Posts Tagged Germany
Put the Lime in Leimen
Because of all our exciting upcoming weekend activities the rest of this month, we had planned to take it easy this past weekend. We had a few things planned, but we had no idea how busy – or fun – our Saturday would turn out to be.
We woke up at 9:40, which was the latest we have slept since before mid-March. It was nice to sleep that late, but I also woke up in a panic because it was already so late in the day. We made it out the door an hour later and went to Schwetzingen to check out Spargel Samstag (Asparagus Saturday). Schwetzingen is known as the Spargel capital of the world. Yes, we moved from the music capital of the world to the asparagus capital. Exciting, I know.
Anyway, things were just getting started at the festival, and there wasn’t much exciting to do except maybe have a beer and watch older ladies model European fashion for their generation. Slightly entertaining, yes, but worth our time? No. I had really wanted to eat Spargel at the festival, but surprisingly, there were no booths like that. Oh, I must show you – this is what Spargel looks like:
Image taken from www.alibaba.com
Apparently, the farmers cover up the asparagus with soil in order to prevent photosynthesis. Thus, the asparagus tastes white. I have yet to taste it, but I have heard it’s sweeter and tender than green asparagus. C N Heidelberg posted her attempt at making Spargel mit Kratzete (white asparagus with pancake bits) here, and I’d really like to try to make it as well. It looks yummy!
Ok, I’m getting off track. Back to our day… since the festival wasn’t what we expected, we decided to grab a table at the Kaffeehaus and enjoy sandwiches for lunch. We headed back home to take Béni for a quick run to the park before doing the fastest change into nice clothes ever and going to the college graduation of a woman in John’s office. We left as soon as she walked the stage, which was about 2 hours later.
After running an errand or two, I convinced John to head over to Leimen, which is where I went to the Apotheke (pharmacy) earlier in the week. When I was there, it looked like they were also setting up for a festival, and I wanted to check it out.
It was a cute little spring festival, and we really had a good time. We both had bratwurst and a local beer while wandering around. I especially loved examining all the really old architecture in the city. Like Schwetzingen, Leimen dates back to the 700s. Crazy, right? These cities are 1,000 years older than the US!
One other thing that was great about the festival was the live music. An old man stood about 8 feet to the right of the conductor and did his own conducting and dancing to the music. It was incredibly endearing as well as entertaining!
I’m sorry if the play-by-play account of our Saturday was a bore. I really wish I had taken some photos to spice up the post, but I left my camera at home (probably a first for me!). Next time we’re in Leimen, I’ll be sure to take some good photos to share with everyone!
- Sarah
8 comments May 12, 2009
Sunday Stroll
My Canon SLR (single lens reflex) camera has been out of commission for over a year, because I’m a klutz and dropped my two nice lenses awhile back. When my parents came to visit, they brought the repaired lenses with them, and on Sunday, I finally got a chance to use my 50 mm fixed lens while on a walk with John by our home.
Back in September, we went for a walk along the same path. If you click the link, you’ll be able to scroll through all the fall photos from that walk. This time around, there were much more vibrant greens and the wonderful smell of fresh flowers.
I spent the afternoon editing the photos, but the color is still off, so for now, I just have two photos to show you.
The blue got a bit skewed in the upload. In my original file, it's much more vibrant.
Being a city girl, there's something so fascinating to me about farms and tractors.
As soon as I can get the color balanced to my satisfaction in the other photos, I’ll post them. As a side note, we watched Bolt last night. Even though it’s a kids’ movie, I really enjoyed it. (Who am I kidding? One of my favorite movies is still Beauty and the Beast.) Regardless, it’s worth renting once it comes out on DVD.
- Sarah
2 comments April 28, 2009
Pictures of Frühling in Deutschland
Because I have spent the day procrastinating instead of getting past page 1 on my cultural diversity paper, I don’t really have time for an update. However, I do have some fun snapshots I took (some just from the car) this weekend in sunny springtime Germany. Seriously, I have been in such a good mood lately, and I think I have the weather to thank.
Thank you, spring!
Enjoy the slideshow:
- Sarah
6 comments April 15, 2009
I Forgot the Words Y’all
Happy St. Patrick’s Day! I spent the morning baking beer bread for John’s office in celebration of the day. Are you doing anything to celebrate?
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For those of you who subscribe through Google Reader or something similar, I’ve noticed our videos tend to not show up, so if I mention a video in a post and you don’t see it, just head on over to our blog to view the video.
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On Friday, John and I got to take in an incredible concert in Mannheim: Jason Mraz (with Marit Larsen opening). Because it was the first time we had gone to a big-name concert together, I wanted to look nice so I wore heels. That turned out to be both a blessing and a curse…
The concert got off to a great start when I heard Marit count off her band with “en, to, tre,” which made me realize she’s Norwegian. That’s automatic cool points in my book. However, in between her set and Jason Mraz’s, my feet began to ache. They were rubbing the sides of my feet raw, and the balls of my feet were hurting from being in high heels and standing for so long. I should have thought about the fact that the concert was “standing room only” before I chose to wear those shoes. (Because the concert was a standing room only show, it was also smaller – probably about 2000-2500 people were in attendance.)
waiting for Jason Mraz to take the stage
You know how when you’re watching a show and you can see perfectly but then that ONE tall guy gets in front of you and blocks most – if not all – of your view? Imagine a room full of “that guy.” I don’t know when Germans got so tall, but I’d be surprised if the average height in that room wasn’t about 6’4″. It was ridiculous! So because of the tall factor, I am glad I had my high heels on. I’m sure some of the shorter girls around me couldn’t see a thing.
Finally Jason came on stage. He opened with 1000 Things, and after the intro ended up singing “I forgot the words y’all” before getting back on track and finishing the song very well. It was a nice recovery and gave everyone a laugh. I was amazed throughout the show by his talent. I have always enjoyed his recordings, but seeing him live gave me a new dimension of appreciation for his music. If you ever have a chance to go see him play, please do it!
Two other tidbits from his set: he mixed in Oasis’ Wonderwall and Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds and had some great audience participation with that. At one point, he had everyone turn to the person they came with and sing the line “every little thing is gonna be alright” and then turn and sing that same line to a stranger. Fun! Also, while introducing his band, he took Polaroids of each band member and tossed them out into the crowd. How cool is that?!
I put together some short clips from his song I’m Yours, which he introduced as “a little hippie song we like to play.” Unfortunately, my camera was running out of battery, so they’re choppy but it’s better than nothing.
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Don’t forget, our giveaway is coming up on Friday. I’m so excited that I want to tell everyone what it is, but I’m doing my best to keep it a secret. Here’s one hint for today: it’s a great substitute for one of my favorite things.
- Sarah
12 comments March 17, 2009
School Projects
My senior year of college, I had a decent amount of credit hours that I could use for electives, so I took an advanced Norwegian class which really taught me a lot. Unfortunately, a lot of it has gotten mixed up now with my Deutsch, but I’m confident that with some practice, I could bring it back.
As an ode to my countless hours of norsk studying, I bring you week’s Nostalgic Friday. The clip is a minute-long segment from our 15-minute video project. We were reading the Norwegian book Kurt, Quo Vadis? by Erlend Loe, and our professor assigned us a project in which we had to “make a movie” out of a section of the reading. In my group, we rotated who played which character depending on the scene (in order to get enough “air time” for each of us). In this scene, I was climbing to the top of a ladder to think and think and think. Oh yeah, and I’m playing Kurt, who works in construction and has a nice handlebar mustache. I think my favorite part of the clip is how the hat is way too big for me.
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Also, for your viewing pleasure, John stumbled across this ADORABLE video of a “whistling” puppy. Enjoy!
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Last night, we finally got to try out the restaurant Die Kartoffel (The Potato). Their main attraction is that you can order a steak that is served on a hot stone and cooked at your table. Knowing that was enough to pique my interest and send us over there last night. It’s not in Heidelberg, but it’s close enough – it’s about 15 minutes down the A5 in Ladenburg, which is essentially in Mannheim (it’s an outlying town, but it’s close to the city). The restaurant is in a medieval 16th century home and the food was tasty, so it’s definitely a place to bring visitors!
Have a great weekend!
- Sarah
7 comments March 13, 2009
Flight Line
John was supposed to be off from work today, but his office sent him to a briefing this morning from 8AM – noon. It stinks, but on the upside, he gets credit for working today and can take the rest of the day off without losing a day of leave.
As I mentioned yesterday, we’re going to see our puppy today!! I’m incredibly excited and will definitely take some pictures.
Later this afternoon, we’re heading to Ramstein, and of course, will eat dinner at Chili’s tonight. If you read our blog often, you know that Chili’s is a huge treat for us since there’s a lack of American-style restaurants near us. Last night’s dinner was a very typically German experience. We all ordered schnitzel and potato-based sides, which was a filling dinner!
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Serious.Life Magazine just published their March issue today, and I am in their Featured Blog Directory. The magazine has some great articles and content from bloggers. It’s owned and published by the Riggs family, who I have mentioned before (on Hi/Lo Thursdays). The family has seven kids, three adopted and one who has Leukemia (www.riggsfamilyblog.com). The magazine also gives away a bunch of ads to charities and ministries.
The subscription is FREE, so take a minute to check it out. If you like it, it’s easy to sign up to get future issues.
- Sarah
2 comments March 10, 2009
Snow and 45 degree weather minutes apart
It’s time for another “Not Me! Monday”! Unfortunately, I don’t have much to report this week, so it’ll be short.
Anyway, this blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.
I did not fully vacuum our apartment for the first time in months discovering our huge need for something else besides a broom & dust pan and electronic sweeper. I wish Dyson vacuums weren’t almost $400!
John and I like to read (for leisure, not for school), and we wanted to still exercise our brains while both of us were under the weather last week. Naturally, we read a lot and there’s absolutely no way we watched about 6 hours of TV one day. Not us.
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My parents got here EARLY Saturday morning. Their flight was supposed to arrive just after 7 AM, but instead, they got here just after 6 AM. We also have about an hour drive from where we live to get to the airport. Needless to say, we got up early. We explored Frankfurt a little bit after picking them p from the airport, but because it was so early, nothing was really open so we drove back to Heidelberg.
We toured the city a bit in the car and drove up to Königstuhl, which is about 10 minutes – maybe 15 – from where we live. It’s up at the top of the hill by our house. At the bottom of the hill, it was partly cloudy, but by the time we got to the top of the hill, it was foggy and guess what? snowy! I guess the previous day it had snowed up there, while it had only rained all day down where we live. This picture was taken up there:
my dad, me and my mom
Later in the day, we went to the Schwetzingen Schloßgarten (the Schwetzingen castle gardens) to walk around and this is how it looked:
Isn’t it crazy that these pictures were taken on the same day?
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Yesterday, we took my parents to our favorite restaurant (the Kaffeehaus am Schlossplatz in Schwetingen) for brunch, and they loved it! We will definitely go again before they leave. After brunch, John gave everyone a tour of his office and then we showed my parents the PX (Post Exchange), which is like a miniature Wal-Mart with a fairly poor selection, but hey, since we don’t have any other options, we’ll take it!
Today I’m attempting to get some schoolwork done, so I’d better get back to it. John is at work and my parents are relaxing and reading. Have a great Monday!
- Sarah
5 comments March 9, 2009
jfowens
osarah
obeni
