I promised that I would actually put up a couple of pictures of things here, so I will try to do that the next couple of blogs. My apology in advance, that my pictures with Katie and Matt haven't made it onto my computer just yet.
<------- I last talked about my day with the street musicians. Here are those charmers. As you can imagine, there was always a huddle of 16-25 year old girls freezing themselves and listening. I found out later that Dave (far right) connected with his girlfriend while he was "busking," as street entertaining is called. They are (from left, just like reading): Dominik, Samuel and David.
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Katie woo took this picture of me walking through the monument to the fallen Jews in Berlin. It's an awesome monument. Really solemn and yet really alive, with people usually running through it.
<------- On our one day tour through Berlin, I made Katie and Matt wander around with me until we found Fassbender & Rausch, Chocolatiers Am Gendarmenmarkt, again so that I could buy amazing chocolate even by German standards. This is a picture of a model of two famous buildings in Berlin (I only remember that they're nicknamed the lipstick and powder box) but the whole model is made out of chocolate. They also have a model of the Titanic, which is probably 5 feet long. It's deeply tempting, but that little placard at the base says not to touch, and for some reason I tend to obey the placards.
Today Sabine asked me why we say "season's greetings." You must understand that here they only have Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. What is it that we have at home? Football season, Baseball season, Basketball season, and the off-season? And then there's the holiday season. Starting sometime around Halloween and lasting until the advertisements for credit card holiday debt reduction ads finally go off the air around February. So in our twelve month year we have five seasons, four of which last three months with the fifth lasting almost five months.
This weekend marks the beginning of the Weihnachten Markt (Christmas market) here in Oldenburg. Apparently it's not just a weekend thing: the booths stay up and open throughout the week. The seasonal delectables are also appearing in full force. There are roasted almonds, hot spiced wine, gingerbread by the loaf, cookies, and of course the mandatory chocolate Santas. Hot chocolate, tea, and coffee are, if possible, even more present in my daily routine. Oh, and the biggest thing is that yesterday it snowed here. That's right: snowed. Granted, it didn't stick because the thermometer was barely tickling the zero mark, but I witnessed with my own eyes flakes coming down from the sky. It has been a very long time since I have seen snow in November, and I only hope this means that there will be a fair amount of snow, because the stuff just delights me. As long as I am not attempting to drive over it on my way through a mountain pass, or spend the night on the street, snow is a-okay with me. So here comes Christmas whether I am prepared or not (so far, I am not even remotely), and with it all the joys and headaches of the peak of the fifth season.
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