05/04/2008
Mother's Day - first edition
Germans in general aren't as actively practicing religion, as people in the Midwest. But Catholic and Lutheran Holidays are strictly observed. This year Whitsunday (the first day of Catholic Pentecost in Germany) would be on the same day as Mother's Day (which is always the second Sunday in May).
Since Catholic Holidays were scheduled long before Mother's Day was even invented, whenever Pentecost falls on the second Sunday in May, Mother's Day is celebrated on the first Sunday in May - at least in Germany.
So I ordered a pretty bouquet of flowers, and a heart-shaped box of chocolate to go with it, for my mom. 
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04/17/2008
Smart makes it to the Midwest
Now, when you tell people here you bought a Mercedes, this is probably not what they have in mind. 
The *Smart for 2* has been available in Germany since 1998, and officially made it to the USA in November 2007.
With gas priced at about $3.50 a gallon, people are likely to smarten up more around here too.
When I went for my lunch-break walk today, I saw the first one cruising down the road in Fort Wayne.
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12/02/2007
do-it-yourself advent wreath
Germany has many ancient, antique, old, modern and new traditions built around pagan, christian, political and commercial holidays. December is especially suitable for celebrations, because it's dark and cold outside. People cuddle up by the fireplace, with a cup of mulled wine and cinnamon cookies. The smell of pine or fir from an advent wreath is one of my oldest memories associated with the month of December.
The wreaths you will find in stores here are different. You hang those up on a wall, or on your door. The advent wreath I associate with Christmas sits on a table and has four candles on it, one more of which you light on each of the four Sundays before the 24th of December.
So, if I want to keep the traditions alive, I have to make my own advent wreath. Last year I had one with red and gold decoration, this year I went with white and silver. Building it was fun! And the result looks very professional.
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11/25/2007
my favorite birthday present
Last year, for my 50th birthday, my daughter wrote me a beautiful letter - with a silver pen on dark red paper, and 50 little silver hearts embedded in the text.
This year she wrote a poem for me. I will not translate it for you, so those of you who don't understand German, will maybe feel left out. Sorry about that.
Mein Gedicht für Dich...
so es ist mal wieder so weit, ein Jahr ist rum und Du hast Geburtstag.
Deswegen ALLES GUTE, immer VIEL GLÜCK und ein Gedicht weil ich Dich so mag !
Rosen sind rot, Veilchen sind blau,
Mama Du bist `ne tolle Frau.
Hihi Spaß !! Das sollte es nicht gewesen sein, hier kommt der wahre Reim :)
Es gibt so viel über Dich zu sagen,
Du bist `ne Powerfrau und konntest im Leben viele Lasten tragen.
Du hast mir `ne schöne Kindheit geschenkt
und als die Pubertät einsetzte mich auf den richtigen Weg gelenkt.
Ich hab` Dir zu verdanken, daß Du mich selbstbewußt und stark erzogen hast
und, daß Du immer mit Rat und Tat an meiner Seite warst.
Bewundern tue ich, daß Du in schwierigen Situationen einen kühlen Kopf bewahrst
und Probleme systematisch lösen kannst.
An dieser Stelle muss ich sagen: Es tut mir leid,
daß ich Dich manchmal beschimpft hab` wegen einer Kleinigkeit.
Doch manche Zeiten waren nicht sonderlich leicht für mich
und ich weiß, sie waren`s auch nicht für Dich.
Jetzt im Nachhinein kann ich Vieles verstehen
und das Geschehene aus der Entfernung ansehen.
Zum Beispiel als Du Dich vom Papa geschieden hast
und zur gleichen Zeit bereits mit`m Tom zusammen warst.
Das war für mich damals schwer zu begreifen,
aber solche Erfahrungen ließen mich reifen.
Was ich von Dir gelernt hab` ist, daß jeder Mensch seine Entscheidung für sich trifft,
auch wenn sie in den Augen anderer nicht richtig ist.
Und dann die Kraft zu besitzen und den Schritt zu wagen,
seine Ziele durchzusetzen und die Folgen eventueller Fehler zu tragen.
Du hast mich zu dem gemacht was ich heute bin,
hoffentlich ist das Ergebnis auch in Deinem Sinn ;)
Meine Mama, Vorbild und Freundin....
Auch wenn wir uns "nur" am Telefon hören und auf Fotos sehen,
wirst Du für immer und ewig in meinem Herzen stehen.
Ich bin stolz, daß Du meine Mama bist,
weil jemanden wie Dich zu haben das Größte ist !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ich hab dich unendlich mal Tausend lieb, piep :))
Bussssssssiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii
Deine Alejandra
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09/01/2007
re-unite the class of 1974/75
I graduated from highschool in May 1975, after the required 13 years of school in Germany. About 80 other people graduated the same day at the same highschool, 17 of which were my classmates. I lost contact with them almost immediately, because my dad took the family to California for one year in July 1975.
Twenty years after graduation two of the *girls* in my class organized a class reunion and I went there, out of curiosity. It was fun to see what those *kids* had turned into. I recognized most of the people, after I heard their names - but some had changed so much, they could have told me anything.
This year, during my vacation in Germany, I think it's time for another re-union. And, with the help of the internet, I found it relatively easy to research my classmates' addresses, phone numbers, emails, even work places. We'll go back to the roots again.
P.S.: can you guess where I am on the photo?
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08/11/2007
Home-made Bavarian Leberkäs'
Home is where the heart is? I get a feeling the stomach is involved too. I wouldn't say I'm homesick, but sometimes I get these cravings for certain foods, which you just can't buy in Fort Wayne. Yes, there is mail order, and online stores. It's not the same.
So today I tried out my new electric meat grinder. I turned two pounds of hamburger and chicken breast into Bavarian Leberkäs'. Tom had to have a slice right out of the oven. There it is again, that warm fuzzy feeling of home.
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06/14/2007
Alarm für Cobra 11
One of my favorite TV shows in Germany was *Alarm für Cobra 11 - die Autobahnpolizei*. I used to look forward to Thursday nights at 8:15 p.m. when it would come on.
After moving to the USA it took me a while to find out how I can still watch German TV. First you have to sign up for an online recording service. Then you need to schedule a recording, then download and decode the file, and then you can watch it on your computer.
I'm looking forward to Thursday evenings again, for an hour of fun and action on TV. And then there's also Sunday nights, when I can watch *Tatort* - like I used to do for decades.
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05/02/2007
took my *antique* IBM keyboard to work
I really got tired of having to switch my brain and fingers from German to US keyboard layout twice a day. Plus I think, I'll be spending a few more years at Indiana Tech - so it's OK to personalize my tools.
So today I took an old IBM PS/2 keyboard, manufactured in 1994, with 102 keys, German layout, and that familiar *click* to work. All I needed was a PS/2 to USB adapter, and some fiddling with the regional and language settings on my Dell computer.
Works like a charm! 
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04/26/2007
this blog available as a book now
OK - for all my 5 or 6 average daily visitors - you've been warned...
I really did it now, this blog can be purchased as a printed paperback book, or a downloadable .pdf-file. It will also be distributed via Amazon and other bookstores soon.
I purchased an ISBN for the first edition, which makes it more expensive (costs $32.95). I will continue to update the book, as I post on the blog. The continued edition doesn't have an ISBN (it changes too frequently) - so you can buy it at a lower price of only $21.95 (directly from the publisher). The downloadable version is $6.95 for either edition.
Just in case you can't wait to get your hands on the first copy, hot off the press, buy it here directly from the publisher:
buy *Karin's Adventures continued* now
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03/19/2007
my blog will be available as a book
I realized that I have put a lot of time into this blog by now. And you never know, if this service will continue to be provided *forever*. What if blogspirit decided to close shop?
So, to make it more permanent, I decided to put the contents of my blog into a book. I'll add some documentation about my history before the blogging and publish it.
You'll be able to purchase a printed version, or a downloadable one, at a moderate price.
I don't know yet, how long it will take me, and how much I will charge for it. Watch this space for more information.
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03/13/2007
Walk around the Cemetery
While working for BBV in Munich I used to take a walk around the nearby cemetery with a colleague during lunch break, to stretch our legs and air out our brains, whenever the weather permitted it.
Working at Lincoln Foodservice Products I still went for lunchtime walks, but I first had to drive a mile to get to Buckner Farm Park - and no colleague ever wanted to come.
Now, working at Indiana Tech, I have a cemetery in walking distance again - and a colleague to go with me. So, with spring in the air, I'll be walking around the Concordia Lutheran Cemetery for lunch. To stretch my legs and air out the brain. 
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01/03/2007
visit the German embassy
My passport still listed *München* as my hometown, which prevented me from receiving a tax refund for my purchases in October 2006.
So today I took a deep breath, printed out a map, and headed towards Chicago again. Eight hours on the road for a five minute task.
Now my residence is officially *Fort Wayne*. The weather was unseasonally warm, dry, sunny - and traffic wasn't as bad as I had anticipated. Time for a short walk downtown, just to gaze up the high-rising walls of these amazing buildings.
Despite the fact that Chicago is huge and crowded, I found the people very nice. Two different guys saw me looking around, and came to ask if I needed help finding my way.
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12/29/2006
Host on Demand
A former colleague in Germany, who *inherited* the databases and IT applications I had built for our employer there, called me because there was a problem he couldn't seem to fix.
At first I tried to walk him thru what I would have done over the phone and with several emails. But after a while we realized, that there was more involved. We figured it would be a lot easier, if I had access to their mainframe - to look at the data and maybe correct the error.
Thanks to the internet timezones and oceans inbetween aren't enough to stop people from working together anymore. IBM's host-on-demand software requires only a webbrowser on the client side, and some administration and security set up on the server side.
I got access to the host in Munich, used my laptop to logon to TSO/ISPF there, and worked for about 2.5 days. I managed to correct the databases and rerun a few reports. The biggest surprise was that, after a year of doing a lot of different things, I still remembered everything needed to work with those mainframe databases.
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09/30/2006
Travel to Munich
It felt a bit strange to travel back to my old hometown as a tourist. I was wondering wether I would feel homesick or not. I realized that there are very few things, mostly people, I truly miss.
The first thing I really noticed - something I didn't even pay attention to before - was the smaller size of everything. The average car is smaller, the lanes on all roads are narrower, my mom's kitchen appliances are a lot smaller, the portions in restaurants are smaller.
One thing is definitely bigger though: the normal glass of beer!
After two weeks of visiting friends and family, celebrating my daughter's 17th birthday with her and enjoying the Wies'n (the one and only real Oktoberfest) I was happy to come back home to the spacious environment, which is so easy to take for granted.
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04/25/2006
Discover sources for hard-to-find neccessities
The older you get the harder it is to give up certain habits. There are more and more things that you feel you just can't do without.
My *neccessities* are mostly physical in nature: I need to swim and sweat in the sauna at least once a week. And I need to eat plain yogurt, bread and cereal made from very few, all natural ingredients.
Swimming and sauna were easy to find - we signed up with Spiece Fitness. Dannon plain, all-natural yogurt is available in most grocery stores. Finding bread and cereal, that would be acceptable, was a bit harder.
Ordering online, imported from Germany, is very expensive. Buying imported food at Meijer's is still a bit salty. Finding US made food in local stores is the real deal.
I recommend Bob's Red Mill Muesli, which I buy at Kroger on 601 E. Dupont Rd., and Rubschlager Sunflower Bread, available at The Fresh Market on 6306 W. Jefferson Blvd.
Also, for homoepathic remedies, fair-trade coffee and tee, organic food - or just a dose of *feel at home* - be sure to check out Three River's Co-op Natural Grocery at 1602 Sherman Blvd.
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04/02/2006
Go shopping at Aldi's
Back in Germany I didn't consider Aldi the source for my everyday groceries, because there were other stores more conveniently located.
But here Aldi is more than just *convenience*, it is a way to feel at home. There are some differences, especially in the product selection, but the entire look-and-feel is just like every Aldi I've seen in Germany.
You need a quarter to be able to use a shopping cart, and plastic bags are not free. The store is relatively small, you do your entire weekly grocery list within half an hour. You don't see 50 different brands of the same item. And you save a lot of money.
We estimate about $250 savings on our monthly grocery bill. We found spanish red wine for $6.99 a bottle, and everything else for 30% to 50% less than Meijer's. They don't honour coupons, they don't advertise in the Sunday paper, but they are open on Sundays - which is one very convenient difference to Aldi's in Germany.
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