Part II- Deutschland willkommen zu

---

Sans the marzipan and tea this time, I am ready for writing again. I left off on the visit to Michael and his friends at the army base. Great people and good memories. The southern Canadians (thatd be Mike and I, so-called by his friends) faithfully cheered the Badgers, seeing a sweet victory of the axe, and then we all walked to the Arena (the U.S. Army base bar) while singing a little Taylor Swift. We sound pretty good as a group, maybe well go on tour some day, ha. Then checking into the army base, I always have to get a signed permission form showing my passport and whatnot, however this time I understood more of the Italian guards dialogue while they issued my permission form, and realized they were signing me in as Mikes wife visiting for the weekend. Of course Mike and I found this hilarious and he was my "hubbie" and I his "wifey" for the rest of the weekend. Oh Dio, lol. Anyhow, at the Arena, the boys sang karaoke and spent the rest of the night at a great mojito bar downtown, and then followed Mike to a club because he was dead set on dancing somewhere, haha. I owe J and Mike a million thanks for sharing their apartment as if it were my own and showing me a good time.

Then just last week Cecilia, the kids and I went on a 5-day vacation to Mönchengladbach, Germany, where Cecilias brother lived. It was arranged partly for a family visit, but also for work, since Cecilia would be listening and critiquing Rafaeles (her brother) cello practices in preparation for an important concert at the end of October. It was one of my worst airport experiences (waking at 5am to make it on time but then arriving to find that our flight was moved to a different airport completely, and then five delays and 7 hours later we finally left Venice for the 1 hour flight, with exhausted and whining children in hand), but our time in Germany itself was great.

The weather has dramatically changed this past week, and especially in Germany you could see the true red and golden colors of fall, and the many corn fields and frost in the morning made me homesick for the first time as I thought of how similar this climate was to Wisconsin. It was outside of Mönchengladbach that I saw my first wooden windmill slowly spinning at sunset, casting some really cool shadows on the fields surrounding it.

One day Cecilia and I drove to Düsseldorf, where I felt like I saw some of that rue German spirit. There was a VERY lively German brass band that paraded through the streets on and off for four hours (I still don know what they were celebrating), the smell of brats lined every street downtown, and whoops and hollers came from men watching the soccer game and drinking beer. Just like a football game day back home :-) Anyhow, we went to the ceramic museum (damn those things are old- some pieces dated right back to thousands of years before Christ), a few churches and did some shopping.

The rest of the week was spent going to rehearsals of Rafaeles (I love the sound of the cello!), walking around Mönchengladbach, and hanging out at the house with his kids, Cecilias mother and her friend Magdalena (who had also come along for the vacation). While we didn do much "sightseeing" on this vacation, I appreciated the change in scenery and the fall weather. I was the only one, though, who really seemed to like the chilliness, haha. Oh, and adding another language to speak with people (as many still didn speak English in this area) confused my tongue every so often so that no real language would come out. After that week I also became more determined to return to music. I used to do so much of it in high school- choirs, dance and band- and I really miss it, especially after seeing a musical with Cecilia one night (granted it was all in German, but I think I understood the gist of it, haha).

Now back in Montegrotto Terme... I start volunteer work again on Monday as a leader for an English conversation table in Padova, and hopefully begin an Italian language course on Tuesday. Tomorrow is the going-away party for my friend Michaela (our neighbor) who is leaving for London on the 23rd to practice English for five months. But what Im really anticipating is the birth of my new nephew this weekend! I like the name Bradley...

Its been wonderful hearing from many of you, as always. Take care!

---