Toward Routine: Little Friends, Big Schools, and the Rhythm of the Everyday

The last weeks of August in Aachen have been marked by a slow settling into our new everyday life routines--getting up early to trundle off to the neighborhood schools by foot, scooter, or bike; finishing school and either hanging out with neighborhood or school friends or doing homework after coming home; cleaning the house and getting work done in the rare quiet morning; playing frisbee in the park with new friends in the evening; attending a local climate-neutral (effectively, "acoustic/no electricity") music festival; helping the kids adjust to their new social environments; and much else. After months of exciting summer movement, transitions, and adventures, it is wonderful to begin finding new school and friend routines. At the same time perhaps the only constant is change: even as we are enjoying settling a bit, our dearest little friend below is moving and the weather is cooling down, with the brisk chill of autumn in the evening air. If it sounds like, overall, we are doing well, we think we are too: it is, on the whole, a rather wonderful season. 

As the new routine, random photos follow below: 

 

Maya, Libbie, little friend, and Elliot on local playground device (a soccer ball from the local city team)

Kourtney, Maya, and Ben in front of the Rathaus in the center of Aachen (on the day after Ukrainian Independence Day) 

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Libbie and little friend run to greet one another near the bus stop on Sunday morning



Maya's hand drawn art work atop a birthday crown for a little friend 

Musicians at a local festival

Morning jog scenery

Giant sandbox in front of the Dom housing the seat of Charlemagne

City park with the full family (moments before Aaron heads off to college)

Sample exploration chart into a few common German verb roots (right) and their prefixes (top)

Libbie's room lit like a dance hall of colored lights 

Listening on the grass to a classical music concert

Side Stories: a Kitchen and Vaalserberg, where three (once four) countries meet

It's been four weeks in logistical forest fire fighting mode. Still, we’ve squeezed in two side stories worth note: a side trip and a side project. 

First, the trip to Vaalserberg. The weekend before Aaron jetted off to his first semester of college, most of us took a side trip by bus and then a little hike to Vaalserberg, the southernmost point of the Netherlands that meets with Belgium and Germany. The distance would have been easily bikeable from our home, were we to have enough bikes. On the way up the hill, we followed a road called „Viergrenzenweg“ or „four border way.“ Well, we knew about the three intersecting countries—the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany but what is up with this fourth border? 

It turns out the three border corner includes the remnants of a fourth country called Neutral Moresnet, no larger than a square mile on the site of a zinc mine on the border between Netherlands and Prussia and then Belgium and Germany. Wikipedia has more about Neutral Moresnet, once proposed as the utopian site for Esperantists before World War I, here. At least it is nice that the spot found a new dispute to distract it from the usual fray between Belgium (or Catholic Netherlands) and Netherlands (or Protestant Belgium). The Netherlands is hardly known for its above-sea-level elevation change—and for good reason: the hike to the highest point in the Netherlands elicited some nice views of Germany as well as a few spontaneous renditions of Moxy Früvous’s melody about the "lowest highest point." At 322 meters it is hardly high. Still it was enough of a climb to produce some grumpiness on the way up and glee on the way down. 

There were some geometrically interesting moments, such as photographic proof that it is possible to have single arm wrapped around three countries simultaneously. Juridical minds puzzle, which country would prosecute a crime committed from atop of the pillar at the exact intersection of the three countries? If one holds onto the pillar just enough to lift one‘s feet off the ground, in which jurisdiction is one located? 

In the surrounding park, the Dutch have gone all out with a miniature resort park complete with hedged labyrinth full of water traps and multiple restaurants. The Belgians smuggled in an ice cream shop and lookout tower, and the Germans have left it mostly forest. It was fun. Photos below. 

Now to the side project: have we mentioned that the place we rented had no kitchen? 

As in, where there should be a kitchen there was upon moving in a wall, a backsplash, and a bunch of outlets. It has taken us no less than four weeks (which many tell us is whip fast), dozens of hours from at least two overeducated engineer volunteer friends (one from church, one neighbor), trips to the recycling depots with mounds of cardboard, and the trap of global capitalism that is IKEA to bring to our home a functional kitchen. If we sound a bit grumpy, it is because we are not going to tell you how much the startup costs had to go into this basic kitchen (although it's probably much less than a middle-class US reader will think a kitchen costs, even after factoring in the costs of having to eat out too often for four weeks), nor the fact that we are not guaranteed to resell it to the next renter. Still, thanks to friends, our kitchen experienced progressed a bit like this: we arrived with a box of food, so that cardboard box was our kitchen for the first week, then we upgraded in week two to dry goods on a bookshelf, then we secured a cabinet with kitchen goods from a friend in week three, and now, finally, after working on it every free moment we had, with the magical help of, again, no less than German structural engineer and architect friends, we have a basic kitchen. If it sounds here like the fact that we boiled water for the first time in our house and had pasta tonight is even more historically significant than the curiosity that is Neutral Moresnet, that is intentional: this feels just exactly so!  

There's nothing quite like washing dishes in a shower to make one appreciate the transformation lab of creativity, heating, freezing, cooling, washing, plumbing in and out, safety valves, fatal amounts of electricity, messes, recycling, surfaces, and soap that is a kitchen. Time to reread Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen.  

Those are the side project and side trip for now. They don‘t really compare: I mean, is it particularly surprising that two countries fought over a zinc mine, and managed not to come to blow over the course of a century of simultaneous rule? In the grand scheme of world history, it's perhaps notable. But is it memorable to us that our no-longer-so-little family, armed initially with nothing more than a broken leatherman (what else would get through TSA?), managed to assemble a functional kitchen in four weeks? Abso-stinking-lutely. We feel ourselves enormously fortunate. This post, a celebration of micro history! Photos below. 

Views of Germany and a berry snack from halfway up Vaalserberg

Kourtney (and Maya, hidden) from atop a lookout tower in the Netherlands

Four people in three or four countries: we are surrounding the pillar that intersects the three countries

Libbie, incredulous at the hedge labyrinth she‘s about to enter

On the way to the three-country intersection point (in the far back left, in front of the Belgium lookout tower) we crossed this separate marker that boldly proclaims itself the highest point in the Netherlands. Lowest highest point!  

More of the hedge labyrinth in the Netherlands park

Hedge labyrinth passage points

Maya posing amid the hedge labyrinth

About a third of the labyrinth

Finally having reached the center of the labyrinth, Libbie transformed into a zombie with Maya on lookout

The sign congratulating us upon completion.

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The new kitchen

About a third of the starting materials on site (the backsplash is on the wall to the left)

Very local construction workers

Assisted by neighborly structural engineers

Producing massive amounts of recycling

Near the final stages of completion

Kitchen in action for the first time: Elliot preparing, Kourtney stirring, and Maya flexing 

Close enough to the final kitchen, voila, our side project!

First Days of School—in German (& New Mexico)

This post covers our third week living in Aachen, Germany.

Well, it’s been a whirlwind start to the school year too! 

We now have four out of four kids attending three various schools: on Wednesday, August 10, Elliot began tenth grade (Oberstuffe) in German at Kaiser Karls Gymnasium, the leading gymnasium in Aachen; Libbie began eighth grade in German at the same school; and Maya began fourth grade (4B) at Am Lousberg Grundschule with Frau Schilgen. Then, accompanied by Kourtney on Saturday, August 13, Aaron moved into his dorm room as a first year at St. John‘s College (Santa Fe, NM). School starts at 08:00 in the morning and ends variably between 12:20 and 15:30, depending on the grade and the day. 

Nothing quite like sending your children off to school in languages they do not yet know and in foreign lands (the US at the moment). We have all experienced various levels of reasonable nervousness, most especially the kiddos, as they ship off to brand new social circles, language environments, school expectations, and much, much more. Responses and mileage may vary. We have taken great comfort in the fact that, before the fourth day of school began, Maya had already arranged a play date with a new friend in her class at our house and hers, Libbie had gone out to explore the city with a small group of new friends, and Elliot had navigated his way on the city bus to and from a friend‘s BBQ—all on their own social willpower. All of this, leavened and lifted by several new, vital friends in the branch and neighborhood who season and speed our early days here. We are hopeful, as well as cautious, about the coming weeks and months: ups and downs are sure to move in waves.  

The kids, so far, are remarkably resilient as well as eager to speak English with anyone who dares. We are encouraging them to make wide social networks and support them in high-frequency, low-stress language learning. Wir werden sehen. 

Comments interspersed into the photos below. 

The three kids on the way to the first day of school in Aachen

Maya and Tato at the new school year party at her school. Maya is in the oldest grade in her school and, to her quiet pleasure, notably taller than her average schoolmate. 

The German school year begins with precise lists of school materials from each teacher. It’s a scramble. Here is an example of a shelf of different notebooks that teachers request the students to pick up. Given that securing the right school materials appears to the kids considerably easier (if still impossible) than understanding school in German, we have invested not inconsiderable effort in trying to pin details down. 

Elliot and Libbie, save for one French textbook, received all of his textbooks from his school, such as this Spanish 2 textbook: his courses this year include topics such as History, Math, Biology, Spanish (notably more advanced than Spanish 2 in OK), Politics, German, English, Religion, and Physics. Libbie, meanwhile, is taking History, Physics, English, French, Art, Chemistry, Math, German, and Religion. Libbie‘s grade yet does not offer Spanish, and so she is taking French 2, and, as she jokes, she is currently learning German through her French textbook, which she is learning through her Spanish. Maya‘s grade offers everything in German; Libbie has English and some History in English; Elliot has English, History, and Biology in English. It‘s not clear whether these schedules are final, but it is clear that Aachen schools take science and languages seriously. 

Here is a photo of the central city theater, in front of some scaffolding. Given our taste for the finest of high arts, our children insisted on watching The Rise of Gru (the next Minions movie) in a nearby movie theater to celebrate the first half week of school. 

Here is a close up of Maya and Tato at the start of the school year. (The 11th was technically the second day of school, if you count the half day on the 10th.) 

Libbie on her first day of eighth grade (in Germany)

May on her first day of fourth grade (in Germany) in front of her school playground. To the right is the school sports hall, where a gymnasium and a pool can usually be found. Maya‘s grade swims twice a month, and swimming clothes is part of the school materials list. The school children are playing sports outside now, however, because the sports hall has been occupied for the last few months by as many as seventy refugees from Ukraine, some of whom we have met and are working with to help find materials, documentation, and supplies. 

A kid in each room just before bedtime. 

Maya, in search of ice cream (Eis)

The front of Libbie and Elliot‘s school, Kaiser Karls Gymnasium (or Emperor Charles/Charlemagne) which has roots back to the 1680s (but not in this building). Charlemagne, and then about eight hundred years of wanna-be-Charlemagne kings thereafter, were crowned in Aachen in 800 AD; hence all the Karls.  

A celebratory meal upon the completion of the first half week of school at a local and excellent Italian pizzeria (waiter spoke basically only Italian and English). 

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The New Mexico chapter: Aaron‘s day zero at college

Ima and our first born, moved in to his dorm room! 

A chill and chat spot just outside his dorm room

More Santa Fe vibe between dorms and classrooms

18 year olds, demonstrating the subtler of vandalism arts (the building name is „Urania“)

Aaron, mid move into his relatively spacious dorm room

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Our last meal together as a family before the college chapter. 

Mediterranean cuisine, what else?!