Einschulung!

Ready for school

 Today T2 was eingeschuled.

The welcoming to the community

I went looking to link to the post I made on T1's einschulung, but I see that I have that listed as an "unblogged period". I feel so bad about that, that I will go add a few photos in when I am done with this posting. (and I added one below)

T2 chose her schulranzen and her schultüte and I filled them both up with what was on her list (for the former) and candy and games for the latter. 

We took T1 out of class to join us and all came together in the Aula (auditorium), where the leader of the community, the leader of our associated Rabbi (a lovely man who leads our school Seders and other celebrations), the principal and the head of the schulverein all welcomed us (primarily the children, but also the families) to school. Then the children were called up to the stage by name and class (this year we have three), introduced to their teacher and taken (with their gear) off to spend some time getting to know their classmates, teacher and classroom.


(The cast below is one of the reasons I am so behind in my blogging, as is the boom of my laptop, which goes in for repair next week.)

She's a schulkind!

T1's einschulung, T2 holding tight:-)

EM Fever

Go Deutschland!

Schloss Bellevue

 Bundespräsidialamt-
where the workers are.

Visiting Schloss Bellevue is an incredible treat: there are very limited tours allowed, they are given only to certain groups, and they book out years in advance. So I was very excited to have the opportunity to tour the ceremonial seat of the German President and the associated Bundespräsidialamt.



Our guide was a charming government worker, who started us in the office building, discussed its history, architecture, and the individuals who work there and then walked us to the Schloss. This is one of her duties as she spends a period of time attached to the President's office.

The lovely Schloss Bellevue, although the official residence of the President, is not where he actually lives (that is a government-owned home in Dahlem, not far from the other ambassadors, including that from the US). The flag seen flying from the "residence" does not actually indicate that the President is in his office (either here or at the Bundespräsidialamt), but that he is not in official residence at the Bonn Residence: Villa Hammerschmidt or on a state visit, when he would "reside" where the German flag was raised.

The official Guest Book

Original art, furniture to match

Great Hall

The largest hall in the palace is used for large receptions, state banquets, concerts, discussions, ceremonies awarding prizes and decorations and other events. The walls on the north and south side exhibit two large bodies of colour entitled "Begegnungen" (Encounters, 1988) by the artist Gotthard Graubner.

Seeing our group indicates the size of this room, a reception room which can also be used as a banquet hall.

I loved the paintings.

(Below, you see the painting on the facing wall, with me below it to show scale.)

Meeting our Katzenbaby

T1 with her soon-to-be new "sister"

Ever since we lost Felix (the cat we brought with us to Germany), we have been a cat-less family.

This has been the longest that I have been without a cat since I turned 5 and got my first. We have been putting off finding a new family member for several reasons:

• it's so easy to travel spontaneously without pets!
• my in-laws don't like pets, so visiting them becomes more problematic
• we visit the US for weeks at a time, make a petsitter necessary, expensive, and worrying
• we are never certain how long we will be here, in this apartment, city, state, country
• adopting a pet as an expat family in Germany is actually quite onerous and adopting is really quite expensive.

All these combined to leave us pet-less for almost 4 years by now. And it's been too long.

When we visited Grünewoche this year, we once again visited the cat section (and were disappointed at how small it was compared to last year). But this time, I visited with the desire to actually look at and compare different cat breeds: I have never had a pedigreed pet before, always adoping from animal shelters, kitten give-aways, or feral animals on my property (as Felix).

Because this time, since no kitten is at my door, I decided to actually choose a breed and a kitten for the pet that will share my life for the next 15-20 years. We chose a Somali, which is basically a long-haired Abyssinian. The type is ruddy: to me, little Feuerflamme (tentative name) looks exactly like a cartoon-cute fox. She is absolutely charming. I did a lot of (internet) looking around and exploring, both here and in the US, and FF's dam and sire were, to me, utterly charming exemplars of the breed and type that I wanted. So we are waiting until she is old enough to take home and the children are looking at pictures of her as she grows and counting down the days.

Visiting Onkle H

The children talk constantly about visiting Onkel H when we leave them for a few days with Oma and Opa, and who can blame them? Onkel H and Tante U have a pony, with a foal. Sheep, with lots of little schäffchen. Special geese, white and mated, homing pigeons and piglets and chickens, whose eggs one can collect.

So, on our visit to Oma and Opa, we took a run over, our first. We were just amazed at how one can have a real smallholding right in the middle of a village. A charming house, that they built a few years after getting married (so some 30 years ago), with an open kitchen, high ceilings and lots and lots of glass and windows (or the exact opposite of my in-laws' house, which was built around the same time), rather on a chalet model, I guess. Very airy and comfortable. And then small outbuildings and barns and fields, all secret and hidden behind a housefront which looks like any other suburban building!

Onkel H retired (as a family doctor) over several years, and after doing some consulting to his practice (which his son and daughter-in-law have taken over as Dr and nurse), he is spending more time with his enkelkinder and animals, as well as doing some traveling and lots of biking (he is incredibly fast on his mountain bike).

Both the girls gathered eggs and petted lambs and brushed the horses and then did a bit of riding. The German thought it would be fun to put the girls on the pony together, bareback, and so they were simultaneously bucked off. (No picture- I was running toward them.) That was not fun for either of them, but especially not for T2. Above you see T2 being soothed into remounting (we didn't want her to stay afraid of riding, since she is still interested in taking lessons next year)--- afterwards, we made a daisy coronet (below)and she felt much better. T1 is actually standing on the pony after being bucked off--- I'm not certain if she just loves ponies more (it may be) or if her fall was cushioned by T2!

Walking through Soest

Soest is a charming town, not far from my in-laws'.

We took the opportunity to let the children play with Oma and Opa and just took a walk along the city wall (still extant, with a running trail) and look at the trees in bloom: enjoying the medieval remains.

We also stopped at our favorite Eisladen, the Venezia, where we had coffees. The German wondered why his cost a bit more than mine: I pointed out that his had a Schlag, or a measure of alcohol, in it. (He had thought that he was ordering a cinnamon coffee but it was actually with cinnamon Schnapps.) About 85% of the coffee and hot chocolates (and ice cream confections) had alcohol in them— the menu made me laugh,a nd think how typical of Germany that is.

Ruminations on Public and Private Health Insurance in Germany part 1

I have spent the past month being ill and in the process I have had the chance to see how the public health insurance system in Germany works. That's not unusual, because the majority of Germans (87%+) are members of the public system, which is not, as is the NHS in Britain, free, but rather based on a percentage (up to 15.5%, half paid by employers) of income and capped at an income that may be increased (approx. 63k in 2009, much as the US' social security deductions cap out over 100k).

(The Wikipedia article on German Health Insurance is quite good. The Bundesministerium for Health publishes some articles in English as well as being thoroughly descriptive in German. Here's a good article from the American view on the system.)

What is unusual is having been on private insurance for the last 4 years and then moving into public and thus being able to directly compare them in this way. To be allowed to move into the private system in Germany, one needs to make a certain amount (50,850€ in 2012) and the move is one-way: like a roach motel, you can enter but then you can never leave. That is, you can reduce your income for over a year to below the threshold, but most people in the situation where they would want to change back— getting married, having children, getting old— couldn't afford the loss.

Also, after the age of 55, as far as I know there is no path back into public, so even losing one's job in a country where age discrimination is rampant could leave one facing an increasingly unaffordable insurance bill.

However, in our case, we have had American expat(private) insurance as my husband was seconded here and therefore we were allowed to have non-German insurance. When he moved to the German firm at the end of the year, we needed to make a decision as to what insurance we would move to. Complicating the issue, 1. he had never been previously insured in Germany, so could not return to his prior public (he left Germany while in school and covered under family insurance), 2. the law in Germany did not allow non-EU nationals from countries without public plans to enter into public if they would not be ordinarily eligible.

This was such a stressor that we considered moving to the Swiss firm or the British firm, either of which would have allowed us to enter immediately into the national health schemes. The difference in cost between private and public here in Germany, for our family with a non-working spouse and two children, was such as to make our remaining here unaffordable, as well as seriously disadvantaging the children. We got as far as discussing the advantages of moving when there was an anticipated revision of the law to allow workers the one-time opportunity to enter public if they had not previously been insured in Germany and it was determined that the German's previous private cover (by his parents' insurance) did not count.

Whew.

So, in my time here in Germany, as a private patient, I have had: unscheduled emergency surgery, standard things such as mammos and colonoscopies, emergency room visits for breathing issues, pneumonia, specialists, MRIs, dermatology visits and ordinary and specialised vaccinations. My kids and husband have had the standard, with a sprinkling of allergist, dermatologists, and so on.

Before we moved to public, we talked to all of our doctors and to our dentist (whom we adore- he is the best we have had in years). They all assured us that there is no difference in treatment between public and private patients, other than private versus public room certain other clearly defined differences: Germany sets a minimum required amount of coverage, all insurances adhere to it, and differentiation is in the extras that are given.

The minimum is quite generous: if I could have paid less by taking out acupuncture and other non-scientific remedies, I certainly would have. Germany invented the quack science of homeopathy and although there is pushback against the public insurances paying for it, many insurances do.

Next part- what we chose, why, and how the execution has gone.

Goals for 2012

I'm not much for resolutions. They sort of drive me crazy, as if I fail in even the smallest way, I can find my resolve to do anything completely dissipated.

I do, however, want to set some rolling goals. For this year and going forward. I want to have a place where I can actually keep track of what I want to do and have these thoughts not just be on scraps of paper that I lose. I want to see where I (and we) are in the ever-changing structure and goal-setting of personal life. I also enjoy reading other people's life lists and I'd like to take a stab at at thinking about where we are and how we are progressing.

Current goals, very general:

1. Get in better shape. Do that through spending at least 4 sessions a week doing a proper cardiovascular activity. Which should be attainable, rather than daunting.
2. Decide where we will be next fall. We are moving. The question right now is, exactly where. It's either Munich or not. Now that we have achieved German public health insurance, the world is our oyster, as we will always be able to return to it. A huge, huge relief.
3. Make a little more time for our friends and family here in Germany, because we may not always be here. We just had a wonderful time over the holidays. The most relaxing and pleasant time since we got here 4+ years ago. We did it by actually having enough time to spend with them and we planned that time. We fell short of our goals- I had hoped to meet up with another cousin (+family) and aunt/uncle, as well as a blogger with whom I had been chatting (and to whom I owe an apology for not meeting)- but I accept my limitations and I'll try again in the spring. We did spend two nights with a friend and her family (so the girls played merrily), met up for a long afternoon with current friend and former au-pair, had an afternoon and evening with cousin (and family- kids had a blast), a birthday party with sister-in-law (and family, more masses of kids), time just chatting over the table with the in-laws and the sister-in-law and her friend. Good times.
4. Make more time for myself (cf #1) but also, note that the time that I have been spending on German classes has left me in a place where I have had not time to enjoy myself here in Berlin. Since taking the last 10 weeks off, the apartment is in better shape, the kids are getting more attention, and I have finally had a manicure: my first in this country. I'd like to continue in the path of spending more of my time making our family life less chaotic and more time enjoying this time when I am not required (and it would actually be deleterious) to work outside the home.
5. Get back to the Museums. I made a decent start on that last year, but then class and the kids' activities impinged. Since I will only be taking a 1 day grammar course this semester, I expect to spend much more deliberate time enjoying Berlin. I hope I can find a few folks to share the touristing with, but if not I will do it anyway.
6. Try to decrease the paper and book clutter in the house! I am constantly working on this (cf other blog) and this year we added another bookcase and a DVD case, which has helped. In addition, I am working my way through reading a very great many genre books, some of which will be returned to my mom, some which she doesn't want back and others of which I won't want to re-read when they are read: they are being gathered and will be 1. shipped back to Mom, 2. given to friends, 3 offered for sale locally and on Amazon and 4. given to a local library when the former don't pertain. Last year I donated 80+ books, this year I hope to achieve and surpass that level. So far I have 54 assembled, so there's not much chance of missing this goal.
7. Make certain that we have at least 1 family vacation and at least one vacation that I enjoy. This past year we had several weekends without the kids, through the joy of hotel points. Those vacations involved culture and walking through cities in other countries. We also had several with them. Of course, their favorites involved Disney, play grounds, pools (they don't need to leave a hotel to be happy- they only need a pool), and playing with other children. We are already starting to plan more for this year.
8. Try to stop over-planning. A major source of my stress in the last few years has actually just been about over-scheduling. Since the German is gone the majority of the week, we try to schedule things so we don't just veg. The kids really don't need that- they would be happy to just hang around in their pjs with us. Both my in-laws and my friends mentioned how much more relaxed the German was this last week. I think that was because, although I had scheduled our time (because otherwise we don't do anything), I both scheduled wisely and crossed out several activities (cf. meet blogger friend, meet with cousins and uncles) that, although we would have enjoyed them, would have mean that we were go, go, go non-stop.
9. Don't take things as seriously. It's hard to believe that at my age I am still so amazed, and sometimes hurt, at the bad behavior of others. I have made strides in just 1. cutting people who behave badly out of my life and 2. setting limits on how I will allow myself to be treated when not able to cut people who behave badly. This can be as simple as not allowing racist and xenophobic and sexist remarks to pass without open remark and as complex as needing to realize how deep these beliefs and behaviors may be in others' psyches, so deep that they are incapable of recognizing how sexism, patriarchy and racism have informed their understanding of normality.
10. And to round up the list, try to be more mindful of how happy my life is right now. It really is. This time with the kids is something that I am grateful for (no matter how stressful and annoying their behavior may sometimes be). It's a gift, they are a gift, my life is a gift, and I should enjoy every minute of it.

So, on the whole, life is getting better and more organized. There have been some hardships in our time here, and some health issues. But we are all in a good place now and it looks like , wherever that place is, it will only get better.

Thoughts on the holiday spirit.

It's the end of 2011 and a week or so ago I received an e-mail in my role as an officer of multinational group. I have anonymized the letter, because I don't think anyone needs the identity of the writer or the group to look at the concepts and thoughts behind the writing.

(As a pertinent piece of information, the group is not just multinational and multi-ethnic, the German membership has a hard 20% cap to retain the "multi kulti" aspect—otherwise, in groups of this nature, the standard progression is that foreigners move away, Germans do not, and clubs become increasingly German.-At the moment, we have a several year waiting list of Germans.)

Dear Ladies

After due consideration and having read the following email, I decided to share my thoughts on this matter.

I am a member of X for approximately 18 years and have seen a lot of changes, mostly positive. However, every year when I receive the X newsletters, I find it disturbing, when I read the "Festive Season Dinner" or "December Festive Season Event" instead of "Christmas Dinner/Event". My question is - What are we celebrating? 'Why has the word Christmas been dismissed over the years? I am told it is politically correct to do so. Who are we insulting? Who are we trying to placate? Who feels threatened? I have served on X for a number of years and during my terms as X, my colleagues and I reverted to using the word Christmas, which we felt was correct and proper. I have the greatest respect for other holidays e.g. Hanukkha, Ramadan, Diwali and so on, and wish my friends all the best for the specific holiday and not the general in-term Happy Festive Season as I join them in celebrating. .Likewise, as a Christian, I would like the same respect. I would also like to remind everyone, that although we come from all parts of the world, we are based in Germany.

I wish you all a Happy Christmas and a healthy, successful and exciting 2012.

X

This was my response:

Hi X-
You sent this to me, not to "separate collective e-mail". So let me answer. I'm not Christian. I don't celebrate Christmas. Neither do many members of X. Therefore we have a holiday party.

If you would like to have a club that is open to only Christians or which has a religious basis and underpinning, you are welcome to found one. I don't see any pertinence to the article you included, by the way [a ridiculous "war against Christmas article"]. I also don't have a (pagan) tree in my home and find it strange that Christians have stolen the trappings of the Druidic rituals and slapped a Christian term on it.

Happy holidays,

X

I thought about this before writing my response, before ending it and before starting to write it up in this blog post. The German spouse was more incensed than I, and suggested that I should have stated that in an effort to be more inclusive in future I should have mentioned that we will be using sharia law to adjudicate organizational disputes and signed off with a cheery Merry Kwanzaa.

I could ask, who does this person think she is? But I know who she thinks she is. She thinks she has the right to make me, and others who do not belong to her narrow culture, strangers in our land. To make us invisible and to be offended when we refuse to walk behind her, to step to the side, to be at the back of the bus, and most importantly: to be quiet. The sheer hypocrisy of stating that she allow each person to celebrate their occasion and wants the "right" to celebrate her own (by which she means to force the acknowledgement, supremacy and celebration of her religious beliefs and holidays on others) and then ending her mail by wishing me- a Jew- a merry Christmas, just demonstrates her falseness.

All animals are equal. But some are more equal than others.

Halloween and Zombies

The last two years have seen the emergence of the zombie trope replacing the vampire one. I have loads of YA and paranormals on my shelves, waiting to be read, with zombie leads, zombie heroes, dystopian zombified worlds and even zombie romantic leads (I know it's hard to imagine).

Coming home from a Halloween party on Saturday, we bumped into the best zombie costumes (we assume, since they did not go for our brains) that we have seen.

Well done!

(I asked permission to take this photo, of course.)

The end of the season

With apologies for not being very communicative recently (getting over some respiratory problems), I wanted to mark the end of my favorite (and sadly, very short) period in Germany: the Federweisser period.

As I've said, the only German gastronomic products that I would miss if I left are quark (and I now know how to make it at home) and Federweisser (which is irreplaceable). But what I love is not the Federweisser (pressed from white wine grapes), but the Federroter, the equivalent but pressed from red wine grapes.

It is the nectar of the gods.

The season (here) is only three weeks and I know of only one place to find it. I haunt that place and when the wine arrives (they do also have the white, which is far better than what I have bought bottled), I start buying it.

What you see here is the last of our supply. The containers are at different levels of fermentation (I must have rotated improperly) and the German is drinking the one on the left (far more alcohol) while I am drinking that on the right (almost grape juice, but with a fruity and smooth kick).

(And no- the refrigerator is not normally that tidy- as I have been sick and we were away last weekend, it was abnormally empty. So we took the opportunity to clean it.)

Weckmänner

We spent last weekend in Köln, at the Expat Meet Up. It's discussed at much greater length here, (and probably other blogs as well, when everyone recovers enough to post). I'm not going to talk about it here and I was coming down with something so I didn't see a tremendous amount.

But what we did enjoy on the way out was this baked treat. Since Frau Dietz mentioned it, I thought I would as well. We don't have them in Berlin (not part of the culture) and T2 wanted one when she saw them at the bakery as we loaded up before leaving. She wound up eating a pretzelzopf instead and I ate this, so I can say that it tasted quite nice: an egg yolk glazed white flour yeast recipe, not very sweet. The pipe is inedible, the eyes are raisins, and that's a glazed cherry you see.

This is a recipe and a story about Weckmänner. And here is an interesting Wikipedia article that, although translated from German into Esperanto, is not in English:-), while here is an interesting discussion of German religious holidays with information pertaining to St. Martin. On the way home we stopped off for lunch with my in-laws and my father-in-law told me much of what the article below said, as well as some more anthropological bits and the amusing info that those pipes (formerly a Bishop's crozier, and other things) were, not so long ago, functional and that they were changed to non-functional pipes because so many German children actually used them to start smoking (things:-)).

11. November: St. Martin
Der historische Martin wurde 316 AD als Sohn eines römischen Tribuns in Ungarn geboren, wuchs in Italien auf, wo er m Alter von 15 Jahren in die römische Armee eintrat. Als berittener Soldat kam er nach Frankreich, wo er zum Christentum fand. Er ist als Bischof Martin von Tours in die Geschichte eingegangen, zu dem er 371 AD geweiht wurde. Sein Todestag ist der 11.11.397 AD. Nach seinem Tod wurde er Schutzpatron der Bettler, der Soldaten, der Schneider, der Reisenden und der Hirten sowie der Reiter. Und natürlich auch der Kinder, die ihm zu Ehren am 11. November abendliche Umzüge mit bunten selbstgebastelten Laternen und Fackeln veranstalten. Auch große Feuer sind Usus. Ursprung dieses Brauches ist Lukas 11/33: "Niemand zündet ein Licht an und setzt es in einen Winkel, auch nicht unter einen Scheffel, sondern auf den Leuchter, damit, wer hineingeht, das Licht sehe." Typisch für diesen Tag sind Weckenmännlein, ein Gebäck in Form eines Menschen, mit einer Tonpfeife im Arm. Die Tonpfeife ist ursprünglich Martins Bischofsstab gewesen.

Lebkuchenherzen

In my not-yet-written post on Oktoberfest 2011, I'll talk about what we enjoyed and the intersection with what the girls enjoyed. But one non-intersection they did enjoy was Lebkuchenherzen. For myself, I find them inedible and I can't understand how the translation can be "Gingerbread Hearts" when the recipe has either no or very little ginger in it, but the girls not only liked looking at them but actually ate the small ones we had at the fair and later, the larger ones that we brought home.

I thought the one that said Kleine süße Mäuschen would be the most apposite, but T2 wanted the blue and green one.

Art

I am amazed and grateful to be living in a society that believes that art and an appreciation of it are a human right and one that Society (with a capital S) should extend to children.

Thing1 had been taking quite good art classes in the Friedrichstrasse area (not too bad by S-bahn), but those classes were preceded by a ceramics class which apparently had some sort of glaze or clay ingredient to which she was allergic: although she enjoyed it, she was displaying contact dermatitis quite severely (an issue she has had all her life). In addition, T2 wasn't allowed to participate (too young) and the classes ended late, so T1 could only go when the German was in town and able to take her.

Toward the end of last school year, T1 said that she wasn't learning any more and she wanted a different class. So I did a huge amount of looking around (and a good art class for young children is actually quite difficult to find) and discovered that my kiez (neighborhood) sponsors art and culture for children through the VHS system. Of course, my neighorhood is larger than all but 19 cities in Germany (there are 19 cities in the country with more than 300,000 inhabitants) so it's not surprising that there are some amenities.

What's amazing is that as we bail the southern countries out of the hole that they spent themselves into (through graft, corruption, black market dealings at all levels of society and outright cooking of the books), Germany still finds it important that being rich or poor should not alter children's access to cultural enrichment: the latest welfare (Hartz IV) reform laws included funds to allow even the poorest access to music and art lessons and appreciation, as well as to forests and farms.

The new class teacher allowed T2 to join in, even though she is 6 months younger than the limit (as otherwise she would be sitting outside with me through the 2 hour class) and she is having a blast: the first time they went, I was in a class myself, and the German didn't bring any mahlkittles. That was swiftly corrected (through the loss of that dress) and the second class had them both wearing art smocks. They were out of the large smocks and we thought T1 could just wear an apron... wrong. Her new style is in the footsteps of Jackson Pollack and the speckles went everywhere: she will have a long-sleeved full size smock this week.

The best part is that the class is in our neighborhood, only a short U ride away, that there is a great cafe across the street (and a Thai place a few doors down) and that now the kids can attend together, giving me a 2 hour block when I can read or have a coffee rather than running around, stressing out because someone will need to miss something. The down side is that when we shuffled the swim classes to free Friday for both of them, they came up consecutive. But consecutive is still far better than on separate days, as they were last school year!

So now we are settled in to our schedule and until T1 earns her music lessons back (through doing her homework cheerfully), it means that we have two days home by 4 pm (when she has nachhilfe) and 1 by 5 pm (after tennis): a huge improvement on last year!

Cooking courses at the VHS

My birthday present from the German, amongst other items, was the gift of time: I abandoned the family and took several cooking courses through the VHS system. I enjoyed them all, in their varied ways.
In addition to garnering many interesting recipes and having the opportunity to decide how I like various dishes (and how I might alter them from the originals), I very much enjoyed having the opportunity (while on vacation from my language course, which starts up again next week) to actually speak to Germans, in their native habitat, so to speak. It's good to know that, even though I feel completely incompetent in German, I can follow a teacher and communicate with Germans without them needing a dictionary. I have taken several other cooking glasses at the VHS (including jamming) but I actually feel that my cooking vocabulary grew by leaps and bounds this past week and I had a great time.

The photos you see (above and here) are: a Hirse mit Muskatnuss, Orangenblütenwasser und Quark (from Senegal— the dish with pomegranate seeds), Saffron Basmati rice with "layered"(smothered) ground lamb with young peas and fresh dill (Persia), a watermelon and goat cheese salad (Persia), Schwarzen Augenbohnen-Bällchen (black-eyed peas) frittiert with veggies and chili (Senegal and it really wound up bread-like), and the first baklava I have ever liked (made with less than half the sugar and honey of a Turkish baklava and tremendously refreshing without being nauseatingly sweet). I will certainly be making some of these dishes again (particularly the non-pictured but delicious joghurt, aubergine and zucchini dips) as well as the mains and deserts (although I will need to cut the recipes to a third!).

Although I enjoyed all 4 courses that I took, the 2-day bread course was really fantastic: the garlic baguettes that we made were out of this world! I may have to take that again, because the specific folding techniques that create the baguette (rather than simply the dough) are a bit intricate and I'm not certain that I have them down.
In the bread photo, one sees (my breads):

• the garlic baguette (with the dough having been cut with scissors, rather than just slashed, therefore producing more crust)
• a roggenbrot
• a zwiebelkuchen (this is the vegetarian one made for me, made with potato starch as a binder rather than egg, with yoghurt instead of creme fraiche and with cheese instead of pig— it was actually the best I have ever had, but I still prefer pizza)
• and a "pirate bread", which is a half roggenbrot/half Weizenmehl with onions and read and green peppers baked throughout (therefore a pirate's hoard, as it were)
  

The final photo is of our bread teacher, a master baker, discussing some of the finer points of the sauerteig we were using (which is absolutely not sourdough as Americans know and love it). This class was 75% male, which was amusing since of the other three classes: 1 had 1 male, 1 had none, and the third had two husbands accompanying their wives. Bread making is considered a very male occupation here in Germany (and after kneading a dough that made 10 loaves, I can tell you that without a machine, it requires real muscle)

To Oma and Opa's house we go...

Over the river, and through the wood—

And straight through the barnyard gate,

We seem to go extremely slow,

It is so hard to wait!

Lydia Marie Child

The children spent the last week with Oma and Opa, some of which we spent in Rome and some of which home and here. They think of the time with Oma and Opa as being a form of adventure camp. In the last week they have:

• taken a boat trip, which Opa did the narration for,
  
• visited a sculptress and had a lecture and gotten a fragment of marble as souvenir
• visited an apiary, talked to the bee-keeper, examined the hives and poured their own honey into their own jars
• learned how to consistently, and at a high level, make princess crowns and decorate them
• wandered and picnicked in many places, by foot and by bike, including the river above
• visited a cousin and seen his sheep and ridden some local ponies
• visited friends and had American-German style barbecue and batted at whiffle balls
• bonded with cousins and spent time with the beloved Grosseltern and increased their Wortschatz and grammar tremendously.

Summer camp for T1 was lots of fun, with many interesting day trips (T2 stayed in kita), but this was truly an adventure camp for the two of them!

Visiting friends

Visiting friends in a small town in the west, not far from Münster. This is their villge square and their local Eis Cafe. We had an Eis Pizza (and it was very good) and the kids had Eis "characters". Sometimes it's hard to believe they are old enough to finish the whole thing!

Fall in North Rhine Westphalia

Our Spring and Summer in Germany apparently came in April and May so now that we are in July, we are in Fall (almost winter).
Last week T1 told me that it wasn't summer and asked for her long pants back and this week T2 is out gathering apples from my parents-in-law's front garden tree (yes, we ate them).
It's hard to imagine what blue skies and warm weather might be like...

Recycling

One of the things I like most about Germany is the recycling. This may seem a little odd, but because I live in a developed country and consume my share of resources and create my share of junk, I feel pretty guilty. I am watching the end of the world as I know it, seeing the ice caps melt and the glaciers disappear, fish are being wiped out in the wild (and I still eat tuna) and the climate is whipsawing from one extreme to the other.
The least I can do is to not use air conditioning (I have a ceiling and standing fans, when necessary), hang my clothes to dry (although not sheets and towels) and recycle. This is what I have accumulated since Tuesday.

The first picture is paper, magazines and a shirt: the magazines will go to friends interested in catching up on US news, the shirt in orange recycling and the paper in paper. The next photo is 4 days worth of Grüne Punkt. That is plastics and metals and foil and certain packaging (like juice and cartons).
Below you see 5 days worth of ordinary paper recycling. Not pictured are the bowl of organic (bio) waste and the glass containers that will go, respectively, in Bio and Glass recycling containers.
It's not rocket science, so I wonder why so many people don't participate in recycling?
.

Zahnspange, aka Orthodontia

6/30 I had spent the past year asking our regular dentist about when it would be time to look at T1's teeth to discuss orthodontia. I could see from how her teeth were coming in that this would be an issue and I had the greater concern that certain tooth and jaw problems are genetic and I had those in spades.
In April, I insisted on an X-ray (digital, very easy) and the results were worse than I (or the dentist) had thought possible. Not to go into great detail, but our dentist immediately said that these issues would be far greater than he could handle and we found a Kiefer-Orthodontist who specializes in children (younger than the norm) and difficult cases. We got a relatively emergency appointment (within the week) and brought our X-rays with us (kindly sent by e-mail and carried on a USB stick).
The Dr. was also concerned. Although not, she says, the worst case she has ever seen, it is right up there with them. In particular, T1 appears to be missing (among others) an adult tooth which is theoretically not ever missing. We have hope that, perhaps, other teeth may be calcifying away and appear later, but at the moment it looks not good.
So T1 is wearing upper and lower plates, sparkly purple and with an embedded Teddy-bear, and she has been super good with them. We have an appointment with a surgeon next week, not because it will be possible to do surgery in the near future, but because the plan of work will span the next 10+ years: implants will not be possible until T1 is between 18 and 20.

Here a moment to discuss the difference between the US and Germany in regards to both health care and care for citizens and children.

Our top of the line expat insurance carries the usual limitation on orthodontia (including our top of the line dental). We will, of course, take care of our daughters mouth and jaw problems. We would do so even if I needed to go back to work to do so or if we needed to get a loan to do so. The sums will be significant and less than 10% will be covered by US insurance (which we pay for— it's most definitely not free, although subsidized by the German's employer). The amount that we would save in taxes paid if we lived in the US would be greater than the amount we need to pay for the course of treatment outlined. In fact, in the US, the total amount we paid in all taxes (including the amount paid to high tax state NY, but not the (very large) amount paid in real estate taxes) was considerably less than what we pay in Germany. However, here in Germany, no matter what tax bracket one is in, one has health care, and, in the case of severe requirements such as my daughter's, orthodontia (not for pure cosmetics, but for structural reasons and starting at cases far, far less severe than T1's).

I prefer a country which believes that children deserve to have structural irregularities taken care of regardless of how much their parents earn. I am happy that our tax dollars go to support this system. The real issue is when one both pays the taxes (like us) and does not receive the benefit (like us). A reason to look into switching into the German public health system when it is available.