my first real taste of germany

Rich and I had planned to visit Wiesbaden's Christmas Market this past Friday night, but he'd traveled to another base a couple hours away for work during the day.  Since he arrived back at the Lodge later than he'd originally thought he would, we decided to wait until Saturday to go.  

First, though, we had a few things to do on Saturday morning.  We're both keeping our American cell phones, but we also need German phones that will allow us to call local numbers here.  And, in order to get German phones, you have to have a German bank account.  Luckily, Rich knows a guy here who just arrived here a couple weeks and just went through the whole process.  Gerald is from Arkansas, and he and Rich were stationed together in Honduras years ago.  Anyway, Gerald offered to go with us to guide us along.

Sidenote:  The Commissary is within walking distance from the Lodge, as it's only about a half mile away.  From the Commissary, you can walk down a big set of stairs down the hill to get to the area where the PX, movie theatre, cell phone store, bank, florist, bookstore, and more are housed.  I explain this part only so you'll understand that the Commissary is up on a hill, and at the top of the previously mentioned stairs is an absolutely amazing view of Wiesbaden (pronounced, by the way, VEEZ-bah-duhn):

View of downtown Wiesbaden from the Commissary.

We went to the bank first to get our account set up.  This went pretty quickly.  The lady who opened our account was from either California, Texas, or Oklahoma (she mentioned all of these!), and the other lady who came over to sit in on the process was a local German.  Both employees were very polite, but the second lady was quick to inform me that should Rich die, I will be immediately sent back to the States, the account will be immediately closed, but to rest assured that I can keep the money.  Thanks, German Lady.  Just for the record, I would like to report that Rich is in great health, great spirits, and isn't feeling deathly in any way.  Touch wood, everyone.  I know, it's weird.

With our new bank account info in hand, we then went next door to the cell phone store.  For those of you familiar with my husband's love for his trusty Blackberry, I want you all to know that he has now STEPPED INTO MODERN TIMES AND NOW HAS AN ANDROID!!  I will be using a prepaid phone that had belonged to someone who just PCS'd from here.  I'm great with this as all I'll really need to do with it is call and text Rich and other friends here.

The three of us had lunch at the food court, swung into the PX for a few things, then came back up to the Lodge.  Rich and I got ready to head downtown to the Christmas Market--the highlight of the weekend for me!  Once we were layered up and I was armed with my camera, we stopped by the front desk and got a map of the city.  

The walk wasn't bad at all.  We were both pretty chilly at first, but we quickly warmed up from the walking.  Before we got downtown, we stopped off at St. Josef's Hospital to use the restroom since we didn't know what the public restroom situation would be at the Market.  From there, we ventured down a side street to get back to our planned route.  Ummm, as it turns out, side streets in Germany produce magical sites for people like us who are amazed with historical buildings and beautiful architecture.  At this point, my camera was still in its bag--not for long.  

The detail in this home's facade is gorgeous.

Again, the detail here...wow.

Zooming in on the photo above, you can see the carved face just below the arch.

My handsome husband.

I wonder what she has seen from that vantage point over the last 117 years.

What I find most amazing about this kind of intricate architecture is that these houses were built over 100 years ago (and by European standards, that's just a blink of the eye...).  There were no computers, no AutoCAD, none of that.  They were just this skilled.  This is art.  

And then, I started to notice something else.  These tall, exquisite spires seemed to top about every other house or so.  I see a future post dedicated to just a collection of these that I find across Germany:

That's not the only pattern I saw.  I predict another post dedicated just to the ornamental iron fences I find:

Seriously?!  I never would have thought that I would be so fascinated with something so menial as fences.  

After we made it back to the street that led us down to the Market, we could see the Marktkirche (Market Church) in the distance.  I've seen this beautiful church in many of the videos and websites we researched prior to moving here, but seeing it in person is breathtaking.  Rich noticed as we were walking that the sun was setting and casting this perfect glow on the western side of the towers, but I couldn't get the shot in time.  This is what I did get:

In the foreground is Erbprinzenpalais, a palace built in 1813 for Prince William of Nassau-Weilburg.  I had no idea this was a palace when I took this photo.

Then, we took another unplanned detour into the Warmer Damm (warm pond) Park.  It was designed around 1860 as a landscape park.  I'd seen this park a couple of days before as we sped by in a car, but unfortunately I didn't get to see much and I was so disappointed.  But here we were, standing in the middle of it, and I was again in complete awe.  Here's why:

From bottom to top:  Warmer Damm, outdoor ice skating rink, and the Hessian State Theatre and Colonnade.  Construction on the Theatre began in 1839 and was completed in 1894 on behalf of Emperor William II.

The buildings in the distance line Wilhelmstrasse, or Wilhelm Street.

A bunny hanging out in the grass.  Keep in mind, this is in the middle of a city.

We moved on toward the Marktplatz, and my jaw just drug the ground for a while in absolute amazement.  This place is magical.  I don't know how else to describe it.  And you know what I find so exciting about that?  Wiesbaden is only the first city we've even begun to explore in Europe.  I feel pretty certain at this point that the next four years will be one ridiculous experience after the other.  

We took a few cell phone pics of each other:

Is that Albert Einstein?

See that monument behind Rich at the top of the steps?  It's a fountain.  More photos of this below!

That fountain I mentioned above behind Rich?  Beautiful.  I feel like I've used that word way too much in this post, but I assure you that it is complete accurate.

Some other cool things we saw in the immediate area:

An apothecary, or pharmacy.  I worked at Eckerd in high school...it didn't look like this.

This guy was the lookout of a doorway just outside the Market.  

And now, the pièce de résistance...Christmas Market time.  There was an awesome lit entrance:

Sternschnappenmarkt, or Wiesbaden's Twinkling Star Christmas Market.

Christmas markets in the area began back in the Middle Ages.  Vendors sell different types of food, drinks, gifts, and seasonal decor like nutcrackers and ornaments from open-air booths.  But the highlight (and the most common thing I've heard the most about from friends who have lived or visited Germany) is the glühwein, pronounced like glue-vine.  It's a thick, mulled wine that's served hot in souvenir mugs.  

We spotted a glühwein vendor right away; assuming that the huge crowd outside was an indication of the quality, we got in line.  This is when we started to notice that lines in Germany are not the same as lines in America.  You know how we're generally polite, and wait our turn, and rarely ever blatantly break in front of others?  Yeah, this isn't America.  I do not mean to imply that Germans are rude.  This is just a culture shock to me, and I am learning.  

Rich had handed me a €10 note and nudged me in front of him to keep our place.  Now, let me explain here that I am a bit claustrophobic and don't react well to chaos.  Standing in line for the magic hot wine is not a good time to remember either of these things.  I didn't panic, though.  When the very gruff-looking German vendor stared at me, I managed to mutter, "Zwei glühwein please."  Yep, I used two languages.  But whatever, she understood and gave me a €1 coin back in change.  So each cup of wine cost about $5.50 in American dollars, but that includes the beautiful souvenir mug.

The photographer wife says, "Hold it!  Don't move!"  And the husband says, "This is HOT, hurry it up!"

Okay, if you're reading this and you're a huge fan of glühwein and think it's delicious, please skip to the next paragraph.  We didn't love it.  It wasn't the worst thing I've ever had, but it's not something that I want again anytime soon or maybe ever.  I've scanned through a few online recipes, and I'm finding that most versions call for cloves and/or cinnamon, and I hate both.  Neither of these tastes were very dominant, but the presence of these could be why I just didn't care for it.  Or maybe it was the temperature, as I generally prefer sweet, chilled wine.  I'm not sure.  But I won't have a craving for the stuff, like, ever.  I thought I'd never reach the bottom of that mug...

We began walking toward the other vendors, mugs of hot liquid in-hand.  And that's when we learned our next lesson about the locals:  They do not care if they bump into you.  At all.  Or if they bump into your husband's hand, that's holding his mug of very hot liquid, and it spills onto his hand, and the sleeve of his jacket, and his new wool sweater, and onto his shoes.  And if you know Rich, you know that he didn't take this with a grain of salt.  There were some expletives and some what-on-earth looks cast, but the offender just kept walking as if nothing had ever happened.  

As we made our way further into the Market, I was still being as polite as I'd been raised to be, saying "excuse me", smiling at passersby, etc.  But I was getting mowed over and Rich reminded me that I wouldn't survive the next four years unless my Southern skin could toughen up a bit.  *Enter the side of the Southern girl that's had enough of something and you start to see that she's totally capable of being the opposite of sweet but still with a smile on her face.*  I learned.  I bumped right back into people.  And I moved through the crowd.  And you know what?  We had a great time!

There was so much to see that I'm not sure we even saw half of it.  Vendors were selling beautiful Christmas ornaments, ceramic village houses, chocolates, smoked meats, toys, scarves, dishes, and so very much more.  Some things were quite pricey, so we had to be careful not to let ourselves get carried away.  And believe me, that was hard for someone like me who LOVES Christmas and collects ornaments from places she visits.  

Smoked sausage and huge loaves of bread.

I asked the young lady at this booth who made the baskets.  She said her grandma made every one of them.

Beautiful Christmas village houses.  I'm sure we'll collect some of these during our time in Germany.

"Christmas tree sale"

We only purchased a couple of things, but we never found an ornament that had the year on it like we've heard about.  We're hopeful that we find some at a regular store in town, but it's likely too late to get any for this year!

Some other cool things we saw:

A guy singing to passersby and playing his guitar.  I didn't see a tip jar...it looked to me as if he was just happy to entertain.

An amazingly colorful carousel for children.  I really, really wanted to ride!

And this little girl who caught me photographing her.  Oops.

New City Hall, completed in 1887.  Old City Hall, which I haven't seen yet, was built in 1610.  1610!!

I took a few more photos of the Marktkirche:

I wish I'd been able to take more photos of the vendors and their wares, but there were so many people that stopping in the flow of traffic to get a shot was very difficult.  I was nervous the entire time that someone would spill their glühwein on my camera.  We were both getting tired, so we decided to call it a night and head back to the Lodge.  

All the markets will close for the season before Christmas, so we won't get to make it to any others this year.  We've already planned to start early next year and check out other markets around Germany--Nuremberg being a must!  

As always, thank you for taking the time to read about our adventure.  I sincerely hope you'll come back soon.  We'd love to hear from you, so please leave a comment for us below!  

we made it!

Hello from Germany!  This first post will be a long one, as it covers our journey here and our first couple days as well.  Our future posts won't be as long!  I (Julie) will likely be writing most posts, but I'm hoping that Rich will make a writing appearance occasionally as well!

We landed in Frankfurt a little more than 48 hours ago after a very long and tiring journey from Texas.  We arrived at the airport in Killeen just before 10am on Tuesday, December 16th.  We were standby on the 1pm flight to Houston, but the flight was oversold and we had to wait until our originally scheduled flight at 7:15pm that night.  The flight to Houston was short and sweet; but once we landed, we had to TRUCK IT across the Houston airport.  There was only about 40 minutes from the time we landed until our flight to London was to depart.  We made it with time to spare (only because the lights in the jetway had stopped working and they had to get this repaired before boarding)!  

Our flight to London was long at almost 9 hours.  It was also my first trans-oceanic flight and boy, was I ready to get off that plane.  A few things about this flight:

• Our plane was a Boeing 787...by far the largest aircraft I've ever been on.  First class looked pretty cushy!  There was a screen on the back of each seat so each passenger had our own.  We had a variety of free movies, TV shows, and music to choose from.  We just plugged our headphones in and chose whatever we wanted to watch.  I watched a few chick flicks, of couse, and Rich watched some dude movies.  Oh, and the coolest part to me?  We could look at the map whenever we wanted to see where we were at any given time, our altitude, flying speed, miles traveled and miles left, time in flight and time left, and other cool information.

Information about our flight.

Very close to London with only 33 minutes to go!

• We were all provided with a pillow and a blanket.  The pillow was quite flat, however, so I would recommend to purchase your own travel-size pillow of choice prior to a long flight.  Rich and I shared his u-shaped neck pillow, and I was very thankful for that.
• Our flight was an overnight one.  I was very glad for this, as it was dark and made sleeping feel a little more natural.  Not that either of us did a lot of sleeping.  We couldn't get comfortable!  I had melatonin with me but didn't take any...silly me.
• We were served dinner (we both chose the chicken breast with pasta and vegetables and some sort of sauce...not bad) and breakfast the next morning (fresh fruit and a croissant with butter...again not bad).  
• My biggest tip, by FAR, for anyone taking their first long flight:  BUY A BOTTLE OF WATER BEFORE BOARDING.  We were served beverages, of course, but in a period of 9 hours, I may have consumed a total of 12 ounces of water.  Not enough.  I'm sure if I had asked a flight attendant for more, I would have been obliged.  But if you're like me and would prefer not to press that call button, I'm telling you, buy water before boarding.  And don't say you "don't really like water"...flying dehydrates you, and your body needs it in a bad way.  By the time we landed in London, I knew I was dehydrated.  My headache and achy body told me so.  Take my advice!

I started to get really excited when we began the descent.  England was going to be my first visit to a foreign country.  It was cloudy and a bit foggy, though, so I didn't get to see much of anything except some beautiful green fields, some classically old rowhouses, and proof that Brits drive on the opposite side of the road from Americans!  

Clouds and old buildings.

Look closely and you can see the direction of travel.

Blurry, but it's the best I could do.

Once we landed in London, we made our way toward our next gate to board our flight to Frankfurt.  We passed through security again, which I guess is normal when arriving in another country.  The process was exactly the same as security in American airports, but the British agents were especially friendly and helpful.  The gentleman who assisted me even asked how my prior flight went.  After security, we made our way further until we reached customs.  The agents examined our boarding passes and passports, and that was it.  

We arrived at The Queen's Terminal at London-Heathrow.

Customs...not sure if taking a picture here is okay or not...

Me in disbelief that I was standing in front of Herrod's.

I was a little starry-eyed once we reached our gate and I saw the stores surrounding it:  Herrod's, Burberry, Gucci...wowee!  I took the opportunity for a tourist pic, of course (see above).  

We found a currency conversion kiosk and got some American dollars changed into some pounds and euros.  Rich went to get in line at our gate, and I went over to a little shop not far away to get a couple postcards and some Vaseline for my very dry lips (please see my advice above about drinking lots of water on long flights!). 

Rich in front of a spinning sculpture.

Our prior two flights were on United, but the segment to Frankfurt was on Lufthansa which is a German airline.  There was a little table on the jetway with complimentary newspapers, so I grabbed one.  I don't speak much German, but I recognized immediately the headline on this one.  This tragedy had taken place just a couple days before we left Texas.

Loose translation:  "Taliban murder more than one hundred children."

The Lufthansa flight attendants gave their announcements in both German and English.  It was starting to hit me that I was definitely not in the United States anymore!  

A pretty strip of sunlight through the clouds, likely somewhere over Belgium.

We were served sandwiches on this flight, and Rich and I both chose the chicken and feta one.  Not really sure what was in it, but we were hungry and it wasn't bad.  I fell asleep and woke up to the flight attendant saying something to Rich.  She was telling him that I needed to raise my tray table and raise the window shade (I never knew why the window shade level matters at all!).

This was it.  We were landing in Germany.  I couldn't believe that the time had finally come.  After all the obstacles, all the hoops, all the weeks we waited for official orders...we were landing.  I admit that I cried a little, but they were happy tears of relief.  

Two of our four checked bags had been lost along the way, but the baggage agents were able to quickly trace them to another flight that would be landing a couple hours later.  They promised to deliver them to a friend's apartment the next morning.  

This same friend, Aaron, is also our sponsor during this PCS, and he was waiting just outside the secure area for us.  I was so grateful to have someone waiting for us!  He drove us to the Wiesbaden Army Lodge, where we'll be staying until housing is assigned to us.  The room is like a typical hotel room, except with European outlets, European light switches, and a European tub faucet.

Yep.  Welcome to Wiesbaden.  As in, Germany.

Aaron's wife, Alla (who is from Russia), had made us dinner and sent it with Aaron.  It was delicious, and we gobbled it up before falling asleep in our clothes for several hours.  The time here is 6 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time and 7 hours ahead of Central Standard Time.  We woke up around midnight here, both of us wide awake.  I decided I'd take a bath, after figuring out how to make the faucet on the bathtub work!  We also opened the gift box that was left at the front desk for us by the church on base--they leave these boxes for all new incoming personnel.  It had a couple bottles of water, a few bags of assorted American chips, and packs of crackers.  At 1am, those Fritos tasted amazing on a gourmet level!

We went back to sleep finally and woke up again to go on base so Rich could do some in-processing.  We also got our ID cards entered into the system so we can get access into the gates, made appointments to take the driving exam at the end of the month, and made an appointment to meet with Housing on Monday.  We had lunch at the dining facility beside Rich's new squadron...fried chicken and macaroni and cheese!  After lunch, Aaron drove us to his apartment in Wiesbaden to pick up our bags that had been delivered, and then we went back to the base so Rich could be read in to his new position.  I couldn't go in for this, so I took the opportunity to enjoy a nap in the backseat of Aaron's car.  This jetlag thing is no joke, yall!

Once we got back to our room, we walked over to the bowling alley to have dinner.  It's only about 200 yards away from the lodge, and there are pool tables on the second floor as well as a karaoke lounge.  I forgot for a few minutes that we weren't in the States at this point.  We were eating American food, surrounded by American people, and John Denver's "City of New Orleans" playing on the sound system.

After we ate, we walked down the hill to the Commissary to look around at what's available grocery-wise.  We're able to get most of what we're used to back in the States--even Dr. Pepper and Diet Pepsi!  I doubt we'll be drinking as much of either here, however.  As much walking as we'll be doing to get around the city, water is where it's at.  We bought some Vitamin D tablets since the sun rarely shines here this time of year.  It's cloudy and drizzly most of the time.  Vitamin D should help keep the blues away!

Speaking of water, Rich and I have been having regular water and hot chocolate dates downstairs in the lobby of the lodge.  There is complimentary water (with or without gas, more on that later), coffee, hot chocolate, espresso, and cappuccino 24/7.  

Disposable dishes and cups aren't the norm here.  Too wasteful.

Rich getting some water, without gas.

Rich should be home any minute now.  He rode with some other new co-workers to the base at Katterbach today.  We were hoping he'd get to see some beautiful scenery on the way, and I'm also hopeful that he was able to take some pictures.  

Once he gets here, we're planning to walk into downtown Wiesbaden to check out the Christmas market, or Weihnachtsmarkt.  I am SO EXCITED about this.  Anyone who knows me knows that I absolutely LOVE Christmas, so this will be an especially exciting thing for us!  Granted that the rain doesn't keep us in tonight, I'll share our Christmas market experience over the weekend!