The Autobahn and Driving Here

I've been learning to drive a standard car since the school van is standard and basically everything else over here is, too! Tuesday, I went out on the autobahn and down the mainstreet of Weil. Now, this is to clarify and clear up the American conception (or MISconception) of the autobahn (and also to reassure my father and mother that it's SAFE).

First of all, there is no sign posted up before you come to the autobahn marked BEWARE: DRIVE AT YOUR OWN RISK. THE AUTOBAHN AHEAD! The autobahn is the German word for highway. Like I-95 or I-75 or even Butler Boulevard in Jax.
Second of all, yes it is true there is no speed limit....However, Germans are the safest drivers you will ever come across. They don't drive any faster than usual or at least that has been my experience. Plus, when there IS a speed limit it's marked in kilometres not miles and 100 kilometres is about 75 or 80 miles...which is about the speed limit, give or take, in the States.

So, I hope this help clears the Autobahn thing up. Driving on it is a lot safer than people think!

Thanksgiving weekend

Being that all day Thursday I spent completely homesick, I had a much better weekend!

Friday after school I went into Switzerland to spend the night w/the family I used to au pair for. It was so great to see them once again and spend time w/my "kids." Paula and Hajo grilled steaks and we had a wonderful dinner just talking and catching up. Then we watched a movie and I got to sleep in my old bed. The next morning Paula made a great breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon, and coffee. It is so nice to have a home away from home.

Saturday afternoon I met up with Anne at the SBB (Basel train station). The Weinachts Markt aka Christmas Market has opened in Basel and they even have a few stalls in the train station!! I had some racklette for lunch before we headed over to work at my church's annual Christmas Bazaar. We worked at the jewelry stall (Mom would be so proud!) and it was a lot of fun. This is their 51st year I believe doing it so it draws a lot of people and it is a great way to get people to come to our church. It's basically a huge indoor garage sale and Anne and I both ended up buying a few cheap things i.e. The Muppet Movie for 3 swiss francs!

My friend Leighton who is au pairing in Basel met up w/us there and we headed for Weil am Rhein around 3 to get ready for the big Thanksgiving Dinner at Diana's house. We had a ton of fun there last night! I made my grandmother's mac & cheese and there was turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, sweet potatoes, salad, pumpkin pie, pecan pie....so much food and so good!! We all had a great time talking and laughing a lot! It made it really seem like Thanksgiving!!

I am all ready for Christmas and even though we are having a heat wave over here (60 degrees in November in this part of Europe is almost unheard of!) I'm ready for some homemade hot chocolate and snow! I hope you all had a great weekend as well. I'll see some of you 2 weeks from Saturday!!
Love, Allison

Happy Thanksgiving

I really don't know how to start this post. It's been a really difficult day today and I think that is attributed to the fact that it's Thanksgiving and I'm not with my parents and Chip. Not all hope is lost. We did have a somewhat "traditional" Thanksgiving meal (chicken leg, veggies, & mashed potatoes) for lunch and spent most of class time talking about what we were thankful for. But I think it really hit me when I checked my yahoo today and was reminded about the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade (even if there aren't floats I still miss it!). I love watching the parade and I'm especially sad I'm going to miss it since Natalie Grant will be performing in it this year!

Below you will find another slide show I made today. I have a longer break and have included some pictures taken today at lunch.

Enjoy and have yourself a very Happy Turkey Day!
Love, Allison

Turkey Day at R.I.A

Holidays and Homesickness

Well, this would be around the time that I really start to feel the homesickness come on. It's really weird. It comes and goes lately. And these past few weeks have been the worst ever since the start of November. I really think it's b/c this is the holiday season and all I want is to be home with my family and friends right now. It doesn't really seem or feel like Thanksgiving is tomorrow. We are having a big lunch w/the kids in honor of it and watching Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving. On Saturday Diana is having the staff over for a traditional Thanksgiving meal so that will be fun. It still doesn't take the place of being with my parents and brother and/or other family members. 24 more days til I'm home. I can make it!

Weekend to Remember...

This weekend my friend Carly flew into town for a brief but fun visit. We are all of course on a budget over here so Anne and I have been saving up for a fun day trip or two. It's amazing how close we are to everything over here.

On Friday, we had the day off from school for a teacher's meeting. After the meeting, Anne, Carly, and I took the train into Colmar, France which is a/b 30 min from here. It is a charming little French town in the Alsace area. They were getting ready for their Christmas market and so there were decorations everywhere. We had a nice time taking in the scenery and stopping at a little tea room for tea and creme brule! We got home that evening around 8:30 or 9 and wanted to get to bed early for our BIG day trip on Saturday.

Andrea joined us on Saturday when we rented a car from easycar.com and drove to Feldkirch, Austria. I have probably never had a more fun road trip than on this one! On the way we stopped in Wallensee, Switzerland to eat lunch and play on the playground that overlooked a lake and some mountains. It was so nice to not have to keep up w/train schedules and bus times and to just go at our own pace!

We drove through the tiny country of Liechtenstein on our way into Austria. Liechtenstein is pretty but I'm glad that we just drove through! We got to Feldkirch around 2:30 and immediately walked up to the castle that overlooks the city. Then we walked down into the old town (Aldstadt as they say here!) and looked in the cute little shops and walked around the square. We decided to venture further and found a park at the bottom of a hill. We had a great time just being goofy and taking some hilarious pictures!

Afterwards we climbed the hill and saw a mountain opposite us that had snow on top! It was beautiful! We had a great dinner at a cafe in the town and then got ready to go back home (Hey Dad, I had some apple strudel in honor of you and our trip to Salzburg!!). We got home around 9ish and it was sooooo nice to not have to worry again about catching a train into Weil. Unfortunately, our spoiled time with a car ended this morning before church when we dropped it off again. Oh well...it was nice while it lasted!

This has really been a fun weekend and just a nice time to be with old and new friends :) Enjoy the slide show below of our trip!

Awesome weekend!

Carly comes tomorrow!

My friend Carly from college is flying over to see me tomorrow! I am really looking forward to her visit! I will take the train to Zurich to get her from the airport tomorrow and then we will begin our weekend o'fun. Friday we are going on a short day trip to Colmar, France which is about 20 minutes from here. It is a small Alsacian town much like Riquewihr. On Saturday, Anne, Andrea, Carly, and I are renting a car (it's SUPER cheap!) and driving over to Austria to spend the day in the small town of Feldkirch on the Swiss/German/Austrian border. It's amazing what incredibly CHEAP deals you can get over here...esp splitting it b/t 4 people!

Also, a few of you have inquired about Thanksgiving over here. Well, obviously, the country of Germany doesn't celebrate it, but we as a staff are gathering together the Saturday after Thanksgiving to eat a good ol' turkey dinner together. Yes, I will be teaching next Thursday but rest assured I'll be thinking of my friends and fam back home who are all sitting down to a wonderful turkey dinner!!

Love those Brits!

Today at church I went down w/the children during children's church to discuss our Christmas Nativity Play this year. We are doing the same play that I wrote for RIA (it made it MUCH easier!) but of course the kids at church are all from GB (Great Britain) and when they read over my play they saw a ton of American slang and were a bit confused. It was SOOO adorable, however, hearing them quote the play in their adorable Brit accents. We had one little girl named Crisade who volunteered to be not only the lead but one of the angels and a wise man as well. She reminds me a lot of the actress who played "Lucy" in Narnia. Anyway, she said about being a king "Perhaps I shall be a Queen instead and not wear a big crown"!! It was too cute.

Our play will be Dec 10, two days after the Christmas play at school. I will definitely video the one at school and be sure to get lots of pictures of both.

In case anyone is curious, 5 weeks from tomorrow is Christmas Day ;)

Happy Saint Martin's Day/Vet's Day!

Anne and I were walking home from school this evening when we heard LOTS of voices coming from the Kindergarten behind our apartment. Being the nosy beings that we are, we decided to check it out. It then dawned on me that this was the night before St. Martin's Day over here. This is a holiday (and I'm just assuming they're celebrating Martin Luther) in which the kids carve turnips and put a candle in them. Then they parade around the neighborhood and sing songs. I really have no idea what or why or how this all got started and like I said, I'm thinking it's b/c of Martin Luther since that's the only Martin I would think was a saint over here.

Anne also reminded me that today was Veteran's Day in the States so HAPPY VETERAN'S DAY as well.

Tonight was a great night of bonding w/Catharine and Andrea while watching The Polar Express at their apartment. We made hot chocolate cappucino and watched the movie and now I am completely in the Christmas spirit. I figure this is allowed since we don't have Thanksgiving over here and the next big holiday is Christmas (there is also St. Nikolas Day on Dec 6 but that's a whole other thing to explain and we don't get a holiday for that).

Anywho, I hope you all are doing wonderful. Miss you tons!

Random pics of October

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

Sick

Today I stayed home again with whatever it is that has been going around the school. Yesterday it was a sore throat and unability to keep my eyes open while teaching. The past 2 nights I've gone to bed with an upset stomach and this morning I woke up feeling achy and again with my stomach hurting. I think it's due to exhaustion and lack of sleep. They warned us a/b this at PFO. Apparently, around this time of year is when a lot of people tend to get sick, whether it be due to culture shock, homesickness, or just a plain ol' bug. I'm pretty sure mine is the bug that everyone else has gotten at school. I'm the third teacher this week to get it. Whatever "it" is.

and the cold weather continues...

It is 46 degrees right now and since it's been in the thirties for the last week I was actually referring to today as "warmer" weather. Now how sad is that?

Awesome day today

As you all know I really have enjoyed being at the church I'm at right now. The preaching is great and I have met so many wonderful people. I've also gotten involved in the worship planning committee and am helping with the children's Christmas play. It is so great to have a church family so far from home!

Today was the All Age Service where the kids stay thru out the whole service instead of going to Children's Church. We had a great message on Solomon and wisdom today. I even got to do a sketch as part of one of the Bible readings! Well, before the sermon, Pastor Geoff told us a/b a woman in our church who had to flee her home country of Liberia two years ago. She has two small children and has been living in a hostel. Thankfully, she has a family in the church who has "adopted" her and her kids and are helping her out. She found out this week that she has been granted a visa for Switzerland. It was so awesome b/c then she sang a song of praise in her own language!!! It was beautiful!

Every Sunday I am more and more thankful for the Anglican Church in Basel and for the staff and people I go to church with. God has truly answered my prayers about getting involved not only in the community of Weil but in Basel as well :)

So long warm weather!

As I am typing this right now it is 28 degrees outside. The high today will only reach 43. Anne told me she woke up to the sound of someone scraping ice off their car window. I think it's safe to say the warm weather is gone here for a while...

Happy All Saints Day!

Today Germany is celebrating All Saints Day and I am celebrating the fact that we get a day off school because of it! I think this is a Catholic holiday and since all of Baden-Wurtenburg (the state of Germany we live in) is mostly Catholic they give us a day off to celebrate...or just sit at home and do nothing which is what Anne and I have done.

Last night was Halloween here in Weil am Rhein. Since the concept of dressing up and going door to door for candy has just come over here in the last 2 or 3 years, there weren't many trick or treaters out last night. The staff and a few of our friends from various churches went to Weingut Frei winery last night in Weil. It is a local winery owned by friends of our director at school. We had some DELICIOUS pumpkin soup and crepes! YUM! Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of it but since I'll be here for a while, I'm sure we will be going back.

After dinner, we went back home and noticed that some trick or treaters were following us. It turned out to be two of our students, Joey and Jamie Carney! Jamie was dressed up as a movie star (she is VERY dramatic and so much fun!) and Joey was a pirate. Unfortunately, we didn't have any candy to hand out so we stayed outside and chatted w/them for a while until it got too cold and my teeth were chattering. We ended our evening by watching a few episodes of Without a Trace and drinking hot chocolate.

All day today we've done nothing but watch more Without a Trace and CHILL. It is nice to have a day off like this. Tonight I have a worship planning meeting in Basel but until then I pretty much plan on doing absolutely nothing!

I hope YOUR All Saints Day is going great and that you all had a safe and Happy Halloween!