298 Days

On By StevenIn International Travel - Europe2 Comments

My residence permit expires at the end of October, and I’ll be heading back to the US around that time.   October may seem like a long way off, but it’s really not.   I have less than three hundred days left in Germany.

I wrote a 500 days post back in June, after I passed the halfway mark of my time here.  It listed a number of the things that I wanted to accomplish before I leave.  Between June and December, I finished five of them.  Here’s an updated list of things that I really want to do before I go.

I want to see the Tulip Festival in Holland.  This will likely happen-  My partner-in-crime Jenny and I are planning on trying to make it out, but you can’t really plan that too far in advance.  The tulips don’t bloom on a set schedule and if they’re not blooming when you go, it’s a wasted trip.

I kinda want to see Mini Europe in Brussels.  I’ll probably pair Brussels with a visit to Luxembourg-  they’re in a straight line, more or less, and they’re all on my Geographic to-do list.

There’s a bunch of other places in Germany that I want to see.  A selection: Rothenburg ob der Tauber.  Oberhaus Fortress in Passau.  The Tomb of Charlemagne in Aachen’s Palatine Chapel.  The Auto Technik Museum in Heidelberg.

I’m going to see Carnival in Cologne.  I already have my hotel room reserved for the events of Carnival Sunday and the Rose Monday parade.

I’m attending a wedding in July.  I’ve wanted to write a post about weddings here for a while, but I haven’t been to a wedding in Germany yet.  That’s going to change though:  Over the holidays, Jenny and her boyfriend Robert got engaged!   Jenny is my best friend on this continent, and  I’m wildly happy for them both.  I’m sure I’ll be writing about this happy occasion several times this year.

We’re going to Drachenstich!  I found out about this too late last year to make it happen, but I’ve already got tickets for this August.  I’m really looking forward to this!  Drachenstich is a festival in Furth Im Wald which is kind of like Medieval Times, but with a giant robot firebreathing dragon!

furtherdrache2010

Here’s a trailer thingie so you can get a sense of the festival.

I need to visit more countries.  I haven’t been into Poland, Romania, Turkey, or Croatia yet, and I’d like to.  And maybe Greece, if there’s time.  There’s still so much to see!

If you only had one year remaining to live in your current country, what would you want to do before you had to leave?

All Too Brief: Winter Kipferl

On By StevenIn Life In Germany5 Comments

One of my favorite sweets is a candy that appears at the local Aldi stores in November or December, and it vanishes again by late February or early March-  the Winter Kipferl.  Kipferl is a type of cookie, so these are delicious chocolate wrapped cookies in bar form. Each box contains eleven individually wrapped sticks of delicious chocolate joy.

I stock up as much as I can, but I miss this like crazy during the summer.

winterkipferl

What’s your favorite seasonal-availability snack?

At The Closing Of The Year

On By StevenIn International Travel - Europe7 Comments

Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve, or Silvester to the locals. They’re not directly analogous. Silvester is a religious holiday, the Feast Day of Pope Sylvester I. They both fall on December 31st, though. It’s traditional at this time of year to take a look back and see what you’ve accomplished over the last twelve months.

I visited these places that were new to me:

I repeat visited a few places:

  • Frankfurt a bunch of times.
  • Mannheim
  • The United States twice, once in March and once in November.
  • London twice.
  • Nuremberg and Munich countless times because they’re the closest large cities and neat stuff happens here.

I saw some great concerts and shows:

I had some new experiences:

I had some other things happen that were interesting:

Did you have a good year? What’s the most memorable thing you did this year?

The Regensburger Domspatzen

On By StevenIn Life In Germany2 Comments

One of the things I’ve wanted to do since I arrived in Regensburg was to see a performance- any performance- of the Regensburger Domspatzen.

The Domspatzen (literal translation= Cathedral Sparrows) is a world famous boy’s choir based at St. Peter’s Cathedral, the tall pointy church known to Regensburg locals as The Dom.  The choir was founded in the year 975 by Bishop Wolfgang of Regensburg, and they’ve been present here ever since.   The institution is not just a choir-  it’s a boarding school for boys aged 10–19 and a private secondary school with emphasis on musical education.

The Domspatzen sing both regular mass services as well as concerts around Germany.  Jenny also was curious to see them sing, so we went to the Holy Mass services on the Sunday before Christmas.   Advantage:  It’s free, at least until the collection plate comes by.  Disadvantage:  It’s a Roman Catholic Holy Mass, so there’s a ton of ritual, chanting, kneeling, and the swinging of incense which is catnip for migraines, as I discovered.  I’ve been to Catholic mass services before, and my ability to follow the ritual was about the same in German as it is in English.  Still, it’s a good way to see the Domspatzen in their native habitat, and you get a sense of what they sound like without going out of town to attend a full concert.

The Dom is an amazing structure.  The altar space is very tastefully appointed, and very large:

domspatzen01

I didn’t take very many photographs, because this was a religious service.    The majority of the people present were locals attending their church, not tourists.  I try not to be too disrespectful.  Still, you can get an idea of the size of the Domspatzen by seeing the group fully assembled:

domspatzen02

Since I wasn’t partaking of Communion, I used that time to try to get a little bit of the Domspatzen singing.  This clip is the older boys with the black vestments in the back.  If I’d kept the video running for another ten seconds, the younger group in red would also have been audible.

Because my video isn’t a complete song or a very good example of what seeing this group is like, I’ve gone out to the Tubes Of You, and found two pretty good clips that will give you an idea of how they sound.

Have you ever seen a world famous boy’s choir? What did you think?