Sick, but out and about

Alex started the weekend pretty sniffly and coughed quite a bit, but we were out and about anyway. The apartment is just too small to keep us contained for much more than a few hours at a time, even in freezing temperatures. We're becoming quite hardy - trying to keep up with the Germans, who seem unflappable in this weather.

On Saturday, we pretty much just ran some errands in town, but had fun meeting an American family on the bus as our two boys were fighting for the coveted spot in any bus (if you're 4 years old),  the last row. It's seats are slightly elevated and afford an excellent vantage point to see what's going on inside the bus and outside. Well, the "dispute" was settled, room was made for both boys and we got to talking. It turns out it's the family of an ethnologist and I was thrilled to meet someone who was not an astrophysicists or other natural scientist. (No offense, scientist friends!) I hope we can connect again in the future. Anyway. We mostly ran errands and then stopped into the Hauptbahnhof (central railway station) which was the site of a wonderful little traveling science exhibit on water. They had all sorts of displays (kind of like the water things at Wonderlab). The docent explained that it was a grant to bring science out into society (hence the somewhat weird location) where lots of different people would see it without an admission fee. And there were certainly a lot of people there. Alex and I had a good time trying to understand the physics behind the various experiments. Here are some shots of him enjoying the fun.

We spent the rest of the day at home, reading books and snuggling, as Alex was getting increasingly crabby and tired i.e. sick. I put him down on the early side, but he woke up 6 times before midnight and was pretty feverish. I had - stupidly - left our thermometer at home, but not the Children's Advil, which he took at some point in the night and which seemed to have restored him to almost normal. I had a chance to talk to my friend here today on the phone and mentioned this to her and she told me that these kinds of medications are only dispensed with a prescription here, so I was doubly glad I had brought some.

After a long night (Alex woke up at 7:15 instead of 6:30 am!), we had a leisurely morning and then headed out for more adventures. We got off the bus around mid-day at Bismarckplatz - note the Bismarck statue in the background - which is kind of a central starting point for most Old Town adventures (and can be reached by a direct bus from our apartment).

Much to our delight, we saw a bunch of firetrucks and firefighters. We even got close enough to see what had happened. Apparently a city bus had leaked some gas into the street, which was being contained and remediated by the firefighters. This was particularly exciting, since we had just read a library book this morning about exactly such an occurrence. To see it play out in real time was cool. (I'm not trying to make light of the emergency, but no people or even the bus were in danger.)

After all this excitement we found a bakery for lunch.

I realize that Alex's selection does not represent the best nutritional balance, but we had zucchini and spinach for dinner. When you see his enjoyment of the chocolate croissant, you'll understand.

We then headed out and - to our delight - found a guy selling hot roasted chestnuts. We'd been looking for this stand for a while, because Alex loves collecting chestnuts and when he found out there were also ones that we could eat, he got very excited. Also, look at how picturesque the stall is...

In the end, he liked the idea of eating chestnuts better than their actual taste (though they were perfectly delicious and hot), or maybe his belly was still full of chocolate croissant.

Our final stop of the day was the local history museum, the Kurpfälzisches Museum. The Föhrs had recommended it to us, and they did not oversell it. Wow. We had a blast! For the (somewhat silly) entry fee of EUR 1,80, we got several buildings and stories worth of local stuff ranging from (and I'm not exaggerating here, if anything, I'm leaving things out) archeological findings of Homo Heidelbergensis (somewhere between Homo Erectus and Homo Sapiens) to dioramas of Bronze and Stone Age folks, to huge dioramas as well as archeological artifacts, statues etc. from Roman times (including a separate exhibit on Roman funeral practices) to the Francs (Merowingians to be exact) to the Middle Ages, etc. Then there were vast collections of furniture, china, glass, silver, coins, jewelry, costumes etc. from the 17th to the 19th century Palatinate Electors who lived in Heidelberg at times. This was a great follow-up to our castle trip last weekend and Alex saw knights and princes everywhere. And I haven't even mentioned a large collection of paintings (which we skipped) and a lapidarium (which was closed) and a special exhibit on Japanese art (which we also skipped).

It was sort of difficult to explain at times that the Roman knights and the early modern princes were not exactly the same thing. Moreover, he kept insisting that all the 'olden times' lined up with when Abraham Lincoln was President. Hmmm. I need to do some more work here. I had to laugh, however, when were in a lavishly appointed Rococo dining room and he pointed to the crystal chandelier and said: "That's just like the lamp we have in Greencastle." Not quite.

In any event, it was EUR 1,80 well spent! We'll come back here for sure. Any of you want to join us?

Happy Birthday!

Today is my father's birthday. He will embarrassed to see this, but hopefully not mad.

I hope you will have a great day today, Papi. I hope the phone rings many times and you will talk to old and new friends all through the day. I hope you will have fun tonight at your party. I know that the company will be great and the food delicious.

I am sorry that we are so far away today, but I love talking/skyping with you and Mami almost every day and we look forward to our "visit" later today.

Here's a picture from this fall when we had an adventure in Indiana.

We hope that you will visit us soon in Heidelberg, so we can have new adventures.

We love you!

Almost a whole week

It's been almost a whole week since I last wrote. What's happened? Not much and yet a lot. We're beginning to have normal weeks with school, work, errands, but also fun.

For starters, it's still cold. And snowy. Here's the view from our balcony on Monday.

It's not that much snow, but if you have to walk everywhere, well, then the cold really does seep into you. And it's so overcast that the castle has been obscured behind heavy clouds.

On Monday we headed into the city after Kindergarten, because Alex has been complaining about the lack of a scarf. According to him, everybody has a scarf except for him and we needed to rectify the situation. After a lot of searching and choosing, he ended up with a rainbow scarf.

We rushed home on the bus and made it just in time to watch the inauguration festivities in Washington. Here's Alex and President Obama:

Here they are again. This time, Alex is trying on his new sleep sack. In Germany, kids are in sleep sacks much longer than in the US and so we got him and warm and big one. It should last him a while and he seems to love it.

Alex continues to have a lot of fun at school. Here's what he was doing on Tuesday when I picked him up. He was sitting with his teacher Achim and finishing a very neat kaleidoscope puzzle.

It took Alex a while to get the puzzle done and so I sat down at the table with them and chatted with the teacher a while. There's a great relaxed atmosphere at the school which was underscored to me (for some reason) by the fact that the teacher was drinking a cup of coffee and eating what looked like a chocolate croissant while watching over the kids. In fact, Alex is getting so comfortable at school that one of his teachers remarked to me this morning that he is quite stubborn. "When he has decided to do something it is hard to change his mind." Some of you (especially the New Pathways folks) will recognize that streak in him!

This week we also visited the public library again to exchange Alex's books. Even though we brought a few of his favorite books from home, he is increasingly interested in having me read to him exclusively in German and he is beginning to say a lot more things in German on his own. In the past, it has been clear that he's understood everything and he's always said certain phrases in German, but he's beginning to put sentences together and mimicking phrases heard at school from teachers and other kids. I'm thrilled and it happened so quickly! He's not even been going to school here for 3 weeks.

In the evening (after dinner and skyping with my parents) Alex always has his bath. Here he is enjoying the bubbles on a few different nights this week:

Finally, today, we met some other folks. It's been amazing to be able to spend time with the Föhr's and, of course, Alex has been making friends at school, but we hadn't really managed to meet new people (why is that so hard? or is it just me?). Well, the Welcome Center for International Scholars at Heidelberg University had organized a kids afternoon for today and I had signed us up. It took place in a nice meeting room in the building next to our apartment building. I didn't really know what to expect and was really excited to meet 2 other American families. (I know, we should be meeting Germans, but ...) The two husbands are both physicists or astrophysicists (whew) spending sabbatical/research time here, but have brought their families along. It was fun to compare notes, share ideas about things to do etc. The organized event was also really fun. They had prepared for us to stuff some apples with marzipan, jam, cinnamon, butter etc. and then put the apples in the oven to bake while we all headed out for a long walk in the Botanical Gardens that are right next to our building. (Dana, are you reading this?) The outdoor space was a little cold and dreary this kind of year, of course, but it turns out that there is a fantastic, beautiful, and large tropical greenhouse as well. We all traipsed through it and were enchanted by the tropical flowers and plants. Wow. We'll come back here for sure.

After our time in the greenhouse, we headed back to the warm and cozy room, had delicious, hot, sweet, and oozing baked apples and coffee, tea etc. The kids watched a short movie (Oh wie schön ist Panama - a German classic!) and the adults chatted and exchanged email addresses and cell phone numbers. I hope we will get together with these folks again soon.

Tomorrow is Friday already. Time to plan fun things to do for the weekend. Stay tuned.

Sledding and Schloss

The weekend started pretty uneventfully. After a lazy morning on Saturday, we met Sherry and Annika and went shopping. Our first stop was the open-air market where we got the obligatory weekly spinach and tomatoes, but I also picked up a kohlrabi (yum!) and even some fresh blueberries (clearly not locally grown, but oh well). We headed on to the butcher, because Alex who does not usually like sausages, had announced that he wanted me to buy him some. Well, when we got there, he - very sensibly - picked out turkey wieners. As we headed to the grocery store for the last things, Alex and Annika started making plans for after lunch: we would go sledding. It's certainly cold enough and though there is not a huge amount of snow on the ground, we hoped it would be enough for sledding.

It was. Alex and I headed over to Annika's around 2 and we immediately went out - two great wooden sleds in tow. She knew exactly where to go and after a 15-minute walk we were there: at a little hill on the banks of the Neckar. It wasn't very steep, but it was perfect. Here they are all bundled up on one of the sleds just before heading down the hill.

Alex, who had never been sledding before immediately took to it. After seeing him throw himself into it, I was glad that we were at a modest hill and not a more dangerous one, because he clearly would have hurtled down whatever hill appeared before him. Annika was wonderful with him. She showed him how to do it, where to sit on the sled, etc. She pushed him to get off to good starts, she rode together with him, showed him her little tricks, and even tirelessly helped him pull the sled(s) back up the little hill countless times. They had so much fun! And so did I, just watching them laugh and tumble, and slide down the hill over and over and over. At one point, they got into a little good-natured snowball fight and it was fun to see them just enjoy each other and the snow around them.

After it got too cold (and it was frigid, my friends!) even for them, we headed home to a steaming hot cup of tea and some pastries I had thankfully bought this morning before the bakery closed.

Sunday morning started with another trip to the gym to watch Annika's basketball team, but unfortunately, the other team had canceled at the last minute. They were to come in from Mannheim (ca. 20 miles away) and the roads were apparently too icy to drive. The kids and coaches decided to split into 2 groups and play against each other (there's probably a sports term for this, but I don't know what it is) and it was just as fun for us to watch them play each other. They were well-matched!

After the game, Alex and I took a longish walk and then several buses (have I mentioned that it is really cold here?) to get to the bottom of the hill that has the castle on it. Since we can see the castle from our balcony, I simply could not string him along any more - even with the cold weather. The whole excursion was a lot of fun, but also a trip down memory lane, because the last time we were here (summer of 2010) our dear friend Jeannette was with us (and she's currently somewhere in New Mexico as far as I know).

Well, the Schloss (castle) adventure began with a trip on the Bergbahn which is a short, but no less dramatic ride on a funicular which crawls up the steep hill. To say that Alex was delighted is a major understatement.

To take it to the Schloss requires only one stop, but since our ticket included the full length of the tracks, we initially took the Bahn to its highest point and looked around. Here's the impressive station at the top, outside and in:

Here's the view down the hill:

And here we are enjoying the ride:

Halfway back down the hill, we finally arrived at the castle. Though it is mostly (or at least partially) in ruins and I also decided not to take the 1-hr guided tour (we'll save that for another day), we had a blast and the "olden times" came fully to life for Alex. We imagined knights everywhere protecting the castle and it's inhabitants from various "bad guys" and just enjoyed wandering around the grounds.

Here is Alex in front of the outer gate and we are both full of anticipation.

Here are the knights and lions guarding the bridge tower. I should note that every time we saw a carved lion (and there were dozens of them), Alex compared their likeness to Mufasa (one of the main characters in the Lion King). The various worlds, medieval and modern, real and imagined coexist so easily in the mind of a 4-year old.

And here's the door of the bridge tower. Or at least part of it. At first Alex was a bit timid to pose for this picture until I figured out that he was scared the door would close and he would be trapped behind it, so I assured him this would not happen.

Here is the fabulous inner courtyard where we later saw a guy dressed in Renaissance garb. Alex was convinced that he was one of the knights who still lives here.

Since I had opted out of the official tour for today, we had to make do with the only indoor space available (to warm up a little and also to look around) and that was the German Apothecary Museum. Weird, but true. We looked at a lot of old flasks etc. and here is Alex on the stairs leading down to an old laboratory.

It had a special exhibit on the history of alchemy and chemistry with lots of evocative instruments and it would have been great fun to share the moment with our friend Hilary, chemist extraordinaire. Here's just a taste of what we saw. I have to say, I've long been grateful for the advances of modern science and medicine and definitely not nostalgic for the "olden times" but that impression was only strengthened after seeing all this medical and scientific equipment.

The visit to the Schloss would not have been complete without a beautiful piece of Blueberry Torte in one of its medieval cellars.

And a wooden sword for the newly-minted knight standing guard on a park bench outside the main castle.

The views were spectacular (in the distance you can even see our building and I would mark it, if I had the faintest idea how to do that on a photo),

and fun was had by all!

Unexpected Gifts

Today, both Alex and I were recipients of unexpected gifts. Early this morning the doorbell rang and a DHL guy brought us two packages. And when I say us, I mean Alex. I guess these were belated birthday presents, though unexpected and very much appreciated. My brother Lukas sent a second Playmobil toy, this time a very cool collapsible plane, but Alex is playing with it as if it were a rocket. Very cool. The second box was from my parents and included some Abraham Lincoln stuff (including a refrigerator magnet which is now on one of our radiators, because that's the only magnetic surface I could find and a page from the Washington Post with several pictures and a story about the Lincoln Memorial), and a great Melissa and Doug spelling game (clearly, I'm not the only one thinking about Alex's ability to practice recognizing and using the letters of the alphabet). Lots of fun was had with all these new things and though we started with a very modest amount of toys a mere 19 days ago, Alex is beginning to have quite a stash here. We cannot continue to acquire toys at this rate - or else we'll have to have a yard sale at the end of all this.

The second, and possibly even better unexpected gift (or rather, long-term loan) is a super comfy chair from my friends. Those of you who read this blog regularly have become aware of my recent obsession with finding a good spot to settle down in my apartment and so far nothing had worked satisfactorily. Well, today, the situation was dramatically improved. Sherry remembered that she had an super comfy super deluxe folding chair stashed away somewhere that she only uses in the summer (to sit outside and grade papers...), so I retrieved it today and have been luxuriating in it ever since. It's no real solution for working on the computer (though she had excellent suggestions for nearby cafes and libraries I shall try in the not so distant future), but it's fabulous for reading! Thanks, Sherry. It has dramatically increased my quality of life. As you can see, Alex loves it as well.

And, yes, it's big enough for both of us to comfortably fit and snuggle.

Snow and Water

We woke up to snow this morning. Not just a little dusting, but real snow and the grey telltale sky that promised it would snow most of the day. When we stepped out on our little 8th floor balcony (in the dark) we realized that it was also really cold. Ugh! We nevertheless got ourselves ready and bundled up and headed out. We only had one quick stop at the bakery downstairs to get Alex's afternoon snack: soft salty pretzel. This has become a thing now, I'm afraid. On our walk, Alex frolicked in the snow all the way to school - to the point where his pants were pretty much completely wet by the time we entered the building. He seems to be impervious to the frigid temperatures. Here's a picture from our morning walk. It's about 8:10 am and, as you can see, it's still quite dark. You can also see that he's wandered quite far away from the actual path that had been cleared by university groundskeepers earlier in the morning.

Annika, the younger daughter of our friends in Heidelberg had gone to the same preschool (Kindergarten) when she was Alex's age and she has been eager to go back to visit. So, I arranged to meet her and one of her friends there at 3:30 pm, today's designated pick-up time. (At some point I hope to be able to leave Alex there all day, but we've been slowly lengthening his days.) The girls were already there when I showed up in the afternoon, inspecting all the rooms and chatting to the teachers. It was so fun to see these 11-year olds there talking about how old they were, but also remembering how much fun they had at the enchanted place. I got to chatting with one of Alex's teachers and she told me that a 6-year old girl called Ayla has sort of taken him under her wing. Apparently Alex goes wherever Ayla goes.

The three groups at the school are all age-mixed with 3-6 year old kids. Indeed, though Alex's preschool is called a Kindergarten, there actually is no such thing as American Kindergarten in Germany. Instead, all kids stay at preschool until they are 6 (or thereabouts) and ready to enter first grade. What's more, lots of attention gets paid to the fact that children do not have to worry about anything "academic" until they get to 1st grade. So, while they learn a lot about animals or whatever, there is absolutely no teaching of letters, or reading, or writing. As far as I can tell, Alex may be the only kid in his group who can write and read his name. I think I mentioned earlier that the kids' cubbies etc. are all marked by symbols (Alex has a bicycle) and not their written names. And this is not just this particular preschool. I guess my brother and I were also raised in this system and learned to read and write just fine, so maybe we worry too much about these things so early in the US. I don't know. I'm glad Alex has lots of time just to play (and, after all, he's learning to function in a second language), but I wonder if he'll be considered to be behind his peers when we get back to Indiana. Time will tell.

After school, we marched through the snow to the bus and took it to a local pool. At first the idea to go to a pool in frigid winter weather seemed weird, but it turned out to be totally fun. Annika and her friend played with Alex in the water like crazy. Even though they had spent a whole hour outside at school in frigid temperatures earlier in the day, he still had tons of energy to burn off. And, I have to admit, since my wretched chair situation has not been improved (thanks for all the feedback from friends in the past 24 hrs - clearly, I am not alone facing this kind of situation), I also loved lounging around in the warm (30 degrees celsius) water. Stepping back out in the cold was another story, but a bubbling homemade pizza warmed us right back up once we got home.

Soccer and Pretzels

This morning Alex was unusually hungry and so after breakfast we stopped at our local bakery on the way to school, so he could munch on a soft pretzel as we walked. When we got to school, he immediately ran off into his classroom and climbed up unto a loft bed that is used after lunch for those kids who still nap, but the rest of the day, kids can build forts out of pillows and cushions and this has become one of his favorite first stops of the day. I could barely find him to say god-bye.

I headed back to our apartment to get to work for a few hours, which would be great if there were at least one comfortable place to sit. The apartment has 2 desks and we have 6 wooden chairs, which look really cool and modern, but are truly uncomfortable. Then there is the one couch, but it, too, is exceedingly uncomfortable. It seems like a very silly thing to complain about, but alas, it will be one of the main reasons for me to find a different spot to work. Is a moderately comfortable chair too much to ask?

When I picked Alex up from school this afternoon, he was outside kicking a soccer ball around with a bunch of other kids. It had snowed a little earlier today and was quite frigid, but there they were, the little kids, joyfully kicking the ball around in the frozen mud. What a delight. When I could finally extricate him from the group, take his mud pants and rain boots off, so we could head out, he said to me: "School was awesome today." How great is that?

Here's a quick clip of Alex and some other kids, playing soccer in the backyard of his school today:

We then headed off into the city where we had a few things to pick up, including a pair of tumbling slippers (kind of like soft ballet shoes) so that Alex can participate in the gym/tumbling activities at his school. Along the way, we, of course, had to stop at a bakery where Alex had his second soft pretzel of the day. Look at the joy on his face as he takes a bite:

A Normal Weekend

It's Sunday night, Alex is in bed, and we had a totally normal weekend. It's beginning to feel like home.

Since Friday was the last day of the first week back for everyone at Alex's school, the two teachers in his classroom decided to organize a New Years Brunch for the group! On a normal day, the kids all bring their own morning snack, then have lunch prepared for them at school by a cook (out of fresh, local, and mostly organically grown ingredients!), and then bring their own afternoon snack. The school also provides drinks (water and herbal tea!). Well, about midweek a signup sheet appeared outside the dragon group classroom asking families to sign up to bring stuff for the New Year's Brunch for the kids on Friday. All sorts of things appeared on the list from soft pretzels to cold cuts to yogurts etc. Alex and I decided that he should bring mandarin oranges. (Some of you may remember that he brought those to New Pathways for his special birthday snack when he turned 3, so it was an easy choice for him.) I just loved the idea of all the kids sitting together around a common table sharing their goodies and starting into the new year together with their teachers. They used real tablecloths and since it was Alex's birthday week, the job fell to us to take home the two tablecloths and wash them for Monday. It all seemed so easy to organize and was so much fun for the kids. Have I mentioned that we love this school? Alex was allowed to stay until 2:30 on Friday, his longest stay yet. I think next week, he'll be there for full days.

After school, we took the tram (much to Alex's delight) to the local library downtown. It was easier than I thought to get a library pass (though various pieces of paperwork: passport, registration certificate etc. were required again, but I'm now a pro at having those in my bag), though I was surprised that we had to pay for the privilege. I guess some things aren't free - even in socialist Europe. It's a few Euros a month to carry a card and then most media are free to rent, but bestsellers, DVDs, etc. cost extra. Hmmm. Once we were legal, we headed into the kids section which was amazingly well stocked and superbly organized by age, type of book, and even subject. Wow. We were thrilled. Alex chose 10 books, including at least one that Julie had read to him in English at New Pathways! Small world, I guess. I picked up a novel as well and we headed home to revel in our new books! (I was sad to find out that none of the German versions of Troy Cummings awesome kids books seem to be available at this library. Boo!)

When we woke up on Saturday, there was a dusting of snow on the ground, it was still coming down, and it was cold. Nevertheless, we headed to the market, because we had a few things to shop for. On the way there we ran into or friend Nanina, who showed us around the market (now much busier than 2 weeks ago) and we found fresh spinach (hurray, the week is saved) and even a butternut squash! These are very unusual in Germany, yet beloved by Alex, so I had to get it. Nanina accompanied us to a cafe where we warmed up with coffee, tea, and hot chocolate. She then left us to study Latin and Math (ah, I remember the 10th grade...) and we headed on to complete our errands. Once the groceries were stowed away at home, Alex talked me into going to his most favorite playground (so far). It's on the university campus near-ish our apartment (about a 15-20 minute walk) next to the children's hospital and has a huge play-ship on it, which Alex has decided is a pirate ship. Somehow, he took on the persona of Captain Cookie and I became Captain Plunger as we romped around the big ship. (Does anyone know the origin of these names?) Here he is with the pirate ship in the background. You can also still see the little bit of snow on the ground.

Today, on Sunday, we had a leisurely morning and then headed out to watch Annika and her team play basketball. She plays on several teams a U13 girls team (she is 11) and U12 Co-ed team. This was the co-ed team and it was really fun to see her play. We also got to meet a few of the other parents and had a lovely time. During half-time Alex and Christian goofed around a little bit and it was funny to see how Alex aways wanted to kick the ball and not catch or dribble it. I guess the one season of soccer last fall has made a bigger impact than I thought. Thanks, Coach Pedar and Coach Rebecca. When asked if he wanted to play basketball, too, he proudly answered: "Nein, ich spiele Fussball." (No, I play soccer.). Here he is with Christian tossing/kicking the ball around.

And here he is still running around on the field as the team behind him is already warming up for the second half. You can see Annika over his right shoulder holding her normal size ball and also the little one Alex was kicking around pretending it was a soccer ball.

Needless to say, we had a blast. On the way home, we stopped at the pirate playground again, but the rest of the day was spent doing laundry, reading library books, skyping with friends and family, coloring and drawing, and playing with his new birthday toys.

We had totally uneventful, normal weekend in our new life. It was wonderful and we're ready to face another week.

More Official Errands

After dropping off a happy Alex at school this morning (he barely says good-bye to me any more, he's so eager to play with the other kids), I ventured over to Sherry's house and we set off on a number of official errands. I was thrilled she offered to take me around, because even though I sound like a native, I have no idea how anything works and I sometimes wonder what people think of me: Why does this 44-year old person who looks and sounds so normal not know how to properly use her bank account? Has she recently been released from a mental institution?

Anyway, Sherry graciously took the bus with me (instead of biking) into old town where the humanities part of the university is located (our apartment is in a new-ish part of campus that is dedicated almost entirely to the natural sciences, and various labs, hospitals, and research facilities, which means we see many folks walking around in white lab coats - while smoking?!). She showed me around the various humanities buildings, I got my ID card for the Mensa (which is sort of a subsidized cafeteria where I'm allowed to eat at reduced prices, because I'm a guest scholar!), and we ventured into the main branch of the library. I was in search of a library card and Sherry helped me find the registration desk. Since almost nothing here is properly labeled (including the welcome center for international scholars which I found a few days ago only because I'm fluent in German, since I had to ask 3 or 4 different people for directions!), I was glad to have her along. To get a library card, I needed not only my university ID, but also my passport, as well as my official registration with the city that shows my street address! Wow. It was a minor miracle that I had all the right paperwork with me. Sherry showed me all through the building and I feel moderately comfortable that I'll be able to find my way around when I go back by myself.

We then headed to the History Department. I wanted to say hello and also talk to the IT person from the department, so I can get an access code to the wifi system (I've been using Sherry's login this whole time - don't tell anyone!). First of all, the history department is in a beautiful old building off a cobble-stoned interior courtyard that has a medieval tower on one side. Secondly, there also are no signs anywhere. I would hate to be a first year student here. I have no idea how anyone ever finds anything. The only signage we saw at all was this one:

If you speak German it needs no further explanation. For those of you who don't. Well, it prohibits entry into the aforementioned medieval tower (Hexenturm - witches tower), because of the large amounts of dove excrement which is - according to the sign - not only aggressive (!), but also a health hazard and would be brought in to the rest of the building via the treads of one's shoes. I don't know why, but for some reason this cracked both of us up. We have no idea where or how to find any actual offices in the building, but heaven forbid we bring dove poop with us.

Well, of course, we finally found the department (up a somewhat hidden staircase behind the departmental library!) and met up with a wonderful secretary. The professors were not available! We chatted with her, found out her son went to the same preschool that Alex now joyfully attends some 20 years ago and I think I've made an ally should I ever need one. Sadly, though, the department's IT person had quit and had not been replaced, so I was advised to contact one of the advanced grad students, who is said to be good at this kind of stuff. We'll see what that yields.

Sherry then showed me various other parts of the old university (founded, by the way in 1386!) and then we had a lovely cup of coffee in the old Marstall (stables) that have been converted into a cool cafeteria. And then, on we went to have lunch at this amazing hole-in-the-wall middle eastern place where we had the following amazing falafel plate.

Ah. All is well in the world.

I do hope that most of my official errands are now finally done and I can sink my teeth into actual work.

Alex is 4!

My little guy is 4 years old. It seems hard to believe. After my baking efforts last night, I wrapped presents and set his birthday table. What you can't see in the pictures are the yellow batman streamers that look a little like crime scene tape Alex got from his teacher Rachel before we left. I had sort of hidden them away and thought today would be a great day to bring them out. Here's how everything looked before I went to bed. Note the ruin of a cake in front.

Alex, who is usually a great sleeper woke up just after 4 am and snuggled in bed with me for a while. I'm usually bummed when he wakes up, but I was a little wistful this morning and was perfectly happy to feel his soft little body curl up next to mine in bed for a while. When we couldn't stand it any longer, we got up and Alex tore into his presents.

We managed to get the chocolate cake and the cookies to school for his celebration there. They were waiting for him with the specially decorated birthday chair, 4 real candles and even a little gift. The other kids all knew it was his special day and greeted him as we walked in. To make matters even better, today's lunch was spaghetti with meat sauce, or as he calls it: scapetti. Either way, they're one of his favorite things to eat. He was still in a thoroughly happy mood when I came to get him 5 hours later and showed me the home-made kaleidoscope and card he had received from his class. He's already eager to go back tomorrow.

We went home and played with his various new toys: a playmat with streets on it for cars (or whatever), a playmobil race car from my brother and his family, a new coloring book and some cool crayons, a puzzle, and a whole bunch of Überraschungseier (Kinder surprise eggs). It was really fun. Then we got ready for party # 2 with our friends, baked yet another cake, and cleaned up the apartment a bit. Sherry and Annika arrived first in the mid-afternoon and Alex completely took Annika under his wings, showing her all his new stuff, getting her to draw some batman pictures for her, the usual stuff, which gave Sherry and me some time to drink tea, eat cookies, and have adult conversation. In the early evening, Christian and Nanina joined us and we had dinner together.

Alex was more than a little hopped up on cake, candy, and excitement and started goofing around and taking silly pictures. Here is just one example.

All throughout the day, we got calls, email messages, electronic cards etc. (including a really funny talking pink pig from Clara) from friends and family back home - a really nice reminder of the rich lives we've left behind. We miss you, dear friends.