Updates | 7 | ə-blog

August 6, 2011

Living and Learning

In our first five days, we haven’t gone further than a couple of kilometers from our house. The reasons (or excuses) are that I haven’t gotten my train pass yet because it requires passport pictures, which I also haven’t gotten yet. Also, the train station is just far enough away to make it a challenging, though doable, walk with all the kids. Ideally we would all have bikes by now, which is how everyone gets around here, but the bike store is closed until next week because the owner is on vacation, and Emily and James don’t know how to ride bikes without training wheels anyway. So, at this rate, we won’t be going anywhere for several more weeks.

Fortunately, within our very small radius, there are two creeks, a swimming complex, the kids schools, and several neighborhood families with kids. Also, our shipment from America came, so the kids have at least a few more toys to play with. After over a month with just the items in their backpacks, it was like Christmas in August.

Our first week in Switzerland has been a balancing act of failure and success. If you define failure as doing something wrong, then that happens several times a day. In fact, the first time we do anything, we inevitably do it wrong. For example, every time we go to the grocery store, which Joe and I have been taking turns doing each day, we do something wrong: going through the express lane with way too many items, bringing up more items than I had the cash for (they don’t take our credit card), not having the right coin to unlock the grocery cart, etc. (Incidently, since we don’t have bikes yet, we also have to carry all of our groceries home over a kilometer in our backpack and grocery sacks, which makes me feel like I did a 250 rod portage in the Boundary Waters!)

We have also failed to get Swiss phones, internet access, or a bank account, some of which require a residence permit that is going to take a couple of weeks to secure. I got lost with all three kids trying to walk to a nearby playground. Oh, and I fried my hair straightener by plugging it into the wrong electrical converter.

Compared to our failures, our successes seem trivial. But you have to count all the small accomplishments that we take for granted back home. Like understanding a conversation with neighbors on the street (check), cooking a meal with no recognizable measuring tools and instructions in a different language (check), and figuring out the school supply lists (check).

The kids start school a week from monday(!) and it feels like we won’t have done anything. But, then again, we have moved to a new country, and I guess that counts for something.

August 3, 2011August 4, 2011

We have arrived, again!

In case we didn’t make this clear two weeks ago, traveling with three young kids is extremely challenging. We had a difficult day of driving in an overstuffed rental car filled with kids and luggage (and kids sitting on luggage). We made it to Bern, Switzerland and stayed one night in a crowded hotel room with one kid on the floor, and one two-year-old that doesn’t know how to fall asleep without his pack-and-play (which was wrapped in several layers of plastic with several other items and strapped to the top of the car — oops). No one got much sleep, tempers flared, and I wondered several times, “why are we doing this again?”

However, the next day, we drove to our new home in the town of Münsingen. After going through everything with our landlord, a 32-year ex-pat from Connecticut, we were even more overwhelmed and exhausted. But, we had arrived!

There are several things about the house that are fantastic. The yard is a beautiful, relaxing space surrounded by lush greenery, flower gardens, a koi pond with a bridge, candle-lit patio, two fire pits, a bench swing, a ping pong table, fresh raspberries and black berries, and a vegetable garden that has already been planted with lettuce, beans, tomatoes, rhubarb, radishes, and peppers. It will be a bit of work to maintain, but we love spending time and eating meals out there. The house also has plenty of space, including a guest suite with a room and bathroom that closes off from the rest of the house. So, if anyone is thinking about visiting us, come on over!

Also, our neighborhood is great. We are near a creek and in walking distance from everything we need. There are lots of kids here, and Emily and James immediately befriended a family across the street. We were fortunate to arrive on August 1st, which is Swiss National Day. The first night, though we were too exhausted to try to go to the celebrations in the city of Bern, we learned that the tradition for most Swiss families involves setting of lots of fireworks in the streets. We joined the families outside our house where the kids all had a blast setting off over a hundred fireworks of all sizes. The next day, the kids played together again, and we all went to the local swimming pool complex in the afternoon. Even though it has only been a couple of days, we love our new home. Already the challenges of getting here seem like a minor hurdle compared to the incredible experiences ahead of us.

NOTE: No pictures this time. We won’t have real internet access until we get our residence permit, which may take a while (I’m sitting in a Swisscom store right now). But we’ll post when we can.

July 31, 2011July 31, 2011

Heading to Switzerland

For those of you playing along at home, we will be leaving Germany today and heading to Switzerland. Tonight we stay at a hotel in Bern, and tomorrow we hopefully move into our permanent home for the next year. Tomorrow is Switzerland’s national day so we will be greeted with parades and fireworks.

Unfortunately it does mean that for the next few days, at least, we will likely be without reliable Internet access. For those of you who have been kind enough to email or Skype us with your comments, we will be hard to reach over the next few days. We’ll post an update as soon as one is available.

Wishing you all well as we roll into August!

July 28, 2011July 22, 2012

Branching Out

James is spinning the mythical (and touristy) brass ring in the fence - make a wish!

We finally broke free of our confinement and visited two of Bavaria’s larger cities: Nürnberg and Augsburg. We saw so many sights in just two days it could make for an extremely long post. So, instead of giving the background story for each one, I have just included a lot of links so you can find out more for yourself if you are interested.

Kristina’s car was still in the shop on Tuesday morning, so we hopped on a bus in Riedenburg, to a train in Saal, and another train in Regensburg. (I told you we are in the middle of nowhere). Trains are still exciting for the kids, and great for us too when we aren’t carrying 350 pounds of luggage!

At the main train station (Bahnhof), we met Carmen, another Amity intern who spent the year in Milwaukee and who lives near Nürnberg. She was our guide for the day. We ate lunch at a fantastic outdoor café in the old town. Then, Carmen suggested that Joe and I visit the World War II museum at the Documentation Center on the Nazi Party Rally Grounds. Nürnberg was the center of the Nazi party during Hitler’s reign, and was also home to the Nürnberg Tribunal after the war, so it was fascinating to see. Meanwhile, Carmen and Kristina took all three kids to a toy museum (Spielzuegmuseum) – thank you girls! We met up afterwards in the Hauptmarkt by the central fountain and made our way up to the city’s Imperial Castle. We arrived just as it was closing, but we walked around the castle grounds and enjoyed the view. Then we descended back toward the train station, and stopped along the way at another outdoor café for dinner. We got home very late that night (almost 11:00pm) and crashed in bed to rest up for another big day.

On Wednesday we drove (in the newly repaired van) to Augsburg to visit Thomas, another friend and MGIS Amity intern. He took us to König von Flandern for lunch, a microbrewery restaurant near the Rathausplatz where the kids got to see some beer brewing in process. With some food under our belts, we climbed the 260 stairs to the top of the Perlach Tower in Augsburg’s central square. Then, we went next door to see the town hall (Rathaus), including the stunning golden hall (Goldener Saal). From there we walked through old, quaint little streets (Gassen) to the famous Augsburger Puppenkiste. To be honest we had never heard of it before, which I think offended Thomas a little, but the museum was very cool. Some of you may remember seeing their programs on t.v.?? This time, we wanted to get home at a reasonable time, so we took the tram back to Thomas’s apartment, got the van, and drove the hour and a half back to Obereggersburg.

I have to say that this is the best way to travel: visit someone in their home city and let them show you around. They know all the major attractions as well as the cool little areas that you would otherwise miss. And they know how to get around, so you don’t have to worry about getting lost. Thank you Carmen and Thomas for being our guides to these great cities!

Nürnberg and Augsburg Photo Gallery

July 25, 2011July 22, 2012

Home Sweet Home?

Our big plans for the weekend were dashed when Kristina’s car (our only method of transportation) broke down. Instead, we were effectively stranded in our little town of Obereggersberg.

Trying to stay optimistic, we went out on Saturday morning for a hike through the trails in the forest of the Altmühl valley (Naturpark Altmühltal), which encompasses the entire area. With a two-year-old along, our “hikes” are extremely slow and short, but we did manage to find and catch a frog and a toad and observe some beautiful scenery. In the afternoon, we again went over to the Schloss Eggersberg, our neighborhood castle, with the intention of actually going inside. There is a small museum there, but it appeared to be closed. So we just walked in through the restaurant and went up the first set of stairs we saw. The castle has been turned into a hotel, though it didn’t seem to have many guests in residence. No one bothered us, so we explored the whole place, up to the 4^th story theater that used to host a lively music festival (about 35 years ago).

It was still early, and the restaurant wasn’t seating for dinner yet, so we walked down the road to where it stopped and looked over the Altmühl river and valley. There were also ruins of an even older castle there, which proved, along with the beautiful landscape, to be a great backdrop for pictures. So, we did an impromptu photo shoot, and played and climbed until it was time for dinner. We went back to the castle restaurant for a delicious dinner and congratulated ourselves on making a great day out of nothing.

That night, we talked to Kristina and found out that her car would be out of commission until Tuesday. Having now explored every inch of the two short roads that make up Obereggersberg several times, we were completely out of ideas of what to do. So, we all had a lazy Sunday. The kids watched quite a bit of German television, including a “SpongeBob Schwammkopf” marathon on Nickelodeon Germany, which we justified by saying that it would be helpful for their language comprehension. The older kids and I crammed into Kristina’s brother’s sports car so we could get out of the house for at least a couple of hours to eat lunch and enjoy some live music at the Fuchsgarten.

Today is day three of our immobility. Joe took the older kids on an extremely long walk to Riedenburg to get some groceries and have lunch. They walked about 8km round trip and were gone from 10:15am to 2:30pm, and they did a great job! Meanwhile, I stayed home with Henry, and cleaned the apartment.

Which brings up the question of “home.” We often say “It’s time to go home” when we are going back to our apartment here. The kids have declared that our house in Milwaukee will be referred to as “home home” and our current residence (in Germany, Switzerland, or wherever) can be called just “home.” We do what we can to bring many of the qualities of “home” with us wherever we go, including our family, our routine, eating meals together, etc. And certainly life follows you wherever you go. Things like laundry, dishes, learning manners, and other responsibilities are always with you no matter what your surroundings or other experiences are. So, regardless of the language or food or other differences, we still have somewhere, or something, we can call “home.”

A few pictures of Obereggersberg.

July 21, 2011July 22, 2012

No day off for mom

Wednesday was cold and rainy all day. The kids were a little toured-out anyway, so we decided to take the day off. We stayed home and watched some German television, played games, and just hung out. It’s nice to be in a place long enough that we don’t feel obligated to do something every day. I even stayed in my pajamas all day long, though I did that for a very specific reason.

You see, is isn’t very common here to have a dryer. So, when I do laundry, I have to hang it out to dry. I realize that much of the world does this all the time, but for me it is a new experience. My options are to hang it in our bedroom, in the attic, or outside (if it’s not raining). Then you have to wait for 1-2 days before they are really dry. We have no microwave either, so when I wanted to eat the leftover käsespatzle from yesterday, I had to warm it in the oven for 15 minutes, and even then it was still cold. Oh, and also, there is no dishwasher and we have barely enough dishes to get through each meal with five people. Dishes have primarily been Joe’s job. Although staying home all day also meant eating all our meals here, and using every dish, bowl, saucer, and whatever else we could put food on. We are getting used to a slower, more rural lifestyle here.

Up until now, it has really felt like a vacation (and it has been). But today it started to feel more like we are really living here, with all the little things that go with that.

July 18, 2011July 19, 2011

So what’s in Riedenburg?

We probably would never have ended up in this particular corner of the world if it weren’t for our host daughter Kristina (who lived with us for the past year in Milwaukee). It’s hard to find on a map, and even harder to get to. But, it turns out that Riedenburg Germany is a beautiful little Bavarian town on the Altmühl river. Our stay is made even more enjoyable with Kristina as our companion and tour guide.

Our sightseeing began in earnest on Saturday. We started the day at Schloss Rosenburg, the castle at the top of the hill above the town of Riedenburg. This is the second castle we’ve visited, and we’ve only been here for two days… and we’re in the middle of nowhere! It seems like you can’t throw a rock without hitting a castle around here. There are actually two words for castle in German. “Schloss” (or Schloß) is a palace where someone of some rank lived at some point. “Burg” is more of a fortress castle for protection of an area. Many of these castles have been converted to other things. Schloss Rosenburg is now a “Falkenhof” which is a museum and rescue center where they house and train large birds. We saw the falcon show during which extremely large falcons, eagles, vultures and other birds flew scarcely inches above our heads.

From there we walked through the woods down to the town of Riedenburg. We ate lunch at an outdoor café, and strolled down to the river where we treated ourselves to some ice cream. On the way, I stopped in to greet the baker who brings us fresh rolls every morning. In German, I talked to them about mixing up the rolls that we get so we don’t just get the same thing every day. I’m not exactly sure what I asked for, so we’ll se what shows up on Monday morning!

We headed home for naptime, after which Kristina took us to St. Agatha Lake, where people swim and play. It’s like a beach except without sand. The opposite side of the lake has stunning cliffs, which lit up in the sunset behind us. The older kids swam like fish while Henry sat at the edge and threw rocks into the water, his absolute favorite thing to do. It was a perfect day.

Sunday was more relaxed. We played at the Speilplatz in the morning, where we have invented several moves on the zip line including the “tornado” and the “daddy big swing.” We had lunch at our local castle next door where there was live Blasmusik (traditional German oom-pah music; a quartet with tuba, accordion, trumpet, and clarinet) in the outdoor beer garden. Then we headed to the Kristallmuseum and Fasslwirtschaft in town. The crystal museum features the largest natural quartz crystal grouping in the world (7.8 tons). Yes, there are random tourist attractions here too! Oddly, the crystal grouping was originally found in Arkansas.

We went to Kristina’s parents’ house where we had our first reliable Internet access. While Joe and I got caught up on our computers, her parents fed and entertained our kids with German TV and their pet quails. (We now have 15 more quail eggs to eat with our fresh rolls). They also sent us home with some German games and children’s books. Riedenburg is great, but the best part is having such sweet and generous friends here. Check out some more pictures from the weekend in our gallery.

July 14, 2011July 22, 2012

The Journey Begins

In case any of you haven’t had the opportunity to travel halfway across the world with three children ages seven and under, you should definitely make sure to take advantage of the opportunity if it comes along. Definitely. Sarcasm works over the Internet, right?

So we began our journey in Milwaukee, being picked up by the airport bus at 9am on Wednesday, July 13th. It is important to know that we had 5 maximum sized carry-on suitcases, two very large 50-pound suitcases, a large box, a pack-and-play, a car seat, a stroller, and three backpacks. So, every meter we had to move between various modes of transportation was a feat.

On the way to the airport James expressed some concern about going to Germany since he didn’t know how to say the word “toothpick” in German (bonus points for those of you who said Zanstocher). Why he needed to know, we’re still not sure.

From Milwaukee we boarded a small regional jet to Philadelphia. Since there were only 4 seats per row, James got to sit next to a lovely Greek lady named Voula who was headed back to Greece to relax at her oceanside home. We are now all officially invited to Greece. We may see if she’ll just take the kids for a week. Or two. Or three.

In Philadelphia, we transferred to the international terminal to board our flight to Zurich. We were seated near the back of a 737 with James and Emily sitting together and Henry stuck between his mom and me in his car seat. The plane ride featured three movies, “Big Mommas (Father and Son),” “A Night at the Museum,” and “Bride Wars.” I’m happy to say, I watched none of these, though Emily and James got front row seats to “A Night at the Museum” and loved it. Consequently, James and Emily did not sleep at all on the flight over. Henry slept the most, followed by me and Sarah.

We got to Zurich around 7:30am on Thursday, July 14th (James’s 6th Birthday). By the time we made it to the baggage claim our luggage was already taken off the carousel and stacked nicely for us. We found a luggage cart to pile everything onto and headed to the Flughafen Banhof (airport train station). We bought our tickets to travel from Zurich to Ingolstadt, Germany, via Munich at the ticket counter and talked to the baggage man about shipping our large suitcases. It turns out that would take around a week, and the train from Zurich to Munich would have plenty of room on it so it shouldn’t be a problem.

Here’s where things started to turn south. Before I begin, I need to thank some people who helped us along the way. The nameless lady on the train to Munich, Kim and Peter from California, Marco from Regensburg, and last but not least, Irene, the kindest, sweetest of them all.

The train pulls up at the station and I look for the car number that we have been assigned, as we have reserve seats. All of the cars are packed with people. I find our car number and Sarah and I quickly throw all of the kids and suitcases onto the train platform portion of the car (where people enter and exit). Emily and James enter the car and sit in two of our seats, which were open. I look high and low, but space to store our luggage is few and far between. So with everyone watching, I walked back and forth from the platform to the car with a new bag each time, trying to find a spot to cram it where it won’t likely fall and hit someone.

At this point the ticket man comes around and asks for our ticket. I show him the mess of papers that the train station lady gives me, he identifies our ticket and proceeds to tell me that we can’t have all of our stuff on the platform. He actually became quite upset about it and I tried to explain that I was moving pieces into the car as quickly as I could but there was not much space there.

I noticed a nice, pleasant, 30-something lady get up from her seat and walk to the other side of the ticket taker. She starts talking to him in Swiss German, and he responds back. She becomes more irritated and begins to speak very brusquely with him. I begin to realize that she has come over to yell at the ticket taker for being rude to us and to ask him to give us a break as the train is clearly full and we’ve been trying to move all of our luggage. His tone with us began to soften a bit and the lady took a seat.

On the ride we met Kim and Peter, two lawyers from California. They played with our kids (well, just Henry as Emily and James fell dead-asleep as soon as they got in their seats), bought us a drink, and generally made the time go by much faster. They were on day 3 of their two-week European vacation, and I think they really enjoyed not having any children once they met us.

We finally got all of our bags loaded for our 5 hour train ride to Munich (it should have been 4 hours, but the diesel engine broke down at one of the stops and they had to send a whole new engine to attach to the train). We finally arrived in Munich, threw all of our bags off the train, and found the next train to Ingolstadt. Thankfully that was easy to do and the train was not very full, so we grabbed our own compartment and stored all of our luggage without a problem. An hour later we arrived in Ingolstadt.

I went to the ticket counter to buy our tickets to Saal ab der Donnau (The city of Saal on the Danube river), grabbed two Cokes for the kids, and about 100 euros for pocket cash. When I came back we began to move our luggage two tracks over to catch the next train. That doesn’t sound like much, but in order to do that we had to haul each piece down the stairs, over two tracks, and back up the stairs. There were no lifts, so we had to do it all by hand. That’s where we met Marco, a wonderfully nice mathematician from Regensburg. He helped move all of our luggage as soon as he heard we had been doing this all day. He also helped talk to the conductor for me, and helped with moving things off the train once we got there. He also gave me his number in case we needed more help in the future!

Once we got there we were greeted by Frau Irene Petri who helped us load her VW van with our luggage, and drove us to our Ferienwohnung (holiday flat) in Obereggersberg, Germany. She had little chocolate treats ready for the kids, a birthday cake (strawberry custard torte) for James, and a kitchen full of groceries waiting for us. She only spoke German, so I smiled and nodded the entire 25 minutes from Saal to Obereggersberg. She was a tremendous sweetheart.

We got to our flat around 6:00pm on Thursday, July 14th, about 26 hours after we started. We were tired, hungry, smelly, exhausted, smelly, tired, and hungry. And smelly. But most of all, we were elated to be here. We went to bed between 9 and 10pm, and had variable success sleeping. But we all woke up the next morning, having agreed to not set any alarm clocks, at 11am, ready to meet what remained of the day…

July 1, 2011July 19, 2011

The fastest five years in sports…

[singlepic id=139 w=200 h=150 float=left]So residency has come and gone. It feels like just yesterday that we were gathering in the orthopaedic library at the hospital and learning about ACGME competencies, and how to log hours. So five years of studying, rounding, operating, dictating, splinting, and hardly sleeping have finally come to an end. I said it about medical school, and I’ll say it about residency: “The days are long, but the years are short.”

[singlepic id=135 w=200 h=150 float=right]This past weekend we had our graduation celebration and picnic (including resident roasts, and the always anticipated Skits). Unfortunately my camera was out of batteries for the graduation dinner night, but we got plenty of pictures of the picnic on Saturday (see the gallery below). Saturday started with a golf tournament that was a lot of fun (thanks to Joe M, Kelly and Kathy).

[singlepic id=133 w=200 h=150 float=left]Alas all celebrations must end. Right now my time is filled with studying for step 1 of the American Board of Orthopaedic Surgery exam. We take the exam on July 7th. It’s around 350 questions and we have 9 hours to do it. Whew! It’s the kind of test you only want to take once, trust me on that. I’m a little concerned about how to decompress from that once the test is done.

After that we get ready to fly out to Switzerland, on July 13th. We have a few family get togethers before we leave, but within less than two weeks we will be in Europe, hopefully with all of our children. And hopefully with our Swiss Visas. Keep your fingers crossed!

Well, I should get back to studying… See you in Switzerland!

Check out the Photo Gallery here.

December 19, 2010July 3, 2011

Merry Christmas from the Schwabs!

It’s that time of year again when we send words of wisdom to our friends and family. We have been very blessed this year, well, except for Henry’s case of the chicken pox, oh, and James’s broken arm. Thankfully, Emily, ever graceful, survived the year without any physical calamities, save for three lost teeth.

[singlepic id=76 w=200 h=150 float=right]Joe celebrated his film debut this spring directing, producing, and starring in the Skits film for the Orthopaedic Department’s graduation party. He has been looking forward to this for decades, literally. For a while, he was spending more time filming and editing than doing surgery, and pretty much no time sleeping. Reluctantly, he has put his Hollywood dreams on hold, and is now in the fifth and final year of his residency. We’re really looking forward to the next graduation party!

Joe and Sarah traveled to Switzerland in February for a conference, and to prepare for our yearlong stay there starting in 2011. Despite what you may have heard, there are no “Swiss Cake Rolls” to be found in that country. Deceitful Little Debbie!

Among several trips to Door County and Minnesota, Emily and James made their inaugural trip to the Boundary Waters, where they were four lakes and over 500 rods away from any TVs, video games, electricity or running water… and they loved it!! They showed their true spirit on the last day as we canoed out in pouring rain, at 50 degrees, singing and laughing.

Henry turned 1 in June, and passed all of the typical 1-year-old milestones: crawling, walking, first words (“Dada’s at work”). With a 1-year-old, our family travel was somewhat limited, so we decided to bring the world to us.

In conjunction with James and Emily’s school, the Milwaukee German Immersion School, we hosted two teaching interns, one from Switzerland in the spring and one from Germany this fall. Both Isabel and Kristina have been great to have in our home, playing with the kids and helping us with our German language (Könnten Sie bitte Ohrfeige dass Fisch für mich?).

We wish you all a most Joyous and Blessed Christmas, and all the best for 2011!