Today

Greetings from Kasewinkel.

Kind of a strange day today. All the farmers in the area must be eating pheasant for New Year's, because I swear every single one of them was out hunting today. Now that I'm a country girl, temporarily, I get to think about gunfire and where it is coming from, and am adept at scanning the fields and woods for blaze orange. Aengus and I were out walking for almost two hours today, and I probably heard at least 100 gunshots - no exaggeration. It makes for a more tense walk than I would prefer, but I guess I'm the guest in their community, and I shouldn't really complain.

Speaking of pheasants, while we were in the woods today, two females took flight about 10 feet from us, but either they're better at running along than flying, or they were freaked out by the hunters, because both of them flew directly into tree trunks. One of them fell to the ground before flying off again, but the other managed to stay airborne.

And one last tidbit that has nothing to do with anything... People here in Kasewinkel do not do laundry between Christmas and New Years. Evidently there is a longstanding superstition that if one does laundry during that time, and specifically if one hangs the laundry to dry, that someone in the family will die. I think it is ridiculous, but nevertheless, I have not done laundry since the 23rd.

Aengus and I came back to an empty, quiet house. No people, no music, no tv. A rarity. It is bliss.

Stay warm.

Update

Well, Jane is gone. Having her here for Christmas was one of the best gifts I could have asked for. We had tons of fun, and it was great to see her again. Here are a few photos from her visit, including some from Christmas:

Trimming the tree:


The finished tree, including Jane's homemade star on top:


Christmas Eve, lighting sky lanterns that are supposed to drift up into the air like hot air balloons, with our wishes inside:




But unfortunately, all four of ours landed here:


So instead of having our wishes sent up into the sky, we now have a wishing tree in Borghorst. Thankfully it didn't burn down that night!

On Christmas Day, Renate served wonderful food for us:



And then had gifts and a plate of chocolates and homemade cookies for each of us:


Here is breakfast on the morning of the 26th. That thing in the back is called a Berliner. JFK's quote? Ich bin ein jelly doughnut.


I learned a new game here called Carcassone, and Jane, Martin and I played it a few times:


It has been years since I've played board games, but it was super fun.

Lastly, here are a couple pics of Jane and me. Thanks again for being here, Jane. You're the best (except for those couple of people in Asia)!



More to come soon...

Cologne

Hi, it's Kate again.

On Sunday I made my first trek to Cologne (spelled Köln, in German). Martin's sister lives there, and his mom wanted to go for a visit, so all three of us hopped in the car and set out. Jane had just returned from Paris and wasn't up for another day of traveling, so she stayed back and kept Aengus company. I found it to be kind of a strange city (they have lots of mimes and a live miniature horse), but maybe it was just because it is holiday season? Or maybe it was my mood, I don't know, but everything seemed just a bit off.

Cologne does have the largest cathedral in Europe, other than St. Peter's in Vatican City. I told Mom today that I have seen more churches in the last three months than I have in the last three years! There are a lot of them here, and many of them are stunning. This one, though, called simply the Cologne Cathedral, wasn't my favorite. It is huge, and very impressive from the outside, but the inside had a really unusual energy. It was cold in there, for one thing - we could see our breath, even though it was nearly 50 degrees outside. And the collection of artwork didn't really seem to fit the space. It was very eclectic, and includes everything from "the oldest remaining monumental crucifix of the western world", dating from the 900s AD, to a huge pixelated stained glass window that the Pope declared was not in fact art. Also, in 1164 the bones of the Three Kings (yes, those three kings) were brought to the cathedral from Milan, and they remain buried there today. Kind of like I can't imagine how much a trillion really is, in real life, I also can't imagine 1164. Or the 900s, for that matter. I would expect people to be traveling by foot, maybe horses for the wealthy, certainly on unpaved roads, and cooking with primitive utensils and whatnot, but then somehow they found the wherewithal to build this:







Oh, and you can't see it, but this priest was standing near the front entrance with a leather money/donation bag around his neck, talking on a cell phone. That also seemed a bit unusual.

After checking out the cathedral, we went to the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market). The vendors there sold different kinds of things from the ones in Muenster - it was fun to see.






It was fun to see another new place here, although in ways I can't seem to find words to explain, it did seem like kind of an odd city.

And finally, just because he is so cute, here are a couple pictures of Aengus:



Tomorrow will be filled with gift wrapping and eating. Christmas lasts for three days here, the first and most significant for the Germans is tomorrow (the 24th). I'll be sure to update you on the festivities! Happy Holidays from Deutschland!

Guest post: Martin's house and Nature

Jane here again. Martin's house is really cool, and the walks with Aengus are really cool, so here are some photos.

Here is the hallway from the living room to the kitchen. My bedroom is along the right.Here is the same view but from further away. Kate's room is in the door on the left.
Here is Martin's room.
Here is the outer room in Kate's room. I guess she has a suite!
Here is Kate's room. Don't you love how bright this house is?

Here is part of the kitchen:

And here is another view of the kitchen:
Aww...

Martin in his office:Here is Aengus on the back patio:


Cool stuff from the walk we took today:


Here are some sheep. Those lumps of dirt are made by moles. The word for "mole" in German is "Maulwurf" which is hilariously ridiculous to pronounce.
And here's Aengus and me in the little woods right across the street from the house.

Guest Post Part II

Jane here, guest-posting again.

Martin had a birthday last week, and we went to Frankie's restaurant for dinner. The restaurant is called Farenheit 451... no that's not it, but something like that. Martin's friends are good people. Here're some photos from that night.

This is a cute/weird photo of Kate and me. (There is another one that is even cuter, but maybe Kate will want to post it somewhere, it is just that cute.)


In the above photo you can see the carrot ginger soup I had. In the photo below, you can see my empty plate. I had a sort of pizza with fig and goat cheese. It was great.

Frankie gave the table (about 10 of us) a bottle of prosecco to split so we could do cheers for Martin's Geburtstag (birthday).


On Saturday we went to Martin's friend Klaus' birthday party. It was pretty fun. Everyone speaks English, to some degree or another, so conversing went well. Everyone asked where I was from, and as usual in Europe, I found myself telling people "I'm from Minneapolis; it is near Chicago." But some people wanted to know more in detail, so I drew these fabulous maps:

The "C" is for Chicago, the star is Mpls/St. Paul, the "T" is Toronto and the "M" is Montreal. The circles are three of the Great Lakes.


Here's Kate at the party with Frankie, owner of the restaurant mentioned above.

These two guys are Michael and Christophe. They were fun and funny.


I thought I had more, but I guess this post is long enough. Bye for now!

European Road Trip

If you've been reading along, you know that Jane is here visiting John and me, and on Tuesday she and I took a little road trip. She has friends who live in the Netherlands who were kind enough to host us for a couple of days, and the four of us (plus Jane's friends' two kids) took a day trip to Antwerp, Belgium yesterday. It is a stunning city and was a highlight of my three months here so far. Bear with me as I share our adventure with you...

I have access to a car, so we piled our bags in the back seat and hit the road. I did a small bit of research and found the route I wanted to take, and except for one wrong turn that brought us from Holland back into Germany, we did just fine. It really was only a small detour, and didn't set us too much off course. The weather, however, could have been nicer. This was a pretty standard view out the windows....


Needless to say, we couldn't see much of the scenery, but we entertained ourselves and still had a good time.


We arrived in Tilberg, our destination, at about 6pm - about four hours after our departure from Kasewinkel. Jane's friend Wouter met us at the train station (an easy landmark for out-of-towners), and led us to their home. It is a lovely, cozy European home, and he and his wife Cath were exceptional hosts. About an hour after our arrival, Wouter served RACK OF LAMB that he had prepared, along with a sliced potato dish, beans, homemade cole slaw, and for dessert, a homemade key lime pie. Absolutely amazing.

Then yesterday, after breakfast of toast with peanut butter - a rarity in these parts, but entirely welcome! - we hopped on bikes (literally, for Jane, that's her on the back there) and headed to the train station to catch a train to Antwerp.



Here's the train station in Tilburg:


And this magnificent building is the train station in Antwerp:



Absolutely stunning. Although, the Tilburg train station did have this, which was pretty cool:



Again, Antwerp is Stunning. I had been to Belgium once before, but never to that city. I was impressed.


Here's a photo of Jane and me in front of a statue of Sir Anthony Van Dyck (1599-1641), who was an influential Baroque era painter.


And some Guild Houses built in the late 1500s for individual guilds, or trades (e.g. Coopers, Grocers, Archers, and Carpenters):




Here's the Antwerp Weihnachtsmarkt, with the Cathedral of Our Lady of Antwerp towering in the background. It's the largest Gothic church in the Benelux countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg):


It is amazing. And huge. And has four Pieter Paul Rubens paintings inside. It was constructed between 1350 and 1520, which is a wonder to me. How could they build something so massive so long ago?







After touring the city for a bit longer, we ended up in a fun and unique bar/restaurant for some awesome food.



Here's Jane's steak with mushroom gravy, and the requisite pommes frites:


Today Jane boarded a train for a couple days in Paris, and will return to Muenster on Saturday. I made the drive back from Holland by myself, and was thinking that it really isn't much different from driving through Wisconsin, except there are fields of miniature horses everywhere, and the highway signs have way more vowels (and directions to the crematoriums, curiously).

Hope you enjoyed the sights. If only you could also capture the smells and tastes....

Until next time, be well.