I'm sorry

I want to do a mass apology to everyone who has emailed me. I have been horrible at getting back within a reasonable time. Sorry about that. I could make some excuses but that won't help anyway. I just need to work on it.

In other news, I thought that I would give you some information about the dorm. The house's first part was built in 1820. And the second part was built in 1899. It is an old building with a really homey feel. It used to be a guesthouse so it transformed well into be a place for 28 guys to stay. We have a soccer field near us and the Blauen dorm is across the road. I should try to get some pics up for you. Oh, I wish I had a digital camera. Oh well.

Peace all.

A New Experience

Granted I am in a completely different culture so new experiences are probably the norm. But today I did something I haven't done before. I took a guy to the German doctor. Doctors here are pretty different. First off, the waiting room was actually a room with a door. And then it was quick. Within 20 minutes of walking in the door, we were walking out.

Another interesting thing about German doctors is that they don't tell you what is wrong. They just tell you what to do to fix it. It doesn't seem to matter to them what it is and they could care less about telling you. This observation is based on more than just one experience. So I have no idea what is wrong with my guy, but we got medicine to make him better. Yippee.

One of these days I will eventually tell you about the Alps, but not now.

Also, I miss live music. I didn't realize how much I went to.

Over the river...Almost

Recently I had a birthday and it involved a certain watery tradition of the dorm. I have been wanting to get pictures up for you so you could see some of it. It took me a while, but here it is.

This is me giving my birthday speech. It was a grand thankful speech and way too long for the impatient guys. They were really eager to creek me. Notice the water on my shirt as a foreshadowing to the event.

This is half way down to the creek. They started singing, 'Nah, nah, nah, nah...nah, nah, nah, nah...Hey, hey, hey...Goodbye!" and didn't stop until I went in.

And this is me going in. They had great joy in doing it and after I went in, I was sure to give giant hugs to whomever I met on the way back to the house. That is why they are running.

Well, enjoy and have a good laugh at this.

It's been so long...

Wow, there has been lots to do recently. Many things are happening right now. The guys are getting a lot busier with extra-curricular activities and I get to take them to such places. Laundry finally went smoothly today. Hopefully I will continue to smooth everything out as I get used to it.

Football is something that I thought I wouldn't get to watch, but there is this wonderful channel called NASN(North American Sports Network) and I got to see two games this past Sunday. A little taste of home.

Nothing of great significance has happened recently, but I seemed to be reminded often that I am not in my comfy North American environment.

Please pray for me that I will respond well to the students and also work well with my fellow staff members.

Other prayer requests are a bit more personal. Probably my hardest adjustments since being here have been losing my independence and also leaving my support structure back in the states.

God bless

A weekend of Germany

This is where I, with a couple of my guys, hike to on Saturday afternoon. Round trip it was about 6-7 miles. It was pretty neat. The castle started sometime in the 1200s. I could give you more information if I knew some German, but oh well. We were able to climb up to the top of the turret and look around. Pretty cool.

On Sunday, we went into town to a festival called Budenfest. There were all kinds of food stands there were you could get pretty much anything. They also had a polka band that I got to hear. It was pretty interesting to be submerged into complete German culture for a bit. I got myself a nice and juicy bratwurst to celebrate the day. A neat experience to be sure.

A website for y'all to search. It is all in German so I apologize for that, but it is the website for the town that I live in. On the left you can click on something called 'Fotos". There are some nice pictures there.

Weekend Update

Okay, so it isn't really the weekend, but it is close enough. It has been crazy busy this week. So much has been going on. We are definitely in the middle of the school year already. Running people everywhere. Trying to keep up with everything. Nothing like doing 10-15 loads of laundry on one day.

I am slowly starting to get into a rhythm which will be nice. Crazy stuff is happening though. The ceiling in our dorm parents apartment fell in on this past Monday. A headache that wasn't really needed. I got my first day off since I got here this week. It was nice to just sleep in and do what I wanted to.

I have some contact info for y'all. If you want to mail something you can send it to one of two places. Either the dorm or the school.

The dorm address is:
Kanderstrasse 8
79429 Malsburg-Marzell
Germany

The school address is:
Postfach 1109
79396 Kandern
Germany

And my phone number is: 00 (49) 7626.8504

No Room in the Inn

Well, they are all here. We have have 26 students living in the dorm. This is a good thing and has made it a lively place. We wished them off to school today. At the opening ceremony today we had kids stand up who are from or live in 52 different countries. It was really neat to see.

These kids have so much more international experience than me. I hope that they accept me in spite of that. There are so really neat people here. It will be great getting to know them.

Please pray for a family from here. They just found out that their son who is a freshman in college has cancer. He is in Canada right now and they are going back to Canada to be with him. He is having surgery on Wednesday.

It's the day

Today, it started. 15 of the students staying in our dorm came. I met people who live in Italy, the Czech Republic, Turkey, and many other countries. Very cool. Four brothers came, all living in our dorm. Very cool.

Tomorrow the rest of the 26 students arrive. It is great to start meeting the people that I will be spending the next year with. Right now the computer room is full here. Us RAs are just chilling a bit after a long day of welcoming kids and parents. I met many different varieties of many different people.

Please pray for safe travel.

Sperrmüll

This is the German 'large trash' day. Basically what happens is that 3 or so times a year the German people put out all their big items that they want to throw away. The night before, they put the stuff on the side of the road. Some of it is nice stuff that they don't need or want anymore. There will be couches, chairs, tables, skis, and pretty much anything else that you can imagine.

Here is the kicker. The night before, you can drive around and hunt for things that you can use or like. If you decide that you want it, you pick it up, put it in your vehicle and take it home. There are some very interesting things that you can get. It is a great way to bargain shop, especially since it is free.

Laugh your head off!

That's right 2 posts in 2 days. I had something too good not to share.

Tonight I was in a German pizza place. I was necessarily in the mood for pizza so I decided to order something different. I thought that I would go the pasta route. I looked through the menu and found something that I thought looked very delicious. This whole time I was enjoying the fact that I seemed to be figuring out what was on the menu even though it was in German. I ordered my meal and then waited.

When the food arrived at the table, everyone's food looked right except for mine. Why? Because what I ordered was not what I thought I had ordered. Instead of a nice plate of pasta, I got a plate of rice and cheese. That's right. Think of macaroni and cheese and instead of the macaroni, substitute a large plate of rice. Rice and cheese. What a great dinner. I laughed quite well for a while over my fumble. I hope that you enjoy laughing at it too.

Maybe tomorrow I will talk about Sperrmüll.