Advertisement
Published: November 25th 2007
Tonight we went to the Christmas Market in the town square. There was a bunch of booths with traditional Christmas items: Nutcrackers, Nativities, Santas, etc. There was also food, including bratworst, bockworst, and brezeln (bavarian pretzels)...we tried once of each!! Bratworst was similiar in taste to what we know as Italian sausage ang bockworst was like eating a high-end hotdog. The pretzel, well, look at the size of it!! It was a little crunchier on the outside, but much tastier than we find at home. Hey, the Bavarians should know how to make Bavarian pretzels, right? 😊
There were also a few stands selling candied nuts...which were really good!! And of course mulled wine, called gluhwein, which quickly became a favorite! It's steaming hot red wine with spices. Perfect on a cold, German night! (or day!!) The best part is that each individual booth has their own mugs for the wine. You have to pay a 2 euro deposit when you order and they give it back when you return the mugs. We decided to keep our mugs though!! They're great souvenirs!! One booth has clay mugs, another dark blue with white Schweinfurt scene, another a boot!! We have until 22
December to complete our 2007 collection! 😊
We thought of Kelly as we walked by and saw the carousel had real ponies walking freely through the small ring. They just follow the pony in front of them! So cool!!
Romas' favorite part was the drinking crows. They have become our symbol for the Christmas season market and delicious gluhwein! 😊
Our only difficulty: buying a discount book of 8 tickets for the city bus. The bus driver was in no mood for our Germlish (our sad attempt to use very little German, some English, and a LOT of hand gestures!) She made us wait at the door until we could successfully repeat our request in German. Apparantly she didn't appreciate us merely repeating the word "Acht," which means 8 and pointing to the discount tickets on the dashboard. Well, now we know how to say "8 discount tickets please." Not an easy task: "Acht Fahrtenschein fur Volksfestplatz, bitte." 😊 Now try saying it with 10 people waiting to get on the bus behind you!
We've found that almost everyone speaks at least a little English and most speak excellent English. It is definitely convenient to have someone speak English,
The Drinking Crows
Great mulled wine here!!but we're uncomfortable and self-conscious to appear rude. Whenever possible, we ask for help pronouncing the German and try to speak/order in German, even if they answer us in English. Schweinfurt has had the Army here for over 50 years so the businesses and locals have become accustomed to English speakers. It's been really fun to try German and we're hoping that getting the house in Hassfurt will help our language skills because it's a much smaller town and we may very well be the only Americans living there.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.275s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 9; qc: 48; dbt: 0.0529s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.6mb
birute regine
non-member comment
germlish
I love that you call that language goop Germlish. And it looks like you can put that pretzel around your neck like a yoke! Love the entries..