"See" in German is "Lake" in English, but Sounds like Sea with a Z at the Beginning

Munich is surrounded by little lakes, and I can say little lakes, because I come from Michigan which is surrounded by big lakes, or the Great Lakes as they are more officially called.  Anything smaller than the Great Lakes are little lakes.  Of course this is all a matter of perspective, but despite their less than Great size, these lakes are no less magnificent.  They are down right gorgeous, and considerably cleaner than the Great Lakes.   The last week of May, we visited Ammersee, and we were treated to some pretty amazing views, especially at the end of the day when a storm started to roll in.

This week, a friend offered us her family home on Walchensee, about an hour outside of Munich.  We had never heard of Walchensee before, as it is not easily accessible by public transportation like the more popular Ammersee and Starnberger See. Nestled in the foothills of the German Alps with fantastic views of Zugspitze (the tallest mountain in Germany) Walchensee blew away all the other lakes.   The first day we arrived there was cloudy, but I did manage to capture this interesting shot of a sailboat being towed by a rowboat.

Turns out, the locals in Walchensee are fiercely protective of their little spot of paradise and have prohibited use of any sort of gas guzzling polluting motor boats.  The obvious result, a very clean lake, but the unintentional side-affect is that the lake has become a popular destination for sailors, windsurfers and kite-surfers. Unfortunately on days when there is no wind, sailors have to tow their boats with a row-boat, but I'm sure they don't complain about not having to share the lake with "stinkboats."

On Friday, the we took the "Herzogbahn," or cable car, up the side of the mountain, and we were treated to some amazing views.  Unfortunately, we were there at the wrong time of the day, so we had less than ideal lighting for photographs.

 

The lake winds its way around a couple mountains, so without an airplane, or maybe climbing to a higher peak, it is impossible to get a photo that can fully grasp the shape and size of the lake.  Below is another end of the lake from the other side of the mountain.

There are loads of hiking trails in the area.  When we started out on the trail pictured below, we thought we were just taking a nice walk in the neighborhood, with Maggie on her trike and Maxi on his Laufrad, however it wasn't long before the trail got too steep, and we abandoned the bikes.  Yes, you can do that in Bavaria without fear of someone stealing them.  Pretty soon though, it was too tiring for the kids, and Paul became their camel. 

 

The contrast of the mountains and the water is something rare, but it reminded me a little bit of Lake Moomaw, made by the Army Corp of Engineers,  about an hour away from our home in Virginia.

Clearly, Walchensee is much cleaner, so clean that Germans say the water is drinkable.  That means a lot coming from a race that typically refuses to drink tap water, preferring bottled fizzy water.  No, that doesn't mean that Walchensee is fizzy, just that the water is clean and tastes good, which my daughter can attest to, as she drank quite a bit of it.  

 

Even though the kids are fully dressed in the photo above, they did get to jump in the water the next day.  And spending as much time as I did in Lake Michigan growing up, I wasn't concerned with the frigid 15°C (59°F) water temperature, despite the gawking stares of nearby observers.

Paul has taken upon himself to try and get more photos of me on vacation.  This isn't the best photo from the group, but I think it is the funniest.  I'm usually behind the camera, not in front of it, so for good measure here is one more photo from Walchensee. 

Arriving in Dulles with Porter

Home again, home again, jiggedy jig...

Mistakenly, I though the return trip would be easier. It's an overnight flight, so the kids would sleep, right? Wrong. Though they are both exhausted, they are too keyed up to actually sleep. And since everyone else on the flight is sleeping there is no one to help me when Maggie has another blow out diaper. I drag a now, barefoot Max to the airplane bathroom, trying not to think about what he is probably stepping in, as I lock all three of us in the cramped space. While I strip Maggie of her clothes, and wash off the poop that has traveled up her back, Max entertains himself by pulling the toilet paper off the roll and throwing it into the sink.

When we finally clear up our mess and try to awkwardly exit the bathroom through the accordion door, Max takes off running again. Luckily this time, he runs to the back of the plane, and the one grandmother on the plane wakes up and tries to grab him. When she misses, I unceremoniously dump Maggie in her lap and take off after Max, before he can make it around the back of the plane and up the aisle on the other side into first class again. Once I safely buckle him back into his seat belt which is no match for a two year old escape artist, I make him a

nest with his pillow and blanket, and out of pure exhaustion he finally passes out. I retrieve Maggie from the grandmother across the aisle, and nurse her back to sleep. For the remaining two hours of the flight, I watch the documentary This Is It about Michael Jackson.

When we finally land in Munich, a very nice flight attendant helps me bundle the kids up and exit the plane. Of course no one had bothered to unlock the elevator, so I had to back the stroller up three escalators with Maggie dangling out of the Ergo, a diaper bag hanging over one shoulder, Max's pillow in the bottom of the stroller, and the bag of toys in the other hand.

When we got to the baggage claim, I practically begged the security agent to let me deliver the children to their father on the other side before I picked up my baggage, but he instead in his best pissed off voice told me that it was absolutely impossible, because I was in a secure area. So, another father took pity on me, and sent his teenage daughter back with me to retrieve my five suitcases. It turned out that because the plane had arrived half an hour early, Paul wasn't there yet anyways, so the very tired kids and I waited patiently for Paul to show up twenty minutes later. And after a very harrowing drive home with an insane taxi driver, we finally arrived home and I promptly passed out.

A One Way Ticket to Crazy

The kids and I just returned from a seven week visit to the States. Long visits like this were a promise we made to our parents to try to assuage our guilt about moving to Germany. Paul's German contract promised him six weeks of vacation along with a slew of holidays. A long trip back home would give us more quality time with our families than the occasional weekend visit.

The only way Paul agreed to letting the kids and I go that long was if I was willing to split the difference. So Paul came three weeks in the middle, meaning that I did both flights alone with the kids. I had flown alone with Max once before, and while it was not easy, it was not impossible. When I agreed to doing it with two children, I must have had a momentary lapse of sanity. But what was done, was done, and since we purchased the economy non-refundable, non-changeable tickets, there was no backing out.

Thank God they were direct flights, so I did not have to make a connecting flight by myself. Just like any other day when I am managing the kids by myself, the key to success is organization. So, first I tried to minimize the amount of luggage I was taking with me, which ended up being a car seat and four suitcases, two of which were filled with Christmas presents and other things for friends and family. On the way back, we left the car seat behind, because as it turns out it was only approved for use in the United States anyway, but we picked up a fifth suitcase because the obscene amount of Christmas presents we received for the kids.

Carrying on the flight, I brought only the bare essentials: one diaper bag, one bag of toys, winter coats and trappings for all three of us, as well as necessary restraining devices like the Ergo and the stroller.

The last time Paul and I flew back from the States, we fed Max so much to drink that by the time we reached security his diaper had leaked, and we had no spare set of clothes in our carry on. We ended up running around the airport to try and find him some clothes, and ended up purchasing a tourist sweatshirt four sizes to big, and stuffing him in his sleep sack for the flight.

This time I was careful to monitor both kids liquid intake, check their diapers regularly and bring extra clothes in the diaper bag, just in case. And, it's a good thing considering Maggie had a blow out mid-flight. Getting through security and walking to our connecting flight went fairly well. Max only ran away from me when we were waiting to board the plane.

Another mother looked on sympathetically, and pointing to her teenage son saying, "He use to run away from me all the time." If there is one thing I have learned about trans-Atlantic flights is to depend on the kindness of strangers. I immediately befriended this mother and her children. She had been there before me, and no one can relate to me like another mother. Besides that, her eleven old daughter loves children and babies and could not wait to play with my kids. There were also a slew of other grandmothers on the flight that quickly offered to help me by holding the baby while I rushed to the cramped bathroom to change Max's diaper. I also quickly enlisted the help of a college kid who was sitting next to me to keep an eye on Max when I needed to change Max's diaper.

Max was great for the most part. Yes there was some whining, crying and general disobedience, but it wasn't anything out of the ordinary, or anything I couldn't handle. The only time things got hairy was when Max peeled off, running gleefully up the aisle through business class and straight into first class. I didn't think it was the right thing to yell at him and wake up all the passengers in business and first class, so I followed along as quietly and quickly as I could with Maggie dangling from one arm, using the other arm to try and grab a weaving and dodging Max. It wasn't until we reached the glut of first class flight attendants, that someone intervened, "Ma'am, Ma'am, you can't be up here." As apologetically as I could manage in my somewhat exasperated state, "I know, I'm sorry, he got away from me." The very nice flight attendant grabbed Max's hand and cho-cho trained him back to our seat.

It was on this journey to and back from first class that I noticed that there was a kids movie on one of the channels. When I got Max back into his seat, I tried to find the movie, and when I realized that the channel wasn't working for either my seat or Max's seat, I called for the flight attendant. I should have realized from past experience this call button is completely useless. Either the flight attendants pay absolutely no attention to it, or they just assume that Max is playing with one of the buttons.

So I finally flag down one of the flight attendants, and she tells me that they can't do anything about it until they reset the movies for the next run. The next run comes, and nothing has changed, so I flagged down another attendant. This one tells me, that she can't do anything until they reset the movies for the third run. This time, the desperation starts to creep into my voice, "But I already told one of the other flight attendants this was a problem, it is the only movie appropriate for him."

So, she tells me she will see what she can do, and she comes back to me five minutes later apologizing, saying that she is going to try and reset the movie to another channel for the third run, but she can't do anything until then, because it would disrupt the rest of the passengers movies, and there aren't and other free seats in the airplane. As a conciliation she gives me a postcard of appreciation for my understanding. Great, meantime what am I supposed to do? I know, I'll let Max play with the post card, I'm sure it will entertain him for all of three seconds.

At this point the eleven year old girl comes up and offers to play with the kids in the aisle, and I have a moment of calm. Finally we land, and I know it is only an hour or two before we get through immigration, baggage claim and customs. Max is a champ, the eleven year old girl entertains him while I hunt down a United Airlines porter in the mess of what is Dulles international baggage claim. The porter helps me with my luggage, and gets us through customs quickly to the waiting and very expectant hugs and kisses of grandparents.

Weeks later that postcard of appreciation for my understanding resurfaces, and I visit the United website to claim whatever the voucher is for. Oh fabulous, it is for 10% off any international flight originating in the United States. Too bad, I live in Germany.

Subtle Differences

Anyone who moves to a new country, and or new city, notices the differences. Some of these differences make life more difficult, i.e. not knowing the language makes it much harder to decipher a bill or do your own taxes. Some differences are inconsequential, like different food brands. Some differences make life easier, like the fact that the ATM gives your ATM card back before it gives you the cash. No one ever forgets to take the cash they just debited, but how many times has an ATM card has been left behind in the machine?

And then there are the differences that make your life spectacular... especially in Bavaria. For example, we just had a four day weekend, because not only is Easter Sunday a State holiday, but so is Good Friday and Easter Monday. Bavaria has six more public holidays than most of Germany. In 2009, 21* public holidays fall during the work week. Furthermore, we also are guaranteed 30 days of vacation. For the kids, they get out of school for 14 weeks** in six chunks through out the year over the seasons. Now I might be scratching my head, wondering how great this is when my kids are home this much, but I bet that my kids are going to be thrilled. No wonder Germans travel so much.

The only downside to all of these Holidays is that it doesn't only close businesses like my husbands office, but it also closes the stores. So, you had better have all your groceries bought before the holidays start, because there is no where to go to pick up a last minute bottle of milk. The only exception to this rule is gas stations, restaurants and tourist attractions like castles and museums. The same is true of Sundays. With the exceptions of restaurants, gas stations and tourist attractions, everything is closed. At first this was annoying we were used to being able to run out on Sundays for some last minute item we needed at the store, and sometimes we did our grocery shopping on Sundays. Now that we've adjusted, we are forced to relax and enjoy ourselves on Sundays. There will be no running errands on Sundays here. And if for some reason we don't have groceries, we have to go out to eat. Shucks.

Furthermore it's rare that you meet many Germans who work longer than 50 hours a week, and most only work 40 hours.

Now this might make you think, this can't be good for business. The German economy must be in the hole. However, according to the IMF, World Bank and CIA Factbook, Germany has the fifth highest GDP in the world, following the United States, Japan, China and India. Yet it only has 82 million people, compared to the USA's 306 million, Japan's 127 million, China's 1.3 billion, and India's 1.7 billion. I'd also like to point out these figures are after West and East Germany reunited, and it is after Germany converted to the Euro, both which were huge drags on the German economy.

So, Germany must be doing something right. It proves that there can be a comfortable balance between quality of life and productivity. You don't have to work like a dog to be profitable.

*I might have the exact number off here, but it is still signficantly larger than it was at home.

**To see the specific holidays check http://www.deutschland.de/aufeinenblick/ferientermine.php?lang=2