Josh the Weinachts Lottery Winner

Ok, so as we wander through this adventure, it has been great to experience the German customs and traditions, especially around the Weinachts holiday.  To you who think I just sneezed while typing, that is German for Christmas.

As gluhwein, which is a spiced, hot wine that really is the center of the Weinachts festivals, is served by the barrel full, there are countless other delicious treats to pair with it. Shwein schnitzel (pork chop sans the bone) and mushrooms on a non fitting bun, or a bratwurst on a really non fitting bun, or the mother load of deliciousness........racelette mit brot.

So before I stepped into a line, I tried to figure it out.  Imagine a cartoon-size wheel of cheese, cut in half, and on a moveable rack.  Directly above the massive half round of goodness, is a heat lamp that causes the cheese to bubble and bake tender brown in under 20 seconds.  Now the movable part comes in, as does the brot part.  (Brot is bread, by the way). Once the bubbling cheese is ready, the server guy swings the arm out from under the lamp, and scrapes the bubbly mess onto the awaiting peice of bread. Voila! A pizza without sauce, or a fondue without the cleanup.  But here is the best part:  some like it just like that, others go one step further and add zweibeln (onions) and gerkens (pickles), others go all in and get that, plus shinken (bacon).  

When I was about number three from the front, the festival meister came by to ensure the stand was closing because the whole fest ended like an hour earlier.  Well, not really knowing how to say " HELL NO, I have been wating a long time here, I have finally figured it out, and I want my bread with onions, pickles, and ham on it!", I snuggled up tight behind the rotund lady in front of me who apparently was deemed the cutoff.  I think I made her day.......any way, she acted like we were together, and I knew I was in.  

Finally, I am to the point where I understand how much things cost and how to make proper change, instead of holding out all my money like a five year old, so I handed the fella my money and he handed me the goey mess of heaven.  Now, I know that the combination does not sound that appetizing, but I can assure you, you do not want to miss out if you ever see such a stand at your local market.  More so, if you are lucky enough to get the "cheesy crust" like I was, you apparently have won the weinachts raclette lottery, so revel in your victory.  More importantly, if a large lady helped you get the last one served for the night, you can really acheive rock star status, at least in her eyes, by sharing said crust with her.

What fun we are having, hope you are too, and that the holidays find you all well.

Josh, the Raclette lottery winner

It'a a wrap!

Some of you know that our family has recently been involved in the filming of a US television show called House Hunters International.  It is a program aired on HGTV, a cable or satellite channel that features home and garden programs.  This particular show follows families or individuals as they move abroad and try to find a home.  They highlight both the real estate market at the destination as well as try to highlight the city itself.  It is described as a combination travel and real estate program.  They came and filmed us in Memphis/Collierville to document our "backstory", home, and daily life there, then came to Germany and followed us while house hunting here too.  They also came recently and filmed the home that we chose and a few snippets of our new life here.  It has been a fun and fascinating process to be a part of and we have loved the crews that we worked with!  As of now, according to our producer, it is a "wrap"!  We are hoping the 50 million tapes will go to edit now and have been told to anticipate a spring airing of the episode.  Unfortunately, the airline lost a key piece of luggage containing camera lights and batteries so the poor crew had to scramble to come up with some substitutions for about 3 days of filming and wound up having to film us for more days here an originally anticipated.  We are hoping those days will not have to be reshot, but should know something more definite soon.  Anyway, the boys have found new potential careers that they are now interested in and we found more friends abroad.  We are so grateful for the experience!  

Neighbors' First Impressions of the Halletts

I feel like I lecture my kids about this all of the time...it goes something like this:  "People will form a long lasting opinion of you, without even realizing it, upon first meeting you so make a good first impression. It takes longer for them to change their opinion and much more time invested by you"...Keeping that in mind, I was told at some point that there was an "aristocrat" living in our building.  Frau Von Something.  Anyway, last thurs, late in the evening after receiving all of our household goods and dealing with movers for 8 hours, I went back to wiping out cabinets, etc to prep for the inloading. This also after a few trips out in the drizzle. Let me just say, not my best look. Anyway, I headed out to the trash area to get rid of some stuff and wound up meeting a lovely, older woman who was dressed in a beautiful cardigan set, dress pants, and pearls, and who spoke some English, but not much. It started with a simple "guten abend" before her face lit up and she said "You must be the new family upstairs.  Your husband is a pilot?" She and I spoke for about 10 minutes and promised to get together for coffee to get to know one another better. During this conversation, It never occurs to me that I am wearing the apron pictured below or that I look like a drowned rat, until I get back on the elevator and see my reflection.  I get upstairs and tell Josh and The Boys about my new friend and what I was wearing.  Josh is cracking up, saying "NO you were not!!!" (and takes the below photo). Of course, I later find out that she is Frau Von Aristocrat (so lovely;  I never felt judged).  I apologized to her days later for not realizing that I had the silly apron on.  She kindly looked confused and said that she noticed no such thing.  Seriously, how can you not notice...she is too kind.

Later the same evening, we made another great first impression, I think.  When we first moved in, they were working on some pipes in the floor of our unit and ceiling of the flat below us (who is occupied by the Spanish Consulate).  Since our kitchen water/dishwasher was unable to be utilized during this time (two weeks), we were given keys to an empty flat on another floor to use that kitchen to take care of dishes. Our first night after delivery, around 10 pm, about an hour after the garbage/apron meeting, I had loaded this bin of dirty dishes into the elevator and turned away to get something else. Evidently someone else called the elevator so it left without me and it arrived to get them like this: 

No person in it, just a container of dirty dishes...can you imagine getting home to your beautiful flat, after a long day's work and opening the elevator to find this?  Turned out to be the Spanish Consulate, who happened to cause the long delay in the repair work so I didn't feel so badly in the end.  Perhaps he got the gist as the plumbers fixed the issue the next day and we had working water and dishwasher in the kitchen!  I am sure our neighbors love us...

Just when I thought I was blending in...

Just when I thought I was fitting in...I have been taking the u-bahn (combo of surface trolley and subway) to the grocery store to fill our mini-bar sized fridge a few times a week, with my rolling bag and a few other reusable bags. Yesterday, at the stop where I get back on to go our place, I had to carry this cart down the steps since the escalator only goes up at this particular stop. As I picked up the cart, one hand on the top and one on the bottom kickstand-looking thing, one of the wheels came off and bounced down two flights of stairs before landing on it's round edge in the gutter and rolling down the third flight, picking up speed as it went. As I stood there absolutely cracking up and laughing out loud, the other wheel came off, just as the first one shot out of the mouth of the gutter and rolled across the station concourse ricochetting to a flying stop near a coffee shop. I couldn't make eye contact with anyone. I just kept walking down the stairs laughing and walked over to retrieve the wheels laying on their sides scattered about the station. I examined them like I knew what to look for, jammed them back on the axel looking thing and pushed a paperclip looking thing into what I thought was the locked position. I continued down the next flight of stairs to the platform where two, very amused, older women said something friendly to me in German. I asked in German if they spoke English and wound up making two new friends on the ride home. Now I know where to buy a German made wheely cart (I still don't know what these are called though) who's wheels hopefully won't fly off in front of so many stoic Germans. :) I don't think I quite fit in yet...

Searching for Julie Andrews 11/11

Due to some new EU immigration policies, our registration and move in process is taking a little longer than expected.  Before we arrived in country, we rented a home (the 70's style indoor garage sale...) to stay in while house hunting, getting settled, etc. We were originally told that the process would take 2-3 days plus house hunting and to expect a no more than a month of temporary living. That has all shifted to two months now.  Of course, as luck would have it, our month-long rental ended on the day before the largest, annual conference in Dusseldorf began and another couple were checking in on the afternoon of our scheduled departure.  Additionally, ALL hotel rooms in Dusseldorf,  Cologne (about 30 minutes away), and the surrounding areas were all sold out.  Since the flat we have found isn't quite ready, we decided to head off on an adventure for a few days until a hotel room in Dusseldorf became available.  It turned out to be a three day gap. We found on-line what sounded like a fun hotel, with a pool (not too common here) for the kids, about an hour and 15 minutes away.  We rented a storage unit, made several trips to fill it with our stuff, and took off with about 4 suitcases and the dog.  What a pleasant surprise awaited us upon arrival at this typically European hotel.  It was quaint and historic and in the German version of Napa Valley.  The restaurant is an award winning one and of course, they serve local wines in additional to the typical fare.   On our first night there, Josh had to leave on a 5 day trip, so the boys and I ventured out the next day on our own.  Driving through the surrounding mountains and rolling hills was breathtaking!  Even the boys commented on how beautiful it was.  Once we left the vineyard covered valleys it felt like we were driving through the movie set of The Sound of Music.  I was just waiting for Julie Andrews to come skipping over the one of the hills, singing in her nanny apron and skirt.  I love it when bumps in the road turn into such a beautiful surprises!

Garbage sorting as an Olympic sport

I always heard that Europe was more ecologically aware than we are in the US, but never imagined to what extent.  We have now decided that they should add German garbage sorting as a new, exposition/demonstration sport in the summer 2012 London Olympics.  We are required to sort our trash into 4 categories.  There are separate, color coded garbage cans for each.  You are on your own to come up with a system for in your kitchen.  Newer kitchens actually have trash ares that have 4 designated areas.  Yellow is for plastic and metal.  This would include cans and plastic bottles, but also ziploc bags, envelopes that have a plastic window or "coated" paper. Blue is for paper-easy, also includes cardboard.  Brown is for "bio". This is essentially anything that my Aunt Riki would compost; tea bags, egg shells, raw foods like the brown ends you cut off of celery.  Last is black or grey.  This is for "other household trash".  Seems straight forward, right?  So here are our dilemma items:  Where do you put a used tissue?  Paper, bio or household?  Where to you put cooked fish bones or mussel shells?  We went with bio on the fish bones-wrong, they go in household...see what I mean?  You could create all kinds of sorting challenges!!!  I am sure my brother, Greg is loving it!  I also suspect that he is secretly jealous that he only has two categories of sorting in his little village...

Karnival 11.11.11 at 11:11

Rolf, the hotel GM and our guide, giving a brief history of Karnival

Brokeback husband (as named by our friend, Bob), Hayden the musketeer, and Connor the creepy strangler!

Bob and Brokeback Josh 

I had never seen so many brats on a grill before!

Karnival season opens on 11/11 every year in cities throughout Germany.  Cologne evidently is know to have the largest celebration of this so, of course, we had to go.  "Karnival season", also called "The 5th season" is the period between 11/11 and the following Ash Wednesday.  The largest day of celebration of the entire season is Rosenmontag, the Monday prior to Ash Wednesday.  The second biggest day, evidently is 11/11.  This year was special as it was 11/11/11 and the entire thing officially kicks off at 11:11 am.  This morning and season of celebration basically is a combination of Marti Gras, tailgating, halloween, and perhaps the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.  Honestly, that is an awful summary.  It is a sea of happy people (almost all adults), dressed in fantastic costumes, drinking beer, eating brats, dancing and enjoying music and just hanging out.  We started our day in costume by getting on the u-baun at our local stop.  Walking the 4 blocks there, we passed several people but no others in costume.  The boys must have asked 4 or 5 times if we were sure it was the right day.  We were the first in costume among others at the stop, but within minutes two or three other costumed people showed up-tinkerbell and some crazy looking clownish woman.  The boys were relieved. At each stop, more and more costumed people got on.  Mostly adults over the age of 50 in full regalia.  It was hysterical at times.  We met with other Fedex families at the hotel that has sort of become our base.  The hotel has been the main sponsor of the event for 40 years and the general manager, who was being interviewed and featured on local television, kindly offered to take a group of us down and show us the ropes.  He gave us a quick history lesson on Karnival, the three main "characters", and the overall event.  He surprised us by opening up a box of his personal collection of float medallions, that he had collected over the years and placed one around each of our necks, while giving a quick history or description of each of the medallions. He bravely led us through the enormous crowds almost all the way to the main stage.  We eventually had to stop about a block back from the stage as the politzei had started blocking off areas of people to keep the crowds under control.  All in all, it was quite a festive time, with a great group of people and a terrific band set up just next to us.  Thanks to Rolf for guiding us through and keeping us on track!

Adventures in Amsterdam Nov 2011

So we ventured out of our new "home country" for the first time to spend the weekend in Amsterdam (The Netherlands).  First dilemma we had, evidently Baxter, our 12 pound dog, needs a dog passport.  Seriously??? Anyway, it was already Saturday morning so we packed all of the documents required to get him into Germany and hoped for the best.  I don't know who inspects the aforementioned pet passports, but no one asked us for anything all weekend.  Amsterdam is only 2 1/2 hours from where we are currently living so it was an easy trip, other than the coffee machine incident. Got checked into the hotel, got a local map, and off we went.  We walked all over the city, checking out architecture, local art, a special Rembrandt exhibit, and finally boarded an indoor boat for a canal cruise of the city.  The boat tour was great, and a nice break from the brisk day we had ventured out on.  On the way back to the dinner and the hotel, we walked by a store that had a display of some very funny t-shirts.  The kids were cracking up at many of them...more on that later.  There were extensive cheese shops, a few marijuana stores (no kidding), some souvenir shops, and some upscale shopping as well in addition to tons of great smelling restaurants.  We found a good Argentinian restaurant for dinner, headed back to the hotel, got the kids settled, and printed tickets for a tour of Anne Frank's House for the next day.  Morning two: most of Europe is pet friendly, but even with Baxter in a backpack with just his little furry head sticking out, Anne Frank's house is not.  We knew this might be a possibility, so once there and denied, we broke into two groups.  C and I went into the house/museum while Josh and H went to the coffee shop next door.  C and I toured for about an hour, then switched with Josh and H.  If it took them an hour too, it would put us right at check out time of the hotel, which was about a 30 minute walk away.  We decided as a group that C and I would head back to the hotel, get us all set to check out, request a late check out, then we'd all regroup there.  As we headed off, C asked me if we could go back to the funny t-shirt place to get a T-shirt for his birthday, that we all laughed about most of the previous night.  If you have ever been to Amsterdam you know that the city is a myriad of winding streets, "ring" streets, a million people on bikes who pay no mind to street signals or right-of-way, and lots of canals.  Nothing is straight or grid like.  In my opinion, it is one of the cities one is mostly likely to get lost in without a map.  I knew roughly where the t-shirt place was and was fairly sure I could find it within a block or so, so off we went in that direction instead of towards the hotel.  Now, picture this, my blond haired, blue-eyed 11 year old, my little 12 pound fuzz ball of a dog wearing a doggie jacket (since he was shivering the day before), and me-blown dry, dressed normally, you get the picture, walking along...Anyway, we were about a block or two off according to the map and my estimation of where we saw this tiny t-shirt joint the day before, so C and I ventured one more block north and then headed east.  Have you ever been to the "red light" district in Amsterdam???  If so, I am sure you are saying no anyway, but I can now not only say that I have been there, but that I also brought my innocent 11 year old and my dog too!!!  Holy smokes!  I took my first born down an alley of buildings with large panes of glass and women dressed in incredibly revealing outfits (that is really overestimating those straps by calling them outfits), sitting in the windows, or slithering around on bed like shelves, or with their rear ends shaking in the windows at passers by.  One woman was sitting in a chair, reading a magazine (I think), with bent knees and her stillettoed feet spread far apart, wearing the stilettos, thigh-high stockings, garters, a patent leather looking thong, a matching strappy patent leather looking torso thing of some sort, and a look on her face that was just slightly less surprised than mine.  Talk about using the art of distraction.  I still am not sure what, if anything C actually saw, but he didn't seem to notice any of it.  I have NO idea how that is possible, but we can usually read that kid like a book.  There were no looks of surprise, no little smirks or grins, no comments, nothing...I, on the other hand, was so shocked and had so many things running through my head, that I couldn't tell you the exact name of the street or exactly where it is, but I bet I could get you close...never again.  I love Amsterdam, but I will stay off of anything starting with "Konigs" something.  I am still reeling thinking about that adventure though Josh has had quite a few giggles about it today!  XO

The darn rest stop again!

Ok, I have a college degree. I can work most copiers, but today began being beaten by a coffee machine-actually a "kaffe" machine. On our way to Amsterdam, we stopped at a Rasthaus (rest stop)for a coffee and a tea. I bravely offered to go in to get them while Josh walked the dog. As soon as I entered, I spotted a very modern, shiny, automated machine that spit out coffe, tea, cocoa, cappuccino, etc. I found the button that said "thee" which appeared to be the closest thing to "tea". It had an "XL" next to it, so I got a cup from the "XL" stack. I placed it under the main spout and pressed "thee". Nothing. Almost immediately, a woman walked up in a uniform that matched the raststop logo and made herself a tea at the matching machine next to me. In my best German, I asked the woman in the Netherlands (Dutch) if she spoke English. The error didn't dawn on me right away because she answered in a very pleasant "yes!". I inquired about the tea and she showed me that the cup goes under the water spout, not the main one, and that you choose one of the nicely wrapped, individually boxed, tea bags. I moved my cup to the correct nozzle, unwrapped a nice earl gray and hit the "thee" button once again. Again, nothing. She looked over and asked if I put money in. Of course not. Who puts money in the machine?! I opened my wallet and took out a two euro coin only to see that it takes all euro coins EXCEPT two's. As I stood there feeling so beaten by the machine, looking at the two euro coin in my hand, the nice, uniformed, woman pointed to the corner of the store and explained that I needed to get change from that machine to put in this one. Mission finally accomplished-josh was getting whatever hot drink my remaining non-two euro coins would by. I walked out with a tea and a cappuccino awhile after I had walked in, laughing audibly. Josh immediately smiled and asked "how'd that work out for you???". Please let Amsterdam be easier than the shiny, modern, kaffe machine!

Just when I think I know what I am doing...

No idea why the  last post was black on black...I am just going to go with my new excuse for everything "ich spreche keine Deutsch" :)  That seems to work well for me here...

Adventure of the day (day 2-ish): We walked down this lovely pedestrian walk along shops and restaurants looking for a little cafe to have lunch in today. We found a bakerei (bakery) and each selected a sandwich or the like on freshly baked bread, etc. I got a nice spinach quiche, C orders an egg sandwich to which Josh and I both ask him "are you sure that is what you want??? It's hard boiled eggs on bread." He responds casually "yeah, sure, that's good". We are under a little pressure with a few German patrons waiting for us to decide and order and a nice German lady quickly grabbing what we choose and looking impatiently on for us to choose the next item. We sit to eat with three apple schorlies (apple spritzers), a tea, my quiche, H's salami sandwich, Josh's cheese and veggie sandwich on a soft pretzel roll and C's sandwich which is a HARD roll with mayo, lettuce and sliced hard boiled egg-yes, that's all. C takes a bite and get's this look on his face like "What??!!!" We look at him and say something uber sympathetic like "you said that was what you wanted. We asked you 5 times to be sure." He is cracking up saying he thought it had salami and egg...Josh says " well that's good. I thought it had eggs and olive spread! That would be even more disgusting." Here is the irony, though...at dinner, Josh thought he ordered beef tips. His plate comes out with three white eyeball looking-thing and a mangled hot dog (but a "good" one like Nathan's all beef) on top of a pile of shredded red things. I am sticking with red wine and steak. I may gain 50 pounds but at least I know what I am eating! Photos tomorrow...cord in the car :)

Day 3 (Tues 10/18-our all but forgotten wedding anniversary). The day started with all of us oversleeping and getting off to a crazy start. We woke at about 10:40 which left about 20 minutes of breakfast left. This is the largest meal of the day here for the most part and our hotel had a great one. We all jumped out of bed, threw on clothes, took the dog for a speed walk (or quick relief) and hurried to breakfast. We ate quickly only to have to rush up to the room to pack up, shower all of us, and vacate the room. We were scheduled with the "Schulamt" in Dusseldorf at 2 but were told to leave Cologne by 12:30 in order to meet with our translator at 1:30 for introductions and a 10 minute walk to the meeting. The "Schulamt" is the office that will make the decision about where the boys will go to school. We feel like this is the most important of all of our meetings so being rushed and crazy (did I add that it was raining and going to be a really bad hair day anyway???) was not ideal. It dawned on us as we were leaving with a hotel cart full of bags that not only would not all of the bags fit in the car with us, but that we would also have to drop the dog off at our temporary rental home before heading off to the meeting. We wound up leaving two bags with the bellman and took off for the rental home-decorated in what we would sum up as 70's garage sale. We dropped the dog in his quickly assembled crate and left for Dusseldorf, the next major city north. Our GPS vectored us through an industrial town full of traffic lights rather than on the highway, so once we got to the autobaun (highway) we were relieved. That lasted all of about 3 minutes. We wound up being about 8 car lengths back from a nasty wreck that had the autobaun at a standstill. I called our translator in a panic, only to find out that the school office had changed the meeting (3rd time) to Friday so we were ok to arrive whenever. Just as we started to relax in our completely stopped car, Josh noticed that the very nice coach bus (like a rock star tour bus) behind us had four mean looking guards up front and a cage behind them for the prisoners!!! Yes, we had a prison transportation bus directly behind us. We are still looking for the candid cameras...evidently they came to Germany with us! Tschuss.

Just getting family up to date...

Adventure of the day (day 2-ish): We walked down this lovely pedestrian walk along shops and restaurants looking for a little cafe to have lunch in today. We found a bakerei (bakery) and each selected a sandwich or the like on freshly baked bread, etc. I got a nice spinach quiche, C orders an egg sandwich to which Josh and I both ask him "are you sure that is what you want??? It's hard boiled eggs on bread." He responds casually "yeah, sure, that's good". We are under a little pressure with a few German patrons waiting for us to decide and order and a nice German lady quickly grabbing what we choose and looking impatiently on for us to choose the next item. We sit to eat with three apple schorlies (apple spritzers), a tea, my quiche, H's salami sandwich, Josh's cheese and veggie sandwich on a soft pretzel roll and C's sandwich which is a HARD roll with mayo, lettuce and sliced hard boiled egg-yes, that's all. C takes a bite and get's this look on his face like "What??!!!" We look at him and say something uber sympathetic like "you said that was what you wanted. We asked you 5 times to be sure." He is cracking up saying he thought it had salami and egg...Josh says " well that's good. I thought it had eggs and olive spread! That would be even more disgusting." Here is the irony, though...at dinner, Josh thought he ordered beef tips. His plate comes out with three white eyeball looking-thing and a mangled hot dog (but a "good" one like Nathan's all beef) on top of a pile of shredded red things. I am sticking with red wine and steak. I may gain 50 pounds but at least I know what I am eating! Photos tomorrow...cord in the car :)

Day 3 (Tues 10/18-our all but forgotten wedding anniversary). The day started with all of us oversleeping and getting off to a crazy start. We woke at about 10:40 which left about 20 minutes of breakfast left. This is the largest meal of the day here for the most part and our hotel had a great one. We all jumped out of bed, threw on clothes, took the dog for a speed walk (or quick relief) and hurried to breakfast. We ate quickly only to have to rush up to the room to pack up, shower all of us, and vacate the room. We were scheduled with the "Schulamt" in Dusseldorf at 2 but were told to leave Cologne by 12:30 in order to meet with our translator at 1:30 for introductions and a 10 minute walk to the meeting. The "Schulamt" is the office that will make the decision about where the boys will go to school. We feel like this is the most important of all of our meetings so being rushed and crazy (did I add that it was raining and going to be a really bad hair day anyway???) was not ideal. It dawned on us as we were leaving with a hotel cart full of bags that not only would not all of the bags fit in the car with us, but that we would also have to drop the dog off at our temporary rental home before heading off to the meeting. We wound up leaving two bags with the bellman and took off for the rental home-decorated in what we would sum up as 70's garage sale. We dropped the dog in his quickly assembled crate and left for Dusseldorf, the next major city north. Our GPS vectored us through an industrial town full of traffic lights rather than on the highway, so once we got to the autobaun (highway) we were relieved. That lasted all of about 3 minutes. We wound up being about 8 car lengths back from a nasty wreck that had the autobaun at a standstill. I called our translator in a panic, only to find out that the school office had changed the meeting (3rd time) to Friday so we were ok to arrive whenever. Just as we started to relax in our completely stopped car, Josh noticed that the very nice coach bus (like a rock star tour bus) behind us had four mean looking guards up front and a cage behind them for the prisoners!!! Yes, we had a prison transportation bus directly behind us. We are still looking for the candid cameras...evidently they came to Germany with us! Tschuss.

(10/20) I am not even sure where to start summing up today's antics.  Today was our "official" day.  We were to show up at a government building "near the main train station in Cologne" to register, then would go by cab with the law firm hired to help us with the work visas and residency cards (biometric identification card-picture credit card), after which we needed to be in Dusseldorf (approx 30 miles north) about two hours after the estimated completion.  We decided to take the very reliable German trains for all of this as the traffic jams/construction zones are somewhat unpredictable and frequent and have snagged us a few times already this week.  We left our temporary home, got to the train station and the first Amazing Race challenge began.  The only ticket machine at the station this morning was spitting out all of our euro coins and wouldn't take any euro bills.  Because you can only use special credit cards here that have a chip in them (only issued after you complete the aforementioned registration and open an account), we had no way of buying a ticket.  Fortunately, everyone else who appeared to know what they were doing was also having issues with the ticket machine.  What irony it would be to wind up in train jail on the way to register after 5 days in country, we thought...We got to the main station, departed as directed and only walked past the nondescript building a few times before asking the 4th person and being pointed in the right direction.  We met our legal rep, a very cute, young blond, with legs to my shoulders, but little btwn the ears.  She got us set up for registration with a woman which was fun and easy, then off in cabs with 4 other Fedex parties to the ID/work visa office.  After waiting about 45 minutes, we were told that three of the four of us needed to have our passport-like photos redone because we were smiling in them.  NO SMILING in German registration photos.  You must look serious! OK, down to the photo kiosk in the lobby, 18 photos later, back upstairs and after some more waiting our turn to get finger printed and processed.  Oh wait, again a candid camera moment-our paperwork was not here (though we emailed the legal company no less than 5 times to confirm that they had the docs since we hadn't seen them).  It is now after 12.  The German government workers do not work past 12 on Friday and we needed to be on a train to Dusseldorf at this point.  We spoke with Long Legs who kept saying "wait, let me see what I can do"  (this after she took us to the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and finally 4th floor to find the office in the first place!).  We finally just left after another Fedex friend said they would get anything she might magically produce for us, like another appointment next week!  Run to the crowded train station and wait while listening to PA messages saying something about the main train station.  Eventually we ask what they are saying and are told there is a problem at the main station and no trains are going there.  Yes, that is where we needed to go to get the train to Dusseldorf.  We ask again and are told to walk a block or so to the U-baun and take it to Deutz, then catch a train there to DUS.  You know where I am going with this don't you?  Got on the U-baun going the wrong direction with a loud "TICK TICK TICK" going in my head.  Off at the second station, run over to the other side of the tracks, back past our loading station and to another...we eventually made it, albeit late to the school meeting.  We are told the boys will not go to school until we find a house in DUS-I think they are excited about this.  We, however,  can not get a house until registered.  Nothing here is easy. Fortunately, the schools are out for the next two weeks so rushing House Hunters Intn'l and trying to pick up the pace on the house hunting.  Once we have a house, C and H will go to a German Intensive class for 6 months to become completely fluent, then will go to regular school.  In the mean time, Josh and I will be found in the nearest brauhaus!  They have a show here called Hidden Camera...they must be partners with Candid Camera, who must have passed our names and photos along...still laughing and wondering what we have gotten ourselves into (did I mention our ATM card stopped working yesterday-joi de vive!).  Prost!

Blogging!

Ok, thanks to my fabulous sister-in-law, we finally found a way to start a blog on a site that has English as an option!  We will post updates of our German/European adventures here so that we are not drowning people in info on Facebook. :)  Hope to upload some photos and updates tonight or tomorrow.  Wish I had a photo of the elderly man who stopped at the rasthaus (a nicer version of a highway rest stop that typically has a restaurant and clean bathrooms with an attendant that you are expected to either pay for or tip for...) the other day.  We had stopped for a quick bite on our way back to Cologne from a great weekend in Heidelberg when an elderly man stopped in for a coffee too.  He got a tray, went through the line, got a mug of coffee and a small bottle (picture twice the size of an airline or minibar bottle) of Jagermeister.  He poured the jager into the coffee, at which point we told the boys to hurry up and eat because we wanted to get on the autobaun waaaaaay before the tipsy geezer did.  I haven't seen the kids eat that quickly since I can remember.  We were all cracking up as we walked quite quickly to the car and continued north...