germany

When Life Looks Grimm

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Outlook is everything. Better to be an optimist than a pessimist. This I won’t deny . . . however. . . I will say that life is complicated, and it’s better to understand finesse and grey areas than to see the world in stark terms of happy/sad, good/bad, obstacle/opportunity. To be sure, the “glass half empty or glass half full” test paints a certain picture, but as many people before me have noted, it’s far better to realize that the glass is in flux and ever able to be refilled. Ebb and flow, people. Is it even possible to live a balanced life without a sense that there will be ebb and there will be flow?

The Brothers Grimm

This is a roundabout way of coming to the topic of The Brothers Grimm, who occupied my thoughts last week on two fronts. First, I’ve been developing a few lessons on Fairy Tales– those richly complicated stories that seem to have have a Jekyll and Hyde personality in modern imagination. Are they adorable children’s tales where everyone lives happily ever after, or are they dark musings on our dreams and fears that sometimes delve deep into violence? Do they encourage good children to uphold social mores, or do they foment revolutionary plottings?

In a word: Yes.

The second reason the Grimm brothers showed up on the scene last week was new information to me. These literary brothers just celebrated the anniversary of their Deutsches Worterbuch. Their German Dictionary was a huge undertaking, and Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm sought to do more than just record the meanings of the most used German words. They set out to record “the origin and use of EVERY German word.” Deutsches Welle, the German media outlet, has an informative article on this undertaking (here) in its broad scope and political overtones. Definitely worth a read.

The Grimm Brothers’ German Dictionary

How did these famous storytellers come to write a dictionary? Well, first of all, it may help to remember that they were “story catchers”– scholars driven by a desire to preserve stories and the cultures they grew out of. Second, they found themselves at a pivot point, not unlike characters in the tales they collected. The Grimm brothers were professors (anthropologists and linguists), suddenly jobless after the University of Gottingen fired a cluster of educators who refused to swear an oath to the new king or back the alteration of the constitution in Hanover in 1837. They took up the challenge of creating the first German dictionary, largely, because they had bills to pay. Their thorough approach was remarkable and reflected their love of the language: “especially enamoured with the letter A, calling it the ‘noblest, most original of all sounds.’ Unsurprisingly, their famous dictionary begins with a detailed linguistic history of the vowel” (dw.com). The brothers were thorough and reverent . . .however, this approach also ensured that the project would not be completed in their lifetime.

As careful to preserve the diverse dialects of Germany as they had been to capture and preserve the folk tales of their land, they were also keenly aware that this project wielded a certain political muscle in unifying the German Reich linguistically. They would compile one linguistic platform to bring together the diverse German-speaking states. I like to think that they took to heart the role of the trickster in so many of the fairy tales they had gathered: having lost their jobs to a certain political vision, they found a way to incorporate that vision into their new work. They were wily and triumphant . . . in the long game.

It was an ambitious undertaking that outlasted both the Grimm brothers and many iterations of the modern German state– only seeing completion in 1961. Many decades, many unpronouncable German words, and 32 volumes later.

If you have read this blog over the years, you will know of my struggles with the German language. And you will know that I am in the good company of Mark Twain on that front. Still, the Deutsches Worterbuch was a remarkable undertaking that has my utmost respect. Many a day, the project must have felt like a hungry wolf at Jacob and Wilhelm’s backs. But that, my friends, is a little red story for another day.

Chapel in the Woods- (nearly) Wordless Wednesday

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The tiny chapel in the woods behind our house in Germany:  I find myself missing it today in the metropolitan hum of suburban DC with the tiniest of snow flurries falling. What I wouldn’t give for a German Christmas Market, a dusting of snow, and a tiny chapel behind my stone house.

Wishing you each a season that is merry and bright!

tinychapel Ramstein

Twelfth Night

~ travelsandtomes ~ 20 Comments

Tonight marks Twelfth Night– the eve of Epiphany, the end of the 12 days of Christmas.  It’s considered very bad form, and bad luck, to keep Christmas decorations up any longer than this.

This, I think, is a plot hatched by type A neatniks to push type B malingerers into a tidy-up already.  Not a bad ploy;  I get it.  However,  this time last year, I decided to keep my tree up another week or two, until my corner of Germany got some snow.  When the snow finally made its appearance, I snuggled under a blanket with a book and some hot chocolate while the tree lights twinkled.  No bad luck in that.

This year, I’m baffled by what to do.  Family and friends to my north are expecting freezing weather and snow storms in two days. IMG_20160714_063514  I feel like I should leave my tree up as a sign of solidarity– I can read by its twinkling lights, turn on a fan, and pretend that I’m looking out my window at a foot of snow.  But I’ll be looking at this:

Good stuff, but not a winter wonderland.

Or I could be industrious and take it all down and give up on winter ever coming to Florida.  (I’d be tidy and efficient, but kind of a quitter too.  It’s a quandry.)

In the States, we don’t pay much attention to the “12 days” of Christmas.  (Christmas day until Epiphany, January 6th.)  It’s more of an Old World concept.  But it lends more structure, and a  greater sense of traditional festival, to the holiday than our modern sprawl (which is more like the 12 weeks of Christmas, starting before–or at, if we are very lucky– Halloween).

Twelfth Night offers a chance to wallow in Christmas traditions for one more night– to eat heartily (and include a King’s Cake on the table) and drink wassail.  It’s also the night when you finally allow the yule log to die out– that log that you started burning on Christmas Day and kept going until now.  The yule log is said to bring luck for the coming year, and, if you’ve kept a fire burning around the clock for the last 12 days and  buche001 your house is still standing, then I’d say you’re pretty lucky!  We didn’t do that at my house.  We did, however, bake a yule log (a buche de Noel) and gobble up every crumb.  Hopefully that imparts luck and not just extra pounds.

From our experiences in Germany, it’s obvious that Twelfth Night doesn’t just mark an ending of a season– it is also the beginning of the carnival season that leads up to Mardi Gras.   We’ve seen this in Bavaria and the Black Forest, where Christmas season seems to be dipped at both ends with a dollop of menace.  On the front end of Christmas, Krampus came for bad children around December 6th (Nikolaustag), and now at the holiday’s closing bell,  masked demons parade in the streets as the carnival season gets underway.

Down the hill we went into snowy Triberg.
Down the hill we went into snowy Triberg.

Two years ago, in  January, we took a trip to the Black Forest.  We spent the night in Triberg, and the snow was falling fast and starting to accumulate.  We tucked the kids and dogs into the hotel in the early evening and told them we’d go find a restaurant in town and  bring dinner back to them.

When we got down the hill and into town, we turned toward a restaurant we’d seen earlier in the day, and ran headlong into a merry band of demons parading the streets.  But, you know, these things happen in the Black Forest.  We laughed, but didn’t think much of it until the next day when we were talking to Oliver Zinapold in his Triberg woodworking and clock shop.  We talked cuckoo clocks at great length, and even bought a lovely clock from him, and before we left we spotted a devil’s mask up on the wall.  I asked about it.

“Oh, it’s a good thing you came today,” he said.  “Tomorrow, I close up shop and go to Switzerland for a few days to be in the Carnival.”  He showed us his hand carved mask, and pulled out a sketch book of other masks (and clock faces) he’d made.  And suddenly the merry band of devils we’d seen in Triberg made perfect sense.

So, don’t mourn the passing of Christmas time at Twelfth Night .  . . just realize that thirteenth night marks the beginning of another lively season.  And more than a little mischief.

 

I’ll leave you with a short video of Oliver Zinapold’s workshop– Oli’s Schnitzstube.   The video is in German, but if you are drinking your Twelfth Night wassail, I expect you’ll understand every word of it.  And even if you don’t, it’s worth seeing the lovely clocks and (an added treat) one of his devil masks can be seen hanging on the wall at about 22 seconds into the video.

 

All I Want for Christmas is a Ghost*

~ travelsandtomes ~ 14 Comments

(*Originally posted December 17, 2015)

It’s been a long time since I’ve written a This Old House post, but here goes.

 

ghosty snow house moon
A foggy winter night at “the castle.”

We loved the atmosphere of this house from the first moment we saw it.  We have continued to love those moments when you turn the corner toward our house and– “Ta Da!”– you see the oh-so-European red stone castle (albeit diminutive) that we call home.

We moved into the house a year and a half ago, fully aware that an old house would have its share of issues: hot spots, cold spots; inefficient utilities; old bathrooms; pipes that occasionally clog; and light fixtures that give up the ghost.

But we also considered that the ghosts of this house might not be the giving up kind.

dsc_0113

“Marley was dead, to begin with … This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate.” ―  Dickens, A Christmas Carol

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When we first moved into this old home, I harbored a secret fear and longing–an uncomfortable pairing– that the place might be haunted.  It was the right sort of house for that:  imposing, old, creaky, and definitely situated in a country with its share of ghosts.

I was terrified that we’d be plagued by eerie happenings.

 But then nothing happened.  

Eventually, I became simply curious about whether eerie things might happen.

Still, nothing happened.  

After a while, I was just put out that nothing, not one darn thing, spooky had happened.  What a rip off!  I have to live with old (I mean OLD) bathrooms, and I don’t even get a good ghost story out of it!?  Not a fair trade off if you ask me.

DSC_0300 - CopyBut ghosts are people too; they have their own agendas.  I remember putting up Christmas decorations last year and wondering what sort of celebrations this house had seen over the century-plus of its life.  It’s no manor, but it’s grand enough that the original owners must have lived a fine life.  What was Christmas like for them?  Did the Christmas Eve table gleam with silver?  Was it loaded with salmon, goose, and sausage?  Did the children go to sleep fat with gingerbread and the parents groggy with spiced wine?

And what of the years after World War I, when French troops occupied the area?   Was the occupation oppressive or a barely perceptible weight on the shoulders of the locals . . . who must have been haunted already by their own grief, so many young soldiers lost in the war.

And this interplay of politics and personal life certainly wasn’t diminished in the years that crept toward World War II.  What about those Christmas dinners?  Were there rousing nationalistic talks around the table, was there support for the Third Reich, or was there dread at the creeping dark?  Were Jewish friends hidden in the cavernous basement to keep them safe?  Were Nazi armaments held there? This is the era whose ghosts send icy chills through me.  I want to know the house’s history, but I don’t want to know the house’s history.

Staircase between floors/apartments
Staircase between floors/apartments

And then after World War II, when the house was divided into apartments on each level–still lovely, but divided,  like Germany itself, by the rise and fall of its fortunes, ambitions, and fate.

Reverence or dread–the families who have lived here might inspire either.  I would revel in the one, but stoop under the weight of the other.

It’s better not to know, I tell myself.

Still, I want a ghost for Christmas.  I can’t shake that feeling.  It’s part of the old house package.

 

“The past isn’t dead.  It isn’t even past.”  -William Faulkner

I had a ghost once, a few years ago.

I know, I know–just hear me out.  This is a story that is usually told under different circumstances.  The general rule: you must be at least a glass of wine or two into the evening.  For that matter, I must be at least a glass of wine or two into the evening (the story becomes infinitely more plausible at that point).  And one more thing–the children aren’t around.  If they heard the story, they’d never sleep again.

I’m taking a risk in telling this story: first, I can’t be sure that you’ve had any wine (strike one); second, it’s 8 a.m., and I’m nursing a semi-cold cup of coffee, which is a much starker place to be than wrapped in the warmth of a wine glass (strike two); and third, my children may read this (although unlikely, as they find this “mommy blog” vaguely ridiculous) (strike three on two counts).

So here’s the deal–I’ll tell you my ghost story in a few days.  That gives you a chance to grab a glass of wine, if you are so inclined.  It gives me a chance to write this post in a foggy evening state, instead of this stark-morning-coffee-mind that has its current grip on me.

Meet me here then, if you dare, and I will tell you my story.

chistms carol page

 

‘Tis the Season for a Reckoning: Nikolaustag (St. Nicholas Day)

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nick-krampus-austria

Maybe you are late getting the message:  You’d better be good, for goodness sake.  Or if you live in certain regions of Germany and Austria, my friend, you’d better be good, for badness and brimstone’s sake.  A reckoning is coming and coming quickly.  Today is the eve of Nikolaustag– St. Nicolas Day, aka Boot Night.  Children put out boots and St. Nick fills them with candy.  Unless, *sigh*, well, there’s no easy way to tell this . . .

Salvation by chocolate is not a sure thing in middle Europe.  

Judgment is real and is more gruesome than a lump of coal.

On Nikolaustag or its eve, St. Nick is accompanied by his Shadow– his ominous, treacherous, hideous shadow.  The Shadow offers not candy and kindness but switches, ashes, and a little roughing up.  Or, possibly, if you are really bad (you know who you are), you’ll be stuffed in a sack and carried off to the netherworld . . . in one piece or many, it makes no difference to this guy.

I kid you not.

The exact form of this shadow is dependent on the region of Germany– Schwarz Peter, Knecht Ruprecht, or Krampus are all grotesque and the stuff of nightmares, but, for my money, Krampus is the most horrible.  Of the many things Bavaria and its neighboring corner of Austria do right–and there are so many– Krampus is not one.  He is, literally, a beastly demon.  But don’t take my word for it, let Anthony Bourdain bring you up to speed:

Those of you who live in Germany or have followed my blog in 2014 and 2015 have more than a little knowledge of this Christmas tradition, so I won’t be long winded here.  (But you can revisit those old blog posts and get up to speed at these links:  St. Nick and Belsnickel,  and Saints and Demons)

If you have been nice this year, or even reasonably nice this year (I don’t know about you all, but the bar is set pretty low in my house), then you will probably make it out of this holiday alive.  You may even get a bootful of candy!

I did have a friend whose slightly naughty younger brother once got only a bra in his boot– and, to clarify, this was not taken as encouragement to be naughty, but meant to humiliate him into being better next year.  Oh, that crazy German sense of humor!

We’re Stateside this year, but we are still celebrating Boot Night.  Wish us luck with that– I’m feeling cautiously optimistic.