut (and Irish, German, & Welsh) with the purebred tall Danes!
For three days, I attended a conference entitled "Making Thinking Visible" at the International School of Amsterdam through Harvard's Project Zero. It fed my love of teacher-geekiness and renewed me. I've really missed my professional development network through PEBC since I left Colorado so it was great to feel some of that here...and...there was a PEBC staff developer from Denver there so that was really really exciting!
The whole conference!
There has also been some nice spring weather (for a change...although right now it is 48F and rainy. BRRR!) and so my friends The Brydens rented a car for a few weekends! One sunny Sunday we went to an old grain mill that has been converted in a biergarten. Germany is NOT lacking in biergartens! We chilled in the sun and played Frisbee. It was wonderful!
Auermühle. Another reason to enjoy Deutschland!
My school hosts an international festival every spring. The parents organize the whole thing and it is a large community event. It is a fundraiser and a celebration of the fact that we have over 40 countries represented at our school. Each country (or region as is the case for Scandinavia) has their own booth with tradition food and drink. There is also a full day of traditional (and not so traditional) performances by the kids, parents, and even some teachers.
At the Scandinavian station, one could order meatballs, herring, schnapps, or schnapps with a song! My friend Nina and I chose "schnapps with a song" and they plunked down two Viking helmets on us! Then, they proceeded to pour all of the parents (Swedish mostly) in the vicinity a shot of Aquavit and then sang us a Swedish drinking song wherein we all took a shot together! This was an amazing day (and not just because of the food and drinks) but because it really is a unique experience to be part of an international community. I got veklempt at the parade of flags!
SKOL!!!!
Sadly, the American "traditional costume" is lacking.
Most of the Americans were wearing July 4th t-shirts from Old Navy like me.
Next year, we decided we should just invent our own national costume so we can be cool like everyone else.
Notice: Nina is wearing a traditional Bavarian dirdl (Sp? A St. Pauli girl dress!).
We had a three day weekend (same weekend as Memorial Day in the US but for a Catholic holiday...don't know which one) a few weekends ago and so a few of us did a day long bike ride down the Rhein River. Our first stop was at Benrather Schloss which just means Benrath Castle. It was a lovely day weather-wise and company-wise with lots of laughs and some very sore butts the next day as we were on bikes for about 7 or so hours that day. We got lost a few times and following the river takes quite a bit longer than riding directly to somewhere!
Benrather Schloss.
Taking the bike ferry to Zons, a cute medieval town.
Riding along the Rhein.
Another weekend The Brydens rented a car and we went to a castle called Schloss Burg. It is in the Wupper River Valley...or Wupperthal. It was another gorgeous day and there was a chairlift that went up and down the mountain from the town to the castle.
Hugh in his typically orange apparel. Pretty sure he was Dutch in a past life.
Barbara and I are just chilling on the chairlift bench.
Düsseldorf is SO flat because it is on the Rhein floodplain and
so whenever you leave the immediate area, it is shocking to see all the hills again!
One of the hardest parts (besides living so far away from home) about teaching abroad is the high turnover rate of staff. You make friends and then they move on or you move on. The upside is that you get to make lots of new friends and have lots of coming/going parties! This year's leaving staff organized a Segway tour around Düsseldorf. This was one of the most fun things I have ever done and it is going to require a great deal of restraint to not take a Segway tour every time I go somewhere now.
Segway tours are my new boat cruises.
Just chillin' on my Seg...
So, that's that. A quick update on my happenings for the last 7 or so weeks. I have a week and a half of school left and then I fly to Nice, France with Lauren to meet my friend Maura (from South Kakalaki) and her friend (soon to be my friend too, I hope!) Lisa. Then, Lisa, Maura, and I will fly to Münich and tour the Bavarian Alps. Most importantly, we're going to Salzburg, Austria to do the Sound of Music tour! WAHOO!!!
I am ready for the school year to be over but the speed with which this year flew by is a very positive sign. I have had a great year (if I can just get through this last round of report cards!) and am looking forward to another great year at my new school. It will be nice to NOT be a new person for the first time in two years. AND, I am moving to a new apartment next week which is much closer to actual commerce and no longer in a retirement village! Hopefully, that will be my last house move for a bit. I've moved every year for the last three. At least I don't have to deal with furniture this time since I am taking only clothes and personal items and selling all my furniture to the new occupant of my current place.
So, off to bed to prepare for another day of report card writing. These narrative report cards are a killer.
It is just starting to hit me (don't ask me how, after 8 years of this) that teachers have an awesome schedule. We work our buns off when school is in session, and do a lot of work during summer break too, but now that I can actually afford to take vacations, I can compare the amount of time I have off to those with normal jobs and I feel badly for them. Two weeks of vacation per year sucks. I have 14. Delightful.
Not to rub it in or anything but it is pretty much awesome.
And, now that I am living in Europe, I don't have to travel far to get places that are worth seeing for a few days. I mean, don't get me wrong, Ogallala, Nebraska is great, but I don't know if I'd want to vacation there for more time than it takes to fill up the tank with gas, buy a diet coke, and use the bathroom. I use that example because it is about 4 hours from Fort Collins and with a less-than four hour drive from Düsseldorf, I was in Bruges, Belgium taking a boat cruise around a medieval city. I don't think I will ever get used to things being so close together here. And, the interesting thing for Americans (and likely Australians since things are so vast there too) is that when you cross the border, everything changes because, duh, you're in another country.
Driving from Belgium to Holland, there is a distinct change in the type of surfacing on the highway even. The different countries use different fonts on their road signs. Just small things, really, until you get out of the car and realize that people are speaking an entirely different language than they were the last time you stopped for gas.
For our first week of spring break, my friends Keith and Lauren and I road tripped across Northern France to see my French family from my days o' umemployment at La Crochardière (the name of their manor). It was the equivalent distance of driving from Denver to Omaha which cracked me up. They couldn't believe we would drive that far and I think back to all of the times Courtney and I have driven back and forth to see each other just for the weekend without even a thought. They'd really freak at the thought of some of my East Coaster friends driving back East from Colorado fairly regularly. We just think of distances differently in the US, especially in the Midwest and West.
The DJ/Copilot
The lounger in the back.
The Captain!
Our drive took about 9 hours and three stops at McDonald's (MacDo) in France for coffee, delicious ICY diet coke, and a dependably clean bathroom. We sang, danced, and laughed like fake French people (haw haw haw) while we pretended to smoke and acted with ennui. Great drive. I forgot how much I love a good road trip.
We stayed in the rental cottage at the manor as they had guests in the Bed & Breakfast while we were there. They have done SO much work to the property and it was quite nice. If anyone wants to go stay there, just let me know, it is very reasonably priced for a week and was very relaxing.
We started our tourist days at the crack of noon after a nice lie-in (as the Brits say) and relaxed coffee drinking. We visited the French supermarket everyday and I did cook for the family a few times. Since last year, Steven, the older son in the family, has started cooking so he and I baked cookies together. There was minimal whining over the food I prepared because nobody tried to make anyone eat things they didn't want to. So, if you're wondering if they are still more or less living off of yogurt with lots of sugar on it, the answer is undoubtedly...YES. But, guess what, NOT MY PROBLEM and I don't have to be there for every meal. It was great to see them. A week (while my friends were there for me to play with) was the perfect amount of time to visit and I'll definitely go back.
As our big days for being tourists began at noon, we only did one thing per day. Delightful. Very relaxing.
Day 1 was Mont Saint Michel. I ran into one of my students while there! Small world!
A beautiful day for our visit to Mt. St. Michel
See my last year's blog post on it if you want any additional info.
Day 2 was Saint Malo & Dinard. We were lucky to have lovely sunshine even if it was chilly.
The "pool" at Saint Malo.
The squared-off area fills up with water during high tide.
The water was a bit cold for swimming, it is the English Channel after all.
Day 3 was Mont Dol & Dol-de-Bretagne, the town next to La Crochardière.
Lauren and Keith were great indulgers of my picture-taking antics.
SO MUCH FUN!
Peggy, the lonely donkey, still lonely as ever and braying all day long.
Lauren really liked Peggy's bangs.
Day 3 was Cap Fréhel. Beautiful.
One of these lighthouses was built by Louis XIV.
Well, not actually by him...his minions.
We also did a few errands that I can easily do in France because I can actually communicate with people unlike in Germany. It was really wonderful to be in France for this reason. I asked for everything possible in public places and made small talk chit chat with people because I could. Keith also speaks French so it was nice to have a good reference when I didn't know a word. Between the two of us, we were like a whole person speaking French. Compared to my German skills, I feel like I could write a doctoral dissertation in French. But, compare French skills with English skills, I'm still just directly above a special needs chimpanzee. At any rate, France is a familiar place to me now and it was really nice to be there. I know what to expect and things are not a giant guessing game all of the time. There's a lot to be said for that!
Our trip ended at the World War I site of Vimy Ridge, France. This is a large monument managed and operated by the Canadians to commemorate the sacrifice of over 20,000 Canadians during World War I. So, for the first time in my life, I went to Canada, eh! It was a very moving memorial and we were able to tour the tunnels and trenches from the war that have been preserved. I realized that I basically know nothing about WWI as my history classes always got stuck on the minutiae of battles in the American Civil War. Keith is Canadian so he was able to explain a lot of the history of the Canadian involvement in the war as I am an idiot American and know nothing.
The monument dedicated to all of the lost/unknown Canadian soldiers.
Canada, right inside of France.
The American sites in Normandy are the same idea.
As you can see, there are still undetonated explosives.
Scary.
We were there almost 95 years later. We missed the anniversary by 3 days.
Part of the old trenches.
I learned that they formed a North-South line through Europe almost 500 miles long.
This was a wonderful trip. I miss it now that I am back at work. I was a bit sad being back in Germany since my communication with anyone was ended again. The day after we got back I arrived at a restaurant before my friends, tried to speak French, panicked, and ran out. My brain does it automatically. It is my go-to foreign language.
(Quick aside...when Natalie and I were in Paris last year, she kept speaking Spanish (her go-to language) but thinking it was French...really funny!)
Perhaps another entry later about the rest of spring break with my cousin and her husband, but I don't want to rub it in. Here are three picture highlights.
Tulip fields in Holland.
Kinderdijk. UNESCO World Heritage Site in Holland.
Gent, Belgium.
Adorable.
So that's that. No more trips until summer. My cousins from Denmarkia are coming to visit next weekend and then I am going to a work thing in Amsterdam. One day of it is at the van Gogh Museum. Not gonna lie, pretty excited about that!
Just chugging through the remainder of the school year! Year 2 promises to be exciting as well!
Imagine that you have arrived somewhere really early in anticipation that you'll be first in line and first in. Could be a concert you're waiting to enter or just something simple like waiting for a bus or train. In your mind, you figure that if you're first in line, you'll be one of the first people into the event. Many people line up behind you and are also patiently waiting.
The American/British way of entering an event or train. http://www.itp.net/images/content/582151/article/7398-queue_article.jpg
The doors open and you feel that you are moving toward the door. You don't feel anyone pushing you, it seems that the whole line is moving together. There is definitely forward motion and as you approach the door, you look around and though you were first, you are now the last person standing outside. You've just gotten the European Boxout.
I first learned about the European Boxout when I was 19 and studying at the University of Nice. Everyday, my American friends and I would wait to take the city bus to school (and by everyday, I mean the days we bothered to go to class instead of the beach). We would arrive in plenty of time and as the bus pulled up, we'd barely even make it on. What it really indicates is a cultural difference (I am not judging, just pointing out a difference) that is easily misinterpreted.
Americans and British, in general, are liner-uppers or 'queue-ers' as the Brits would say. We have been culturally trained to wait our turn and file onto or into something one after the other. If you jump in front of someone in a line, there will be social consequences in the form of dirty looks, tongue clicks, or even a choice comment made in your direction. Not so in Germany and France (I cannot speak for other countries because I haven't lived in them, but from what my friends who've lived around Europe say, it is a continent-wide generalization).
Back when I was living in Nice, France in 1998, we named this the European Boxout. It feels like a secret sports move where you are doing some sort of blocking and unless you've been introduced to this move since birth, you just can't do it. Now, after living in Europe for a chunk of time, you'd think I would be used to it and know that I have to be ready and be aware and not allow myself to suddenly be at the back of the line. But, it is a cultural thing that is so small and so subtle that I just can't figure it out. I am ALWAYS suddenly at the back of the line, no matter what. Even when I am standing in a line with other people where we laugh and joke about the European Boxout when it is about to happen, we are suddenly boxed out and at the end of a line.
I once asked a French woman about this and she said that she and her French friends thought it was HILARIOUS that the Americans and the British would just stand there and wait and then glare at her as they somehow ended up at the end of the line!
Living in another country, when you eliminate the language barrier, doesn't seem that different. People are just going about their lives, working, schooling, shopping, sporting, etc. But, the little things are what really make the biggest difference!
Last night I participated in a "Flash Mob" with staff members at a fundraiser for my school's sister school in Tanzania. First of all, I've never imagined that schools exist where you raise money for someone other than yourselves to use in your own school. This sure is different than selling magazines so we can have a Literacy Coach at my former school. ISD has had a partnership with a school in Tanzania for twenty years and each year a team of ISD students go there to work on projects. Last night's event raised almost €10,000. What? I know.
Also, it is interesting to work at a private school (especially one in Germany) where everyone can drink alcohol in the school building. A huge part of this event- called Tanzania Night- is the donation and purchased consumption of mass quantities of alcohol on behalf of the parent attendees...makes their purse-strings a bit looser apparently!
Anyway, a group of teachers, organized by the delightful, Tina Post, an English teacher (who I apparently stalk since I live in her old apartment and will be moving into her current apartment in June!) organized us, choreographed and taught us a dance in painstaking detail since we're not exactly a group of dancers!
So, here are a few photos from the night. I'll post the link to the video at the end. It won't let me embed it because it is a private video so you have to just click the link.
Making an ass of myself since 1978. (Thanks Camp Chief Ouray...you really helped that along!)
