the cousins see bavaria

sabin on the lake near neuschwanstein slott

looking up at the glockenspiel on marienplatz, munich

baby geese in the englisher garten, munich

megan's first encounter with a snail.

hey, moneek! we wish you were here!

sabin snuggles up with cousin gizzy

it wouldn't be germany without a shot of jagermeister!

tour #481 neuschwanstein castle, southern bavaria

what are the chances that cousins from halfway across the world, even while doing moderate coordination via the miracle of 3G mobile networks, ended up on the VERY SAME tour through neuschwanstein castle in southern bavaria this very afternoon? apparently pretty good!

farm bill

i would be very interested in what my farming cousins have to say about this. (click the "this" to go to an article from the international herald tribune which i read last week.) remember, if you don't post your opinion here, you'll only be subjected to mine...

shore leave in copenhagen

gisel, sabin and the little mermaid. you guess which one is the mermaid.

cousin gisel had a few hours of shore leave in copenhagen today, so sabin and i took our bikes on the train and went in to have lunch with her. it was a beautiful, gorgeous, sunny day in copenhagen, so after a harrowing bike ride with gizzy on the back of my bike and then even more harrowing with me on the back of my bike and her riding, we settled down for a lovely lunch and then a nice walk.

we'll go down to munich in a few weeks and meet her again when she's taking megan and jenni on their first big european tour (which seems to really be pretty much their first big tour of germany). i'm sure it will also be good for sabin to continue the lessons gisel started today in being a proper nachtigal.

words i'll never hear again

when i studied in kazan, russia, in 1994, dad and norm huizenga came to visit me. i went to moscow to meet them and we took the 13-hour train ride back to kazan. along the way, there was a stop (the name of which escapes me at the moment) where there was a crystal factory.

times were tough in russia back then and the people who worked in the factory were paid in the crystal products that they made. chandeliers, cut glass pitchers, wine glasses, vodka glasses. some in beautiful cobalt blue and other vibrant colors.

the stop came very early in the morning...around 4 or 5 a.m., as i recall. despite the ungodly hour and no matter the weather--bitter cold, driving rain, blizzard conditions--the people from the village swarmed the train with their wares.

i remember my astonishment when dad handed me a $50 dollar bill and said, "get out there and buy something!" words which i'd never heard before and that i'm sure i'll never hear again.

more seasonal cooking

because it's that time of year when the rhubarb pokes its ruby stalks out of the ground and begs to be made into something scrumptious...


Mom's Best Rhubarb Coffee Cake

Cream together:
2 C. brown sugar
½ C. butter
2 eggs
1 C. buttermilk
1 t. vanilla

Mix in:
1 t. soda
¼ t. salt
2 C. flour
3 C. rhubarb

Top with:
½ C. sugar
1 t. cinnamon

Bake at 350 for 30 minutes in a 9x13 pan.

i baked mine in a round pan, as you can see. it made enough for a small loaf for the neighbors who serve as sabin's surrogate grandparents as well. i used a rich dark brown muscovado sugar rather than ordinary brown sugar. it has an almost molasses-like flavor and made it rich and delicious. we poured cream over it and sprinkled a bit more of the crystals of organic raw sugar over it to give it a little extra sweetness and crunch. heavenly.

possible in platte?

i found myself in a hotel room in oslo on monday evening, watching with that sort of sick sense of fascination one has when passing the scene of an accident, the story unfolding on BBC World of the family in austria where the father, josef fritzl, apparently kept the now 42-year-old daughter locked in the basement for 24 years and fathered seven children with her--children that were therefore both child and grandchild to him--3 of whom had never, ever seen the light of day.

the story itself is horrifying. how could someone possibly do that to their own child? he and his wife and apparently an older son lived in the house upstairs and they claim that at least the wife had no idea. three of the seven children he fathered with the daughter were brought upstairs to live a "normal" life--adopted by the man and his wife (whom he also fathered seven children with). they claimed to the authorities that the children were left on the doorstep by the daughter, who had run away to live in a cult. apparently, although this happened a stunning three times, the austrian authorities never questioned it or thought it sounded the least bit strange.

this story has me thinking about a society in which such a thing is possible. this family lived in an apartment building that they owned. the wife apparently lived up on the 3rd floor. but, how could you not notice that there was a whole area of the basement in the place where you lived that was off limits? wouldn't you ever wonder why? or question it? CNN is claiming that josef fritzl took a four week holiday in thailand during the time the daughter and her children were locked in the basement--who took care of them then, giving them food and water? it seems astonishing that he didn't have any accomplices.

and the amount of food it must have taken to feed seven children ages 19 to 5? how could you possibly explain that? a neighbor was actually quoted as seeing the son, who acted as a kind of building superintendent, take food into the house in an actual wheelbarrow. so, apparently it was noticed. but never questioned! the daughter, who "disappeared" at 18 had been abused by the father from age 11 and had tried several times to run away. so, he had an easy story to tell--that she had finally succeeded in running away.

amstetten, austria, where it happened, is a town of 23,000 people. you would imagine in a town of that size, that people would know one another or at least take note of one another, at least within a neighborhood. is it a symptom of a sick state of society that people are so enclosed in their own little worlds that they don't take note of things happening around them? on the spiegel online website, a woman who actually lived in the building for a time said she saw nothing suspicious. how could that be?

but then, i thought about my own neighborhood in denmark. frederikssund is a town of a similar size to amstetten. we know our neighbors on both sides--the ones uphill act as sort of surrogate grandparents to sabin and downhill, the middle daughter has been sabin's regular babysitter for a number of years now. but, go a little farther up or down the street and we have but a nodding acquaintance of our neighbors. i would have absolutely no idea whether they had their children locked up in the basement or not.

but, would it be possible in platte? i sincerely don't think so. granted, platte is a much smaller community, but the culture is different as well. people talk a lot more to one another. they notice what other people are up to. this can, of course, have its bad side, when talk takes the form of gossip. but, even gossip in austria might have helped in the tragic situation there--it would have sewn the seed of doubt. but, that didn't happen and there is a now 42-year-old woman who has completely lived the wrong life. that is truly a tragedy.

i guess the lesson in this is, get out there, meet your neighbors, talk to them, ask after their children, ask to see their basements. notice what's going on in your surroundings. just simply care more. be a better citizen. i know i intend to.