Life: Idiotropic

Today was a taste of America in the Netherlands - Bagels and Beans. Dad and Angie, freshly flown in from the states chose the more exotic options - date pie and fig cake. I, not having been in the states for almost 2 years now, chose the bit of America, a delicious bagel sandwich. Coffee and cocoa is always good there and though my bagel was overall "American," I did enjoy a bacon that is quite local and delicious - nothing like American bacon, and a creamy European goat cheese.

We stopped quickly for some cheese at the Sittard market and to look and see if anything "jumped out" at me to use for Halloween costumes. Nothing jumped, but we were successful in getting some pesto cheese, Elise's favorite graas kaas, and a British made Mexican cheddar.

Schinnen was next for some quick cash - preparing to leave for Spain the next day. Packing for them was easy since they hadn't unpacked. For my cumbersome crew, it took the rest of the afternoon.

Well... here was day two of our visit with Dad and Angie when they were still a little jet lagged and we were keeping the days slow. It's a hodge-podge of photos...

This morning we headed off to the infamous "Barkenhof" - an interesting little gourmet food shop in Saeffelen. I wouldn't normally take visitors shopping, but this place is just a little bit special - not only because of the foods they carry, but because of the quirkiness of the owners who will feed and "educate" you as long as you let them. Olaf is a playwright who lives part of the year in Mallorca, Spain. His wife owns and runs the shop, creating her own tea blends, and then travelling, buying antiques for her shop to sell, and remodelling Spanish homes in her spare time. They are both a bit eccentric, but friendly. Poor dad and Angie got cornered by Olaf right away as he went into his spiel about how we should enjoy a 4 hour meal instead of eating fast food. He was going off his assumption that all Americans eat fast food and that we don't know how to cook and don't have quality food available. Huh. And all Germans eat wurst? I think not. So, over and over again we heard the question, "So what are you collecting?" Olaf is a tall German man of medium build, shoulder length hair in tight curls greying slightly, rosy cheeks and red lips - slightly hunched over and clearly in our big American personal space (personal space is A LOT smaller here) as he kept repeating that question... Dad, Angie, and I looked at him confused? What are we collecting? Ahhh... with the time we save by eating fast food... what are we collecting? Uh... time for other things? These are the crazy stereo types we run into here. Americans are typecast through our movies. And they fall for it.

Anyway... once we got past his 4-hour meal/collecting spiel, we finally got to taste a few things... a delicious goat cheese with French honey drizzled over it, a variety of balsamic vinegars and olive oils, tea, and a delicious dip that my dad mixed for us! It is interesting to taste different oils... there is a big difference. I use my nice oil that Kirk got for me in Italy not only for cooking, but for my skin. Good olive oils are supposed to soak completely into the skin in 10 seconds leaving absolutely no greasy feel at all.

Here's one I've been wanting to photograph for a while to get it on record... Dad did it for me.

Here's the "propaganda milk." Something that you wont' see where you are. This is "U.S. Forces Europe" milk - that's what it says on the front of the carton just under an eagle. On the back are two "ads" -- one says "Read the Stars and Strips your daily paper," and the other says "Reevaluate Reconsider Reenlist"



Next photo...

Here's one of Elise at her Kindergarten. She has a wooden candle picture by her cubby where she has her backpack, coat, and haus shoes. Then the same candle picture is on the cabinet where she keeps her art and again in the bathroom where she has her own towel. It's very sweet. Each child has their own little blue towel hanging up with which they dry their hands. Elise enjoys her independence at this school that is run very Montessori-like.



And here's my Luci. I had dad and Angie with me when I picked up Luci and Arianna and intended on taking them both next door to ballet class. Then, without warning, Luci disappeared and her grandma and grandpa disappeared with her. I ran with Elise slung sleeping over my shoulder to ballet - no sign of them... ran to the front of the school - still no sign... started to run towards Luci's classroom and there they were coming out to find me. My adventurous girl was showing off her class and giving a royal tour. Here she is with her backpack in funny - Luci is not one to do anything conventionally.


Not to leave out Arianna, here she is dancing. She took ballet and jazz/tap last year for just a couple months and dropped it. This year she and Luci are just doing the jazz/tap class and are both enjoying it. It's nice for me also to have them both together - easier on the taxi driving that I seem to do so well. So, every Wednesday right after school, Arianna and Luci both dance for an hour with Mrs. Stella, a very sweet British lady who graduated from the London Academy of Dance and teaches here on the base every afternoon. I think the parents all love Stella as much as the kids do. She's just wonderful to us all.

Dad and Angie arrived today beginning a three week trip for them and a slightly more difficult shower schedule for us. Though tired for the flight, they were amazingly alert and made it through the evening - a walk to the bakery, and time with the kids who climbed all over both of them. Poised with cameras, the dueling photographers were ready to capture each movement Aria, Luci, or Elise made encouraging my monkey's to act their silliest. No photo from today is very serious, but they're all fun!

p.s. Ok, this photo of Tiara and I isn't silly... but it's quite a rare photograph. Usually I am behind the camera and Tiara can be difficult to capture on film (age 12 does not get silly in front of the camera), so I had to share. Here we are!

Nature's last hurrah before winter sets in, these late fall fields of gold adorn our landscape. Not meant to last long, I'll enjoy them the short few days before they go. I pass this field on my way to Schinnen where I do most of my grocery shopping. The church in the background, I believe, is in Jabeek. This is one of those places where I always mean to stop. Almost every time I drive by and see the view, I think that one day, I'll stop and park and walk or bicycle all over the area taking pictures of it's beauty. Time goes too fast. There is always some place to be - some reason I can't stop. Kids in the car, errands to run, somewhere to be... unavoidable obligations eating up my time. So I must console myself with the landscape and those few quiet moments in the car when I can dream.

Amazing what one day can do. Today was jam packed from morning 'til late with meetings and kids activities. I began my morning running around the base doing a few errands for IWC and AWGK, then landed at the IWC board meeting where I put forth a few things - shaking things up a bit. We've never been philanthropic - just a small isolationist organization that does our little dinners. Now we're helping out some Chernobyl children who will be visiting in January. We're also starting some smaller cultural exchange groups - cooking, dancing, crafting... actually, I'm starting them, but I have a lot of support with it, so it's fun and feels good to be making some changes. Change is cathartic.

So, then to the school to see if my computer would be ready for yearbook - not. That's going to change... looks like I might get a couple nicer ones - even better. Then picking up Elise, lunch for her, phone calls, email, gathering dance and yearbook supplies... Arianna and Luci to dance, me to yearbook meeting where I successfully kept a room full of 5th and 6th graders busy for an hour - that in and of itself is accomplishment. Got the girls, home to change and grab food to go, then horses for two hours, home, bath, snack, stories, sleep... marathon still goes as I wrap up this evening.

Horses was amazing though two hours outside got cold quickly! They are fixing the place up, so were pouring cement. All three little ones followed the young cement guy around watching his every move. He spoke a little English, they spoke a little German - and they all kept each other entertained while Tiara rode. Tiara did amazingly well tonight on Holiday - next week, she'll gallop alone. So, my girls learned about cement and then watched a chicken lay an egg. Arianna told me later that she "didn't know that chickens laid eggs out their bottoms. That must be painful!" Luci rode also this evening - only her second serious lesson - before it was just pony rides. Tonight she trotted with no hands - a very balanced and confident little girl - Tanya's "super-rider." From the moment I got there and saw the freshly poured, smooth cement, I had this childish urge to write something in it or leave a hand print or leaf print - something creative... of course, I didn't do that and didn't give the kids the opportunity either, so, I derived great pleasure when Tanya and I were walking by later and saw a frantic chicken running by us at top speed, then turning right and speeding down the cement ramp. Chicken tracks up and chicken tracks down. I saw them made.

Photo from yesterday

• Our local produce sign changes with the seasons and though I don't frequent it much throughout the year (the Bischof stand in my village is MUCH better for produce), this place is the best for pumpkins and Christmas trees. This year, they've added a couple very creepy witches to their annual display and don't have as many pumpkins. The strange weather brought pumpkins out in early September - a bit too early for carving.

Recent Arianna Quotes:

• After watching an episode of The Muppet Show, she said, "Skateboard's uncle wanted to tear the theater down..." Skateboard? Who's that? And then it dawned on me... "Oh... you mean Scooter?!?!?" Yep.
• While having lunch at Burgerking, Kirk asked Arianna what she thinks a good name would be for a rock band. Arianna quickly answered, "Cheeseburger for the Lord."
  

Language is a common topic of discussion here with so many different nationalities speaking so many languages and Americans here trying to keep up by learning a smattering of this and a smidgen of that.

My family is no exception. Kirk speaks German well. I speak Spanish decently and then a bit of German and a very small amount of French and Dutch. Tiara's learning French. Arianna, Luci, and Elise are learning German.

You've probably heard about Nixon's famous donut speech where he said, ""Ich bin ein Berliner" meaning, I'm a jelly-filled donut, instead of saying "Ich bin Berliner" which is what he meant to say. If I were to tell someone here that "Ich bin ein Amerikaner," I'd be telling them that I am a sugar covered donut - not to say that all nationalities have a corresponding donut in Germany, but for Berliner and Amerikaner - yes, you can be from Berlin and from America, or, if you say it wrong, you can be a tasty treat.

Anyway... those kinds of language issues pop up all the time here and they can be embarrassing and funny. Here are a few:

• When Elise is being cranky, Tante Tinny calls her a "kleine hexe," meaning "little witch." She says it good-heartedly enough. Luci didn't know the word "hexe," but knows kleine and grosse (meaning small and large), so the other day when Tinny called Elise a "kleine hexe," Luci immediately called Tante Tinny a "grosse hexe!"
  

• When we were in Austria, Arianna was having a snow ball fight with a German speaking Austrian girl. Arianna kept yelling, "missed me, missed me!" The little girls kept getting mad. Poor Arianna had no idea that "mist" in German means manure. No wonder they don't sell Sierra Mist in Germany!

• My Spanish friend, Maria, tried using German when she first ordered fish at the market here. So, she said, "Ich moechte sechs..." If you are saying the number six in German, it looks like sechs, but is pronounced "zex." A lot of Spanish see the "s" in the front and pronounce it like an "s" instead of a "z," so when my friend said that "I would like sex fish," the fish people started laughing at her. The number 12 is not funny sounding, but it's hard to say, so Maria only orders now in sevens and thirteens!

Today I answered the age long question, "Can one go enjoy a relaxing morning perusing the antique market at Tongeren, and still make it back in time for church."

The answer is a resounding, "YES!"

Just going to pick up the coffee table that Kirk and I had bought the week before, I knew I couldn't "shop," but still wanted to peruse instead of driving there, picking it up, then turning around again. Babs place doesn't open until 0900, but I arrived two hours before so I could spend that time looking around the market. It's always interesting there anyway.

It was dark and cold when I first arrived, so half the vendors were sitting in their cars watching their things, then rolling down the window or cracking the door to give you prices or other information.

Today I saw not one or two, but three elephant's feet. One had a brass ring around the top - used, according to the seller, "on your desk with pens in it." Almost making the elephant's foot look "normal," I saw the most disturbing piece of taxidermy that I've seen to date - a very sweet looking baby cow all curled up laying down looking up at the passers by. The more disturbing thing is that it was gone later. Who would buy that?!?!

I didn't see the British mahogany game table that I'd had my eye on the week before, but did find a beautiful old wooden bowl - this one from France, and about 200 years old. (Yeah, yeah... I wasn't supposed to shop, but I've been looking for the "right" wooden bowl ever since May when Tiara found the perfect one and bought it for herself!)

Anyway... I enjoyed two quiet, relaxing hours all to myself before I picked up my table and did the hour long drive home. Then, I had the girls get dressed quickly, fixed their hair, and we ran to church arriving ON TIME!! That's an accomplishment any day.

**Update! Thanks to eIMAGE Recovery software I now have most of the photos I deleted! Yeah!


I just now realized the all too unpleasant drawback of a digital camera. My card, fully loaded with 259 photos, just got erased.

I did it. In coffee-induced hyperdrive, I made the assumption that the download was done when, in fact, the battery was too low to support it, so instead of double checking it, I erased the entire card. Efficiency at its worst. This is what happens when I'm trying to juggle computer/camera stuff with dinner and bath time running up and down the stairs every couple minutes and getting the laundry done in the downbeats.

So, I can't back up my daily notes with photos. It's sad.

Anyway... today -- drum-roll --

-- pregnant pause --



WE HAD SUN!!!!!!!


The first in what seems like an eternity, today was a truly beautiful and not frightfully cold autumn day! So, I grabbed the three little ones, and "sped" off to the Wildpark Gangelt. I say "sped" in quotes because that was the intent. We were excited. We wanted to go the speed limit plus a few KPM, but... from Gillrath to Gangelt, we were stuck in a parade length line of traffic all stuck behind a "turtles can saunter faster than this" paced overgrown tractor or sorts. When I say slow, I'm not exaggerating a bit. Seriously, I was passed by a bicycle - not once, or twice, but THREE times! And he wasn't even going very fast.

But, eventually we made it.

Now, on my way to Schinnen on the 274, there is this field of deer on the right through some trees that I noticed ever since we moved here and almost always look over at as I speed by. On the left is parking lot down below the highway with a line of International Flags by it. At least 30 times I've wondered how to get down there and where those trails led.

Today, I drove by that lot, drove under the 274 (didn't know it was possible), parked, then eventually walked right by that field of deer!

Wildpark Gangelt is just that - a wild-park in Gangelt - set up just like a zoo with a long loop with caged off natural areas for animals, but without the lions, elephants, and giraffes. Without the exotic, it would seem boring - I mean, the antelope are always my least favorite site at a zoo, but, at this zoo, you can feed almost all the animals - many - by hand. So my girls - even Elise - hand fed feed and acorns to countless deer, elk, and sheep. We also saw brown bear, otters, birds of prey, wolf, and moose that we couldn't feed, and about 50 wild boar running around that we could feed, but not by hand. Still, it was fun to see packs of 15 boar at a time babies and all come running towards us at full speed and even jumping over logs to get their handouts.

Elise was happy feeding the sheep near the playground while her sisters played - then, out of the blue, she came running to me with tears on her cheeks. I asked her where her bag was thinking she had finished the sheep food and dropped the bag. Nope. There was a pile of food on the ground where she'd stood and a very guilty sheep standing 2 feet in from the fence, white paper back in mouth, munching away like he'd won a prize.

The really fun thing was that I've always only seen deer from a distance. And it's fun and exciting to see them in the wild, but it's nearly impossible to ever get close. Here, there are deer farms, so I see them up close, I guess, but it's not the same knowing that they'll be dinner soon and I don't ever stop to feed them. Today we fed them, petted them, and talked to them. One walked along the fence like the most well-trained dog. Another wouldn't stop talking - a sound that I've never heard before - sounded like a large ally-cat coughing up a fur ball - not exactly cute.

Anyway... that was our day - a day of fantastic photo ops from the bicycle that passed me to my girls feeding various animals by hand, great animal pictures, terrific playground pictures, a darling photo of Elise with fresh tears on her cheeks after the sheep took her bag, and a gorgeous photo of an ambitious spider who'd caught a fly 3x his size in a web lit up by the sun. All great - and all gone except for the memory of them. I'm so tempted to go back tomorrow.

Today is a holiday. Arianna and Luci don't have school (Tiara does because her school is in the Netherlands) and Kirk doesn't have work.

Today is German Reunification Day and a federal holiday here. Everyone is off and most everything is closed.

Today, is also, my mom's birthday!!! So, Happy Birthday, Mom! And, Happy Birthday, Germany! You share a day - strange, but true. And, strangely enough, Germany is much younger! :)

Not the most exciting of blog entries... but I have this chicken-scratch list of books that I saw in the English section of a great German bookstore in Aachen and before I lose the scrap, I want to get them down...

Besides... if you've read them, you can tell me if it's a good read or not and possibly save the the time since my reading time is precious. But... it is my goal to break away from elementary fiction and try to read like an adult again. Wish me luck.

• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
• An Englishman in Paris by Michael Sadler
• 1000 Splendid Suns by Hosseini
• Whitethorn Woods by Binchy
• Lollipop Shoes by Harris
• The Historian by Kostova
• Zadie Smith on Beauty

Oh... and the same glorious day that I found myself in a bookstore and I realized just how much I miss browsing a bookstore - something that you take forgranted there in the states, but quickly miss when the bookstores carry books mostly in a language that you can properly read... oh, to sip Starbucks while browsing at Barnes and Noble... to lounge upon a bookstore sofa and soak up the ambiance with my nose in the latest... I don't miss tv. I don't miss a lot of things. I do miss bookstores.

On that wonderful day I popped into a delightful clothing shop that carries the best scarves and wraps in town and heard Raul Paz' En Casa playing overhead. It was fabulous. The really hysterical thing was that I had been shopping all day in Aachen and had been speaking German over and over again with people there, but the second I walked into that shop and heard Raul Paz, my brain switched and the poor shopkeeper looked at my in the most amused manner as I stumbled over my words. Everything came out Spanish. Then he started speaking French and the little bit of French that I have learned just flew out without hesitation. My poor mixed up mind. Excuse me if I can no longer speak English when I return.

You know that Autumn is in full swing when:

• Children at the school are collecting acorns and chestnuts to send to Haribo in exchange for gummi bears. (Haribo sends the nuts to local zoos for animal feed.) My middle girls are very excited about this and have pockets full of chestnuts for Haribo.

• The strip of road just outside of Teveren is full of nut collectors - families with children perched in the trees with long sticks knocking the nuts down so the parents can gather them, old couples with dogs filling plastic bags, young kids in groups on bicycles with baskets or wagons... every time I drive by that stretch of road, it's like a party with great numbers of people under the filbert trees collecting the valuable nuts (6 Euros/Kg at the stores). I've even seen kids sitting in the trees knocking down nuts on blustery rainy days.

• Sugar beat mountains litter the countryside and fill the large trailer trucks rumbling by my home day and night causing my front windows to vibrate.

• Locals start hanging nuts and corn in mesh bags outside on the brick walls to dry the contents for winter. The nuts, they eat. The corn is animal food.

• Vast fields of corn disappear overnight - from 6' stalks to 3" stubble. All of it ground for animal feed.

• All the hedges in the country are pruned, or so it seems. They all get ready for winter. The hedges are now perfect.

• All the windows now have kites, leaves, or pumpkins in them. The chocolate shops and bakeries are making chocolate pumpkins, hedgehog cakes, and gingerbread cookie kites.

• Children in the kindergartens are painting apple pictures and making paper kites.

Well... it's over and though I'm already thinking ahead to next year, the real stress of another large event is off my shoulders for a while. Really, I've never though of myself as a party planner... but, it seems now, at least once a year, that I am, and I'm not altogether horrible at it.

Not that I'm great. There are always glitches and I can't help the retrospective second-guessing and picking it all apart. But, so far, the response to our IWC USA night has been a resounding "hooray!" (Except for one older British woman who told me that all the IWC nights have gone downhill because there isn't enough music and dancing.)

So, the scoop...

I wanted to show the size and diversity of our country this time and chose to spotlight Alaska, Hawaii, New Mexico, Louisiana, and Maryland. Each of those states was represented in food and a special area of the room decorated with things from that state. I was very luck to have two ladies in particular who had A LOT of very special things from Alaska and New Mexico, so those states got areas front and center - just to each side of a large screen where we had a slide show with photos from all over the USA.

We served Alaskan Salmon Cream Cheese spread with crackers, a Hawaiian Tropical salad, Red Beans and Rice, Jambalaya, Posole, and Crab Cakes. All 4 non-italicized dishes were cooked in my very tiny German kitchen the day before, brought in to the club, then reheated by their cooks. The results were great! I've heard fantastic things about the food - all of it!

The really fun thing was that instead of having the normal decorations standardized for each table, I asked the ladies to adopt a table, so each table was decorated like a different state. Our guests LOVED it and got really excited about choosing their table.

Ok, so I originally thought I'd be cooking for 150, but then was told, "no, there are NEVER more than 100 people on the first night," and "because it's the German fall break, most of the ladies will be gone back in their home countries." So, I planned seating and food for 108 (9 tables), thinking I'd be lucky if I got 85 and hoping that we wouldn't have empty tables.

We had over 150 ladies show up. We had to scurry to set up more tables. We ran out of raffle tickets - twice!

The entertainment was simple - just a Native American friend of mine who got up and danced a little and talked about her culture. She was fantastic. And then the ladies talked and talked and it was so loud with 150 women talking that I didn't bother putting on the music - no one would have been able to hear it.

I guess, I can count it as a success. The consular's wife from Dusseldorf came and brought a guest as well. So far the feedback has been good.

If you're interested in the recipes... just go to my IWC website... I posted all the recipes there. http://www.iwcogk.blogspot.com/  [The IWC website has been deleted. The recipes are below]

Wow. Last night we broke records. Usually, September is a quiet month for IWC with may be 100 guests. Last night, we had 150.

Thank you to all who came for being patient as we scurried to set up tables and gather chairs. I hope that you all had a great time.

It was a mellow night with a "social hour" before we sat, a slideshow depicting the beauty and diversity of the U.S, and wonderful decorations from all over the country.

No music would have been heard over the conversations of 150 which was just fine. You all talked with each other. You connected. You met new friends. And that is exactly why we gather together.

If you enjoyed the food, the recipes are below. I've also provided links to one site where I found a couple of the recipes. There you can change it from metric to standard and also play with the portions to adjust the recipe to your family.

1. Place bacon in a large, deep skillet. Cook over medium high heat until evenly brown. Drain, crumble and set aside. (Bacon was served on the side on our evening)
2. In a cruet or jar with a lid, combine pineapple juice, red wine vinegar, oil, pepper and salt. Cover and shake well.
3. In a large bowl, toss together the lettuce, pineapple, macadamia nuts, green onions and bacon. Pour dressing over salad and toss to coat. Garnish with toasted coconut

1. Preheat oven on broiler setting. Lightly grease a baking sheet.
2. In a medium bowl, mix together crushed saltine crackers, mayonnaise, brown mustard, onion, celery, and Old Bay seasoning. Gently stir in the crabmeat. Shape into 6 patties. Place on prepared baking sheet.
3. Broil crab cakes 8 to 10 minutes on each side, or until golden brown.

It may seem like poor-English, but it is fabulous German. Breakfast is a verb in German and certainly can be an event. This morning, I went "breakfasting" with a friend at one of my favorite breakfast haunts - a bauern cafe in Beeck.

This place is open 7 days a week (amazing, here) and provides an absolutely delicious all-you-can-eat breakfast for only 7.50E.


Eggs scrambled, soft-boiled, or sliced hard boiled...
Breads and rolls both white and seedy, toasted or not...
A huge assortment of cereals along with milk, quark, and various yogurts...
Jams, jellies, and nutella...
Juices, coffee, kakao...
Fresh fruit including the best honeydew I've had this year...
Three trays of cheese including some nice brie and a wonderful gouda...
Several large trays of sliced deli meats and a tray of very good teewurst and liverwurst...

It's all delicious... top that off with the fact that this place has a non-smoking section and that it's beautifully decorated with fun, inexpensive things that are also available for purchase... and you've got yourself a cafe to go back to again and again. Yum!