Hello and Happy New Year!
I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season. We have been back to studying and practice after all the celebrations.
Speaking of celebrations, I have to share my experience with New Year’s Eve. After watching “Dinner for One” and having a cozy meal at home, we settled in for some quiet festivities at home. We had heard that Germans love fireworks on New Year’s Eve, so it was no surprise when the sounds of fireworks started ramping up around 8pm… nothing out of the ordinary. We watched a movie and turned in around 10pm with our noise-cancelling headphones on to block out the increasing noise. Well, I woke up at about 12:10am to the absolute racket of fireworks exploding EVERYWHERE! Imagine the fireworks show put on by a small town and then put at least one of those on each block. That was happening all around us and all over the city. And then, occasionally, a TRULY BIG rocket would explode. The noise was incredible and the air was so full of smoke. It went on for about an hour. I have never experienced anything like it in the U.S., even during the height of celebrations on Independence Day. I threw on my coat and went out on the balcony to take a video, but I just couldn’t capture the true extent of the nuttiness. The most amazing part of the night is that Nathan slept through the whole thing! I couldn’t believe it.
The other different thing this week is that we attended a concert at the Schumann Haus Museum on Saturday night. Much like the Mendelssohn Museum, the Schumann Haus is the museum in the former home of Robert and Clara Schumann. There are some artifacts and displays about the musicians and composers. We had yet to visit until this week and Nathan found tickets to a concert for Saturday night. It is so fun to hear music in these rooms that were originally for that very purpose. This concert was a bit different. The group consisted of a piano, violin/viola (same musician), guitar, and accordion. The played all kinds of music, from tangos by Piazzolla to crazy modern stuff to delightful arrangements of Mozart and Beethoven. The addition of the accordion made it truly unique and the accordionist was amazing. It was a real treat.
That’s pretty much it for this week’s news. Since our daily routine is not the stuff of fascination, I thought I would share a couple of bits and pieces that didn’t make it into last week’s post.
One aspect of Christmas decorations here in Germany, especially here in Saxony, is the Moravian Star or Hernnhuter Stern. You can see them in the Christmas Tree photo that I included here on this post (on the tree and in the booth on the left) and in last week’s photos of the church interior and church dome. You may have seen them from time to time in the States, as they traveled with immigrants. It represents the Star of Bethlehem and they are hung in churches, on trees, on buildings, and in people’s windows. The Moravian Church is one of the oldest Protestant denominations and the stars have been manufactured in Hernnhut since the late 19th century. The shape is an augmented rhombicuboctahedron. It would have 26 points except that the one on the top is replaced by a light and structure for hanging. So much of what comes to mind when you say “German Culture” is from Bavaria, except for Christmas traditions and decorations. A lot of those are from Eastern Germany, like nutcrackers and gingerbread and the little wooden ornaments. It’s been fun to find out more about these traditions.
The last thing I will share with you is that our family has loved playing board and card games together ever since the kids were young. We especially played a lot during the Christmas breaks and on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. Since the kids grew up and moved away, it has been kind of a bummer to not do that as much. We attempted to do some long-distance games during the pandemic with varying degrees of success. When we decided to move to Europe, we started doing a monthly board game night with our kids and some extended family as well. We use a website called BoardGameArena.com and it has been such a great way to close the vast distance between our homes. We played a bit on New Year’s Day and the 3-year-olds even joined in. We love it!
Have a great week!
