Oktoberfest

Exactly 200 years ago, King Ludwig I of Bavaria married Princess Therese of Saxony on October 7, and to celebrate publicly they organized a grand horse race in Munich on a place now called "Therese Field." Almost every year since then, the celebration has been commemorated as "Oktoberfest," although most of the fest's days land in September (This year, it ran from September 18 to October 4).

This year's poster

It's known for being hokey, crowded (over 6 million visitors came this year), and touristy - not exactly the "Europe through the Back Door" that someone like Rick Steves highlights. Although I have always been curious about the event, it seemed that it was not an essential German experience, especially since we've spent so much time in Munich, and I let it slip on my list of priorities.

Until Amberly. She and I met up in Paris in March of 2009 while she was visiting her parents in Europe, and for this year's rendezvous she proposed Munich, during Oktoberfest. I didn't need much convincing. Thus, last weekend, while Chris used the vacant house for some serious work on his applications, Daisy and I spent four nights and experienced four cities in Bavaria. I hesitantly checked out Oktoberfest and observed our lovely Munich, pulsing with the beat of the iconic festival, proving itself to be above the hoke and cheese.

I've heard people compare the event to a drunken Halloween, since everyone dresses up and there's a lot of beer. However, I'd like to spend a little time refining that idea based on my experiences.

In my opinion, it's more like a Renaissance Fair than Halloween, but even nicer, since the period costumes look absolutely sharp. Men wear finely stitched Lederhosen with crisp checked shirts, knitted socks, and sometimes buttoned earth-tone cardigans. They all look like they are goin' courtin', no matter their ages. Whatever the men's tradition for those calf socks is, it looks pretty cool. (To hold a knife for wood carving?) Women of all shapes and sizes look amazing in their Dirndls, complete with frilly petticoats, colorful aprons, flirtatious white blouses, and tied-up bodices.

Department store window

I didn't even know designers made clothes like these...or with these prices:

Dirndls: 699 Euros, 1750 Euros

So, my first point is that dressing up makes people at Oktoberfest look better, not worse. Next, I learned that, contrary to it being overrun by Americans, Bavarians compose about 75% of the attendees. The locals actually like it! For example, look at this eyeglasses store window I noticed in a non-touristy part of the city:

You wouldn't do this to your store if your neighbors hated Oktoberfest

In addition, it's not just for wild college students. I saw with my own eyes tenderly-dressed families enjoying pony rides and carousels together, holding hands with gingerbread hearts around their necks. It's a heartwarming and kid-friendly event.

Daisy, helping me out with a giant pretzel

Jesse, Susan, Nate, and Amberly at the carnival rides

Well, if I had the only pen in the world, Oktoberfest would be re-billed as a festival for families, local German traditions, and high fashion. What I've conveniently left out of the story are The Tents.

In front of one of the 14 tents

All the breweries of Munich pitch a huge tent, hire a brass band, and release their special Oktoberfest brew. It comes in liters, which are carried 6 at a time by the hardworking ladies with starched white caps. People book reservations for a particular tent in advance by phone. It sounded a little to wild to bring a two year old to, but I got to sneak in with Amberly and Nate to watch for a while. Even though I didn't have a beer, I was still swept away by the music and singing and wanted to join the groups of friends dancing on tables and waving their steins. Next time.

Because of the other-worldly atmosphere of the tents and the potentially quick consumption of multiple liters of beer, I wasn't surprised to see a little stumbling or scrapping outside. I admit that Oktoberfest has its unsavory aspects. Overall, though, I was impressed by how good-natured and un-tacky the whole ritual is. Maybe I'd go again, maybe not...I'll go if you go.

Baden-Baden: More than Bathing-Bathing

Augustaplatz, across the street from our hotel

Baden-Baden enjoyed its heyday in the late 1800's, drawing visitors from England (the English are responsible for the lovely riverside promenades), Russia (Russians still own many hotels here), and France (where gambling was illegal, making Baden-Baden's casino a hot spot). Back then, there were three times as many rooms for rent in the city as there are today. It is still a polished resort, but not overwhelmingly "touristy:" We could barely find souvenir shops as we hunted for a cuckoo clock (unsuccessful).            

As soon as we checked into our hotel, we set the kids loose in a sprawling park with plenty of fountains, playground equipment, and horse-drawn carriages. Daisy had so much fun playing with Jack. I believe that Jenny and I collectively have a thousand pictures of the pair.

 For dinner, we went to a traditional Biergarten, where Luke had his first Wienerschnitzel. I'm pretty sure that's a bigger a deal to me than it is to him. The lederhosen-clad servers were really attentive to Daisy and Jack, bringing them rounds of new toys every thirty minutes, even replacing Jack's balloon when he popped it.

 You've already heard about the baths. After that, we walked along the Oos river, seeing the beautiful old Trinkhalle, casino, and rose gardens. We achieved nap time and seized the moment by parking the buggies at Cafe König and ordering some predictably delicious Black Forest cake.

More hugs

The kids thought this a perfect place to run laps.

 The ruins of the old Roman bath and steam rooms are still preserved. It is so hard for me to believe that the thermal water that we see pumping out of a spigot in the wall today -->
is drawing from the same source as 2,000 years ago. Sometimes, change doesn't surprise me as much as continuity.

Another remnant of Roman times is this church, which has been modified in stages since then. We came at a perfect time of day and I tried to capture the rich kaleidoscope of color streaming in through the windows.

With our remaining time, we took a bus ride and funicular up to Mount Merkur, providing us with great views over Baden-Baden and the Black Forest. We could see Alsace in the distance, old castle ruins from the 1100's, and tons of paragliders taking advantage of the sunny Sunday afternoon. A nice local couple enjoyed pointing out the landmarks, their house, and where they had ridden their bikes that morning. Their grown daughter lives in Atlanta with her family, and they just recently brought their grandson a cuckoo clock. We stayed for lunch at one of the restaurant's picnic tables perched on the edge of the peak.

Important to have reading material for bus rides, no?

It was hard to leave after such a relaxing, sunny, and friend-filled weekend. We never ran out of things to talk about with Luke and Jenny, and we hope to see them again soon! Maybe to get the kids on skis...you can bet that we'd come away with two thousand pictures if that happens :)

Baden-Baden: Life is but a Dream

We've all had those kinds of dreams - the ones that hopelessly mix up the past and the present with the completely wacky. Sometimes I try to remember them and reflect on possible interpretations. Here's an anecdote that Freud would have had a field day with:

I'm swimming with my friend named Jenny, whom I haven't talked to since elementary school. I remember being in our kindergarten production of the The Little Engine that Could together in California. We're in Germany now, randomly, bobbing to and fro in this shallow bubbling pool.  As if to prove to ourselves that we're all grown up, we swap stories of the labor and births of our children. I look from the mosaic ceiling to the edge of the pool and am surprised to see a reproduction of Bernini's Apollo and Daphne, the original of which I had just admired in Rome four months ago. Once again, I marvel at the way Daphne's hair separates into fine leaves as she's turning into a tree. I think that my toes look like leaves on my right leg. As my drifting gaze reaches the clock, I realize that our time is up, and Jenny and I step out of the bath, naked. My hands feel empty without a towel to clutch for modesty. We walk through a doorway and see a bright, magnificent hall with sculpted cherubs ringing the dome above our heads. There is a pool here, too. We slip in and start to swim. A few men approach the neighboring showers, but we pretend not to see them.

If this summary was describing a dream, there would be plenty of symbols to unpack. The long-lost friendship, nudity, and strange surroundings are all classic elements of that "really weird dream last night." As it turns out, though, this was not a dream but something that I experienced last weekend in waking life. 

Baden-Baden (literally: bathe-bathe) is a relaxed resort sporting Parisian architecture and cypress trees. Though it is situated on the northern tip of Germany's Black Forest, it is not far from Alsace and exudes a French je ne sais quoi. Its hot mineral springs were taken advantage of in Roman times, and the tradition of bathing here continues to attract seekers of health and rejuvenation. Baden-Baden is also roughly halfway between our town of Muelheim and the Swiss home of our friends, the Whitakers.

Luke and Jenny Whitaker have a son named Jack, who is Daisy's age. Our reconnection after approximately 15 years began through Facebook; the Whitakers decided that they were moving to Switzerland from Colorado and were searching for tips from other Americans living in Europe. After they made the big move, we began planning the combined-family trip to Baden-Baden, excited to get to know each other again.

What better way is there to break the ice and develop a personal bond with someone than to visit the Friedrichsbad together?

The domes of the Friedrichsbad

The Friedrichsbad opened in 1877 at the height of the city's reputation as the European summer capital. Celebrities such as Dostoevsky, Napoleon III, Queen Victoria, Berlioz, and Brahms stayed in Baden-Baden for its casino, baths, and gardens (Dostoevsky wrote The Gambler after losing all his money here and Tolstoy changed the name of this city for a scene in Anna Karenina.) Steam rises from certain places in the ground and we got to taste some thermal water in its natural state from an outdoor spigot. The baths offer mineral thermal baths of various temperatures, saunas, and massages. There are actually two different baths facing off on the same square: the sporty Caracalla spa, where people wear bathing suits, and the solemn Friedrichsbad...where people don't wear bathing suits.

Why in the world did we decide to go to a nudist spa together? When I read that the Friedrichsbad would be "a shame to miss just because you're intimidated by nudity," it felt like a challenge to me. A line of Mark Twain's (who, coincidentally, was also a patron of the Friedrichsbad) kept haunting me: "Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do." Since moving to Europe, I have also become more fascinated by the concept of "separation of nudity and sexuality." Given my experimental inclinations and the daring personalities of the Whitakers (this was probably nothing compared to skydiving), it was a natural decision to situate Jack and Daisy in the spa's wonderful child care service and go ahead and try something new.

Here we go!

You might be pleased to know that we did try to keep some degree of propriety: the baths are completely coed on four days of the week and we specifically targeted Saturday for the "separate" nature of the day: the men and women enter through different changing rooms and wind through 17 stages, only meeting at #11, the large domed pool in the center of the complex. Chris and Luke began much earlier than Jenny and I did, and I think that we were all rather relieved to avoid the group encounter.

Now, I might sound pretty nonchalant about this whole experience, but I admit that there were giggles. For example, when Jenny and I missed something very important on the door to "our" locker room, where we completely undressed and only at the last minute heard voices cuing us to throw towels around ourselves:

The male attendant, alerted to our presence, kept assuring us that it was no big deal as he led us to the correct changing room, since it was mixed most days of the week anyway.

We nervously began the 17-stage, 3-hour ritual, gradually becoming used to the clinical attendants in white and becoming more relaxed. In each room, there was a clock on the wall and a description of the treatment in the room with the amount of time one should stay in there. Looking back on it, I truly felt clean and transformed in a way that would have been impossible if I had been wearing a bathing suit.

The Friedrichsbad is known as the Roman-Irish bath because of its mix of water (Roman) and Irish ("hot air baths," pretty similar to saunas). The stages were frequently broken up by fabulously drenching showers to remove sweat or massage soaps. To summarize the chart above, we began with medium and very hot air rooms, enjoyed a wonderful thermal steam room, got a scruffing soap-and-brush full body massage, floated in a whirlpool bath, swam in a few larger pools (including the famous "mixed" dome) and ended with a cold plunge. "Drying off" with warm barley-corn towels was its own stage (4 minutes). We then promptly disposed of the things and hung out in the mirrored lotion room. My skin felt amazing.

The next room felt like something from a movie: pale yellow and lavender, silent, and circular, with concentric circles of beds. Warm light shone through the curtains. Our attendant motioned for us to choose a bed; when we did, she proceeded to swaddle us with the wide sheets and blankets covering each bed. Even our heads got tucked in. She then asked when we would like get woken up (20 minutes). As I was struggling to sleep, I kept returning to thoughts of people like Van Gogh in sanitariums possibly like this. Even though I liked it, I would go crazy if I had to be in there on a regular basis. Finally, we were given towels to keep, and we luxuriously draped ourselves with them and sat down to some hot tea and magazines in the reading room. That was supposed to be 30 minutes, but by then we were starting to feel the three hours away from Daisy and Jack. There weren't any English magazines, anyway. We finished our tea and got dressed. As we left, perhaps feeling the "five years younger" as advertised, we paused to commit to memory the peace and tranquility of these baths. I think it was a priceless experience and I would encourage any visitor in Baden-Baden to go.

My now very good friend, Jenny

For more on the same experience but through different eyes, you can check out Jenny's blog.

We couples, now reunited, recounted the events of the last few hours: next time I'll choose the hard brush; you would not believe what the woman in front of me was doing; how long did you stay in the cold plunge; what kind of tea did you choose; did you fall asleep in the quiet room; I'd come here once a month if I lived here...

Clean and Serene, Bathed and Bonded

Rhyme Time

We have built up a fair collection of books by the dynamite duo Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. Our first few were purchased in Scarborough, England. Even if you didn't know that they were British, you would soon find out if you just flipped through a book or two: Monkey is looking for his Mum, George looks very smart in his new trousers, and scarf is supposed to rhyme with laugh. Unfortunately, Daisy lets us read that line only by pronouncing it as larf.

Perhaps Daisy's favorite activity is reciting her books, which are all memorized to various degrees. It did not take long for the catchy Donaldson rhymes to lodge in her brain, and hence our days are paralleled by a constant stream of storytelling. Besides finding Daisy's voice as sweet as Nutella and the rhythm of spoken words as relaxing as Gregorian Chant, I educationally endorse these books because rhyming is a crucial building block of reading and spelling. With these books, the "Willaby Wallaby Waisy, an elephant sat on Daisy" song, and her Rhymes puzzle, I have a tidy literacy unit that comes in handy on rainy days. Have I mentioned that we have our fair share of those?

I caught one of Daisy's recitations on tape a month ago while she was sitting on her potty after a bath. Oh, is she good at stalling before bedtime! If you can look past my clunky editing, along with the shameful dark circles under her eyes and her lack of clothing, I believe that you'll enjoy her artful performance. It's a story about a respectable dad who happens to be a stick, but out in the big wide world, other people and animals find him expendable.

Video:

The List

What's this I found next to our bed? Not my nighttime reading material...

My husband, recently a graduate student, has transformed into future Professor Christopher C. Scarborough. As the first deadline of September 24 approaches, Chris is trying to publish papers, create brilliant research ideas, and sort through the unique application demands of each school. Despite the hours Chris is working, he lingers at the breakfast table with a pot of tea and makes sure to come home for dinner and playtime with Daisy before running back to the library. It feels like we're a team; I've had way too much fun making excel sheets for the application requirements of each school and doing everything secretarial that I can think of.

Although we have "no idea" where we'll be next year, it will most likely be one of these schools that are currently on his application list (ranked according to graduate chemistry programs in decreasing order). If all we're left with is Iowa and Detroit, though, we might opt to stay in Europe after all...

Cal Tech (Pasadena, CA) MIT (Cambridge, MA) UC- Berkeley (Berkeley, CA)

Stanford University (Palo Alto, CA)

Harvard University (Cambridge, MA) University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign, IL)

University of Wisconsin (Madison, WI)

Northwestern University (Evanston, IL)

Cornell University (Ithaca, NY) University of Texas - Austin (Austin, TX) University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill (Chapel Hill, NC)

University of Chicago (Chicago, IL) Princeton University (Princeton, NJ) University of Michigan (Ann Arbor, MI)

UC - San Diego (La Jolla, CA)

University of Minnesota (Twin Cities, MN)

University of Washington (Seattle, WA)

Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA)

Washington Univ. in St. Louis (St. Louis, MO)

Emory University (Atlanta, GA)

Iowa State University (Ames, IA)

Boston College (Boston, MA) Duke University (Durham, NC)

Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh, PA) University of Rochester (Rochester, NY) USC (Los Angeles, CA) Virginia Tech (Blacksburg, VA)

North Carolina State (Raleigh, NC)

Notre Dame University (South Bend, IN)

University of Iowa (Iowa City, IA)

Wayne State University (Detroit, MI)

Univ of Nebraska - Lincoln (Lincoln, NE) Univ of Oklahoma (Norman, OK) Univ of Vermont (Burlington, VT)

Temple University (Philadelphia, PA) Univ of New Mexico (Albuquerque, NM)

Oklahoma State University (Stillwater, OK) UC-Merced (Merced, CA) *Unranked because it's so new McGill University (Montreal, Canada) *Unranked because it's not in the US

The first step is to apply. Then, Chris WILL be invited for some interviews. After these go well and he has offers pouring in, we'll start talking about what our options are. Until then, I have "no idea."

Encyclopedia of German Culture

We've found it: a rigorous study of life in Germany, an insightful collection of customs, traditions, and social mores. Install it in German classes, gift it to new German residents - this trustworthy encyclopedia of German culture is straight from the horse's mouth.

I present to you The Conni Books: 99 cents, pocket-sized paperbacks, each sold separately.
Oh, yes, it's written for children. But don't adults return to a form of childhood when they begin a new life as a foreigner? (I have a bit to say on that subject, but it can wait for a later post.) Chris and I like learning new vocab words, Daisy likes to - need I say it? - memorize and recite the text, and we all enjoy the mini snapshots they provide of German life.

One of the first things that Conni cleared up for us was the purpose of the Schultüte (school package). Kids here go to Kindergarten from age 3-6, and then head to their "first day of school" at age 6, like the American first grade. This is considered a big milestone; grandparents even come over for breakfast that day to send them off. Shops also exhibit a colorful variety of large cardboard or plastic cones. Chris and I knew that they were for candy or toys., but questions remained unsolved....were they presents for the teacher? Surprises for the kids? Do the kids exchange candy on the first day like Valentines in US elementary schools?

Would you have guessed that the kids get the exciting package that morning, carry it to school and place it beside their desks...still unopened...and schlepp it home again at the end of the day to finally see what's inside?
Well, that's the tradition. Thank you, Conni. The text here kind of translates as "Once she's home, Conni's finally allowed to unpack her cone. So much is inside! Too bad you only get a Schultüte on the first day of school."

Here's Conni at a trip to the sea - yes, topless. It's all part of that European comfort with nudity. You should see the page where they're waiting in line for the showers in the dressing room!

Here's the St. Nicolas tradition of cleaning your boots on the night of December 5 and finding them filled with treats the next morning:

Later in that book, there's this cozy portrayal of a Christmas market. Everything's here: the Lebkuchen (gingerbread), Heisse Maroni (roasted chestnuts), the organ guy...this will bring back such good memories someday.

Apparently, I've been wasting my energy as I try to come up with my own descriptions of life in Germany - it's all published! It's a little deflating when I realize that I'm hardly a Lewis or a Clark as I explore this new country. I guess the good part is that now I don't have to photograph other people's kids at the beach or creepily stalk children on their first day of school to add pictures to my blog posts. The Conni Books will surely stay on our bookshelves for years to come, a wonderful "encyclopedia" for teaching Daisy and reliving our experiences here.

New Shoes

Since it rains yearlong here, it's high time that Daisy had some rubberboots.

They went on their first outing this morning to a freshly showered playground. Daisy was kind enough to pose for a picture before heading out the door.

And this is what I get when I ask her to smile...

Watch out, it's puddle-jumping time!

A Prayer to Share

I found this on a friend's blog, loved the message of living boldly, and was surprised by the author, though it makes sense when one considers the ocean imagery. A perfect creed for our voyage "over the ocean!"

Disturb us, Lord, when

We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

- Sir Francis Drake, 1577

Candy from Strangers

My comment about Hansel and Gretel at the end of my last post reminded me of something I've wanted to share for a long time now.

Daisy loves going on errands with me. We visit the Apotheke and they hand her a new rubber ducky that changes colors in the bathtub. We step inside the Fleischerei and they reach over to give her a special slice of meat. The bookstore slips free kids' paperbacks in my bag. The fish stand peeled and cored a free apple for Daisy, and an old-fashioned restaurant surprised her with a bowl of fresh strawberries with cream. She can count on raking in sugar cookies at the tea shop and mini rolls from the bakery, stickers from the train conductors and apricots from the fruit stands.

My German friends dismiss these freebies as marketing ploys - and the strawberries with cream were probably to get her to stop crying, admittedly - but I insist that it displays a cultural appreciation of children. As our dear downstairs neighbor, Frau Pieper, says, "Kinder immer erste," (children always first). The willingness to devote so much attention to children may be because of a lower birthrate here; out of 223 countries in the world, the bottom five according to 2010 CIA estimates are: Germany, Italy, Hong Kong, Japan, and Monaco. (By contrast, the United States stands at #151, sandwiched between Netherlands Antilles and New Zealand. See full list here.)

Besides, it's not just the stores that pamper the little darlings. I remember the first time an elderly gentleman pulled a piece of candy out of his pocket to give to Daisy. He was sitting near us on a bench in the mall and enjoyed seeing her run around. (I ended up tossing it a few minutes later.) Last week, a woman in front of me in line at the bakery saw Daisy, turned around to order, and deposited a chocolate croissant in Daisy's lap on the way out. (I let her eat that one - even though the woman never asked me if it was ok).

These German women don't seem to place much stock in what the Mama thinks - I'm new at this, and they're experienced. I became accustomed to strangers tugging down Daisy's pant legs in the winter, frowning when they touched her cold hands. A woman once went to great lengths to clean Daisy's face that still had remnants of her breakfast smoothie on it (boarding a tram together, reeling while taking a tissue out of her purse; dousing with mineral water from her bottle, spilling on the floor of the train; I was allowed to do the actual wiping of Daisy's face. She took the wet, dirty tissue after I was done, though). Recently, while at the pool with Daisy, a friendly woman offered to watch Daisy while I swam a few laps. Although I'm 100% sure that Daisy wouldn't have minded and that the woman was trustworthy, I still could not bring myself to do such a risky thing. Apparently, the community works like this. It's really "taking the village to raise the child," something that I support in concept, but can't quite participate in. It's obviously not my village yet.

At any rate, I have a feeling that Daisy will remember her toddlerhood in Germany as one big, tasty gingerbread house. And I might remember it as learning to accept candy from strangers.