Köln and Wageningen (I can say it correctly now Bridget!)

I spent a couple of days in Cologne (Köln) Germany and there were a couple of highlights or ponderings that I wanted to share from my time there.

On Wednesday I arrived in Cologne and the one place that everyone tells you that you must visit there is the dom (cathedral).  I couldn't fail to see the dom as soon as I arrived as it is right next to the train station and it is so large and imposing that it dominates the skyline in many directions for kilometers.  I think the dom is a rather grotesque structure, garish in its heights and intimadating in the sheer volume it takes up.  I know that many people admire the dom, but I can't help but feel that it gives an altogether one sided impression of the God it celebrates.  It intimidates upon arrival and it has a standoffish feel as though one must come into it only with hesitation.  The dom in Cologne gives the impression that God is awesome and terrible (tremendous) which is true, but it fails to show the character of God that beckons people to come as they are to this awe inspiring God and to surrender to His mercy.  The inside of the dom left me feeling cold as well as it seemed to be more of a museum paying tribute to a dead god of a long ago myth rather than a place of vibrant and holy worship -- this had much to do with the bustle of tourists with cameras in hand, but it was also the spirit of the place.  I went back the next day in the early morning to see if my first impression could be changed and as it was quieter I was able to sit and pray and I warmed up to it a bit more, but I still left feeling that I prefer to meet the Lord outside in the sunshine than in that space.

Aaron Benda gave me a small list of places to visit while in Cologne which included the dom, the botanical gardens and the chocolate museum.  On Thursday I went to the botanical gardens and in the  midst of the beautiful flowers and trees I had such a delightful encounter with a local woman.  I was writing away on a bench thinking through a jumble of thoughts when a lady happened by.  She had flaming red hair cut short and stylish and she was wearing a puffy long black trench coat jacket with a shiny black Chanel bag.  She looked down at me as she was walking by and made a comment to me in German.  I smiled and nodded.  She paused and said "Oh, are you English?"and I said, "No, I am American."  Óh, she said and then she went on to tell me how she used to like America back in the 50's after the war.  She has relatives from Baltimore and she would go and visit them.  She does not like America any more. It is poor there.  The last time she visited her relatives she was dressed better than them!  "It is better here now," she said, "it is good you are here."  I informed her that I was not living here, but I was just visiting.  She looked me up and down and said, "You like America?" and I indicated that I did.  She looked at me inquiringly and then relaxed as she came to a conclusion, "Ah... because you live there."  She then asked me for  my occupation and walked away with a final "ciao."  I couldn't stop smiling as she walked off; it was so fun to sit and replay our conversation in my head and to think of all the different applications there are for it.  Her bluntness, style, character and choice of words all came together to make a delightful combination for a memorable encounter and it made me ponder if I ever assume that because a foreigner is living in the US that they must consider it to be better than their own country; I hope not.  Either way it was a good object lessons on making cultural assumptions.

I did make it to the chocolate museum as well, but when I got in line for a ticket I started having doubts... was I really there to learn intricate details of the chocolate making process or was I there to visit the museum store and eat chocolate?  I was there to eat chocolate. Therefore I saved 8.5 euros and skipped straight to the museum store for mango chocolate.

On Thursday night I met two German guys who were staying at my hostel. One was an Iraqi who had came to Germany as a child and was trying to find a flat in Cologne where he was working (Wisami) and the other was a would be university student on an indefinite holiday (Christian).  Christian and I went out to test his new camera that he had come to Cologne to purchase; there was almost a full moon and it reflected well off of both the Rhine and the dom at night. We had an interesting conversation about our differing world views; Wisami had said he was of the Sabean religion (which curiously uses a cross with a sheet in front of it as their special symbol but they do not follow Jesus Christ) and Christian said that he believed in thinking positive thoughts and waiting for things to come to him but he believed this was not necessarily true for everyone and he was satisfied that it worked for himself. Wisami and I didn't have a chance to talk more about the Sabean religion as he needed to go to bed early for work, but what he did tell me sounded fascinating so I will have to look the religion up on my own.  Christian and I had more of a chance to chat about his ideas on life as we took pictures and I felt like I was able to understand him better as he tried to articulate his thoughts.  I know I can ask a lot of questions when I am trying to figure something out, so I wasn't sure that he was glad he had asked me to accompany him to photograph Köln after I got done asking him all of my questions (anyone who has been on the receiving end of my endless questions can attest to this), but it couldn't have been too bad since he helped me find my train in the morning.  I will be interested to know if in a couple of years Christian is still satisfied with his idea that if things work out for him then he has nothing more to think about; I have a feeling that some day he will care a great deal about whether or not things are working out for other people.

I arrived in Holland today and I am so happy to be here with Lisanne!  I met Lisanne in Costa Rica about 7 years ago and this was our first time seeing each other since then. She met me at the train station in Urecht and we journeyed on to Ede-Wageningen to her boyfriend's university house together. Her boyfriend Tim lives in the center of this small town above a bakery in a quirky old house that is a serious university  house complete with a three step process for going to the bathroom (visiting the WC or toilet -- but you can't wash your hands in there because the sink is full of toilet paper rolls and a notepad where people jot notes to each other between times -- and on to a small laundry/shower area off the kitchen where you wash your hands -- but you can't dry your hands in there as there are no towels -- so your last stop is the kitchen to dry : ), writings and drawings on the walls, and many odd things hanging from the ceiling -- not all of them respectable, yet very much at home in a typical university house.  Tim is great (not suprising since Lisanne is) and so are his housemates who cooked us a semi elaborate dinner of two different asparagus courses (Julia would approve of the in season local menu) which we ate in the tiny living room-add-a-coffee-table-and-it-is-a-diningroom.  Today (while yesterday since I am typing this late) was Holland's memorial day so we attended a memorial service where they have two  minutes of silence to honor those who have died and fought in a war.  There were memorials at various spots around the country.  We went to one at a Jewish memorial. Wageningen is the city where the Netherlands and Germany signed a peace treaty on May 5, 1945 and so many large celebrations happen in this small city. Late at night we went down a block to a square where a torch was lit from the flame that always burns in Wageningen and runners went out to all the other provinces in Holland with these torches.  There was a drama performed which had a number of odd facets not the least of which was the musical selection which featured a piano instrumental version of TLC's "Waterfalls." As the torches were lit the trumpeter on site played the national anthem along with Old McDonald had a farm and As the Saints Go Marching in which was quirky and fun.

 I am going to sleep now in my "penthouse" room (well it is at the top of the house) that I am using while one of the housemates is away for Friday night. It has a neat view of Waneningen and access to the roof and his computer (thanks to Tim)-- tomorrow is supposed to be a crazy party day with 8 music stages around town and many many partiers and with the house's location right on the center square and 16 house guests coming to squeeze into this tiny house tomorrow and the fact that the university just got done with finals week I am anticipating the fact that I will not sleep much.

This was a really long post, but I do not think I will be able to do one for a few days so I thought it'd be best to get one done now while the memory of the woman with flaming red hair is still fresh enough in my mind to make me smile.

I hope you all have a very good night; thanks to everyone who have sent me e-mails, I will respond to them as soon as I am able.  Please let me know if you have any prayer requests that I can join with you in intercession for.

In Him whose light is life,

Cassie

High Speed!

Mainz and Weisbaden
On Tuesday So Raya came over and we wandered around Mainz, she showed me her favorite sites and everywhere else her boyfriend suggested as he called every 20 minutes or so (he is proud of Germany and he wanted me to have a good impression of it).  So Raya wasn't as concerned, perhaps because she is originally from Iran and although she has lived in Germany most of her life she has two cultures.  It was a great pleasure to spend the day with So Raya as she is kind and very interesting, we had good conversations about faith in God and where we find our peace.  She identifies herself as muslim but she stopped practicing the religion when she was 16 because she no longer believed it to be true.  Listening to So Raya's story made me think again about the importance of telling our stories to others.  Life stories are powerful as they can convey a truth, an idea or a belief in an easy to comprehend way that is both personal (that is intimate) and interesting, and personal experiences can be hard to refute.  As I listened to So Raya and the questions she had about finding peace I was drawn in and it made me question how I choose which stories to tell which people and which are the ones that God would want me to tell?
So Raya and I visited churches in Mainz and Weisbaden and the healing waters in Weisbaden.  I convinced So Raya that we should go down and touch the healing water even though it was dirty, unfortunately we had to reach way down to get to the water and all So Raya got was goose poop on her hand for her troubles.

The Slide
While wandering around Mainz in the evening on my own I encountered a strange slide in one of the many parks. The slide was at the top of a large hill; the tower to climb up it was in a windmill and the slide was composed of a long steel tube that was enclosed for the better part of the hill and opened at the bottom (perfect for dumping children onto the ground once they reached peak speed).  This indeed was an impressive slide and I was curious to try it, but I hesitated, not because of fear of course, but because of the couples lounging about around the park who may be disrupted by a large figure shooting out of a metal tube at high velocity.  Now I had a conundrum: to slide or not to slide?  I paused and considered how Meghan had requested that I write about embarrassing incidents on this blog; sigh, the choice was made: I would slide.  Even with the decision made I found myself hoping a small child would happen upon the slide to test it out first.  As luck would have it a young girl, age 8 or so, in a pink sweatshirt came up to the slide with her mom.  The girl stood at the base of the windmill and looked at it wearily while her mother coaxed her up.  Eventually they made it all the way to the top where some negotiations were made (all in German of course, but I could tell from the tone of her voice the girl had reservations).  Finally it was decided that the mother would accompany her daughter and down they came; the little girl let out robust screams even though I could hear her mother slowing them down by bracing against the sides of the slide and they came shooting out.  The daughter looked relieved if not happy, so then it was my turn.  I deftly climbed up the inside of the windmill (despite the poor German engineering of the ladder) and made it to the top, I paused to take in the scenery and who should appear?  The pink sweatshirt girl was back and this time with her dad.  So as to be polite I motioned for the pink sweatshirt girl to go first, with equal chivalry she shook her head no and motioned for me to go first. In the cramped quarters at the top of the windmill we were at a standstill.  Luckily her father broke the truce of niceties and had his daughter go with him first.  Down they went (she screamed again).  I was next, so with gusto I begun my descent. I began to pick up speed quickly but felt I could neither grip the sides to slow myself down nor scream as pink sweatshirt girl and her dad would be watching and I needed to preserve my dignity. Thus, at full speed and just a mild "eeee eeee e" I dropped out of the enclosed portion and bounced to the end of the slide just catching myself with my feet so I wouldn't land on my butt.  Whew! I looked back at pink sweatshirt girl's dad and mumbled and motioned about the surprising velocity of the slide while I collected myself. He nodded sympathetically in acknowledgment of the lack of grace with which I slid down the slide and said "high speed!"  Disclaimer:  the windmill slide is much more ferocious than it appears in the picture below.

Pictures
So Raya in Mainz, picnickers during Germany's labor day holiday, So Raya and I, the infamous windmill slide, me nervously considering the infamous windmill slide, the Rhine at sunset, the nasty fountain water of a fountain that pictured children hurting each other or animals (4 different sculptures on the four corners) with a little boy giving an apple to the baby Jesus held by Mary at the top ??, a boy twisting/squeezing a girl's arm with the girl visibly looking pained, the Germanic obsession with putting couples names on locks and locking them to bridges, and finally - an example of TPing a tree in Germany?

Mainz (not yours) Germany

Whew!  The airplane ride is over, I found my hostel with a lot of help from friendly locals (it helps to learn to pronounce the desired location correctly) and I have successfully stayed awake until 8 p.m. German time.
It is quite nice traveling alone, I had almost forgotten the feeling as it has been a couple of years since I've done it.  I love how approachable being alone makes you to other people and how it forces me to ask for help and I meet new people as a result.  It took much head nodding from a friendly older man, frantic conferencing between two motherly older women, one kind college student, a bakery worker and a man on a bike to get me from the Frankfurt airport to the train station to the Mainz Romisches Theater stop and then my hostel (basically a whole village), but I gained a friend in the process and I think Soraya (the college student) and I are going to spend the day together tomorrow.

I have been pondering the idea of  conversations with strangers lately, and more specifically I have been considering how people will reveal more intimate information with those that they think they will never meet again, but have a hard time sharing equally personal information with those close to them.  Consider Charlotte for instance who was on my long flight last night; she never knew my name but she told me what it was like to lose her daughter to a brain tumor when she was only eight.  Charlotte described in detail her daughter's character, the funeral, and her own health struggles up to the present without bothering with small talk or even with asking me questions; she needed to tell her story.  So why is it comforting to have a stranger take an intimate but small piece of your story with them?  Is it because we are all hungry to be truly known by another, but we rarely have the courage to let anyone in to the deeper waters within, therefore it is less threatening to open up to someone we will never have to face again? There are probably a myriad of reasons as to why these conversations occur, and I think I will have plenty of time and opportunity to consider this further -- but for now I am content with the thought of sleep and the chance that I will get the room to myself tonight : )

It Begins (Actually, technically... it has begun)

On the Friday of my last day at work it did not really feel like I wouldn't be coming back to Target on Monday and so I figured I should save some room in my schedule on Saturday to make sure I processed the transition.  This was a good idea since I had a lot of mixed emotions when I woke up in the morning, however after a few hours talking to God about it and a long stop in Psalm 84 I felt like I was ready to move into this new cadence of life.  I am definitely going to miss seeing my friends from Target  everyday, yet I am excited for the opportunity to meet even more people and to hear their stories. So far no day of this sabbatical time has been the same, there has been a flurry of getting things sorted and packed and moved and seeing good friends and praying and acknowledgment of how big a role that joy plays in breaking up fields of sorrow or confusion.  Joyfulness is a theme I have been camped on for a few weeks as Dave Andros presented on it during a prayer team training session at my church (New Hope Church) and it has rung very true with me that I do need to look for and dwell on joy producing moments/people and things so that when adversity comes I am quickly reminded why the joy of the Lord is my strength.