Food, Film, and Dresden

September 29, 2013

It’s hard to believe that I’ve been in Germany for a month now. Sometimes it feels like a just got here, others times it feels like I’ve been here for a long time.

I have found a Methodist Church not far from home. There are Catholic and Lutheran Churches that are closer, but I really wanted to be in a church were I was welcome to take communion, even if its only every now and then. My first day at the Methodist Church happened to be a communion Sunday. Overall the service was familiar until it came time to receive the bread and “wine.” The Eucharistic ministers went to the altar, received communion from the pastor, and then took plates of bread and cups of “wine” to the congregation. It was strange to see the bread and “wine” passed up and down the rows, and even stranger to discover that Jesus’ body was cubes of white wonder bread.

Usually I bake something over my three day weekend that I can eat during the week. Last weekend I choose to make a lemon angel food cake. Since we didn’t have a grater yet (I bought one yesterday.) I spent about and hour and a half “grating” and mincing three lemons with a paring knife. I watched Gilmore Girls at the same time so it only numbed my fingers and not my mind. After 35 minutes in the oven, the cake had puffed up over the top was cracked and a dark brown. It looked like it might burn soon so I took it out of the oven and turned it over the wine bottle. My mouth dropped as the first chunk of cake fell out followed by several more until all my hopes of a fluffy angle food cake was reduced to a pile of lemon flavored scrambled eggs.

André had much more success cooking when he invited Monika and I over Wednesday evening. He made stuffed zucchini, rice, a tomato sauce, and had some delicious Crème Brule left over from a previous evening of entertaining. Yum. Afterwards he showed Monika and I some pictures from his brothers wedding and we got to here about some of their wedding traditions.

One of the traditional activities is for the couple to feed each other bread and give each other a drink of water. They saw a log in half, which can’t be accomplished without working together. There is also a sheet with a heart painted on it. Both are given a pair of scissors, and then they race to cut out their side of the heart the fastest. The winner is said to be the leader/boss in the relationship. Afterwards the groom carries the bride through the sheet.

There is also a question game. The bride and groom sit back to back and each has one bride and one groom shoe. They are asked questions like, "Who is the better cook?" or "Who snores the loudest?" and so on. They raise the shoe of the person they think fits best. In a series of 20ish questions, Andre's brother and his wife answered every one the same. I got the impression that that doesn't happen very often. At midnight a little something is said and nightcaps are put on both of their heads. They keep them on until they go to bed.

Thursday night Monika and I went to Helge’s to watch Was tun wenn’s brennt? with several other people. We met at 9 o’clock and started the movie at 10 o’clock, a good thirty minutes past my bedtime. Fortunately the movie was very good and short so I managed to stay awake through most of it. Soon after it was over, I said I needed to leave soon. A look of surprise and slight horror appeared on the face in front of me. I tried to explain that I had to get up at 5:45 the next morning. No change. Last weekend I was called boring by a very nice person I’d just meet because I went home at 11:30. I just smiled and laughed. I like my sleep.

On Saturday I met Hannah, a Fulbright ETA in Chemnitz, on the train to Dresden. It was planned. We spent the day there and met up with several other ETAs in the Sachsen area for about half of the day. We visited the Herbstmarkt (Fall Market) three times, including for lunch. We also wandered around the Alt Stadt (Old City), checked out the upcoming programs at the Opera House, and toured the Frauenkirche. The Frauenkirche is a stunningly beautiful church. It was meticulously reconstructed after the Second World War because, like most of the city, it had been reduced to rubble.

Dresden is only an hour and a half from Zwickau by train, so Hannah and I are hoping to spend a lot more time there. There is certainly plenty more to see!