Our stuff and the American club

Our stuff came from the U.S. on Thursday. All of it. Intact. Weird, huh? Only 5 weeks from Champaign, to Chicago, to New York, across the ocean to Bremen, Germany to our apartment. Seriously. After all the crazy stories and not so much as a plate was broken. And all of our commemorative bathtub coffee cups arrived unscathed. Plus we have our bikes. I feel like a proper German buzzing around town in heels on a bike - it's great. No one wears helmets, though. I gotta tell you, that's just nuts. Even with bike paths, pedestrians could seriously cause damage to you and your property if they don't get out of the way. And neither of us has a bell yet. So I just go "brrrring-brrring." People look at me like I'm nuts, but they get the point.

I've also noticed a curious phenomenon in this country. If you obey the rules (mostly traffic rules - at least so far), people are very resepectful. Pedestrians largely get out of the way, cars give you enough space, and people actually look before they pull out into the intersection. Again, weird. BUT! If you try and cross the street while the sign-hand is red or if you stop your bike at the light and your tires are not within the confines of the clearly marked bike path, look out. All bets are off and it is open season on you and your apparent stupidity. Fair enough, I guess. As long as we understand the rules.

We went to a pre- 4th of July picnic this weekend hosted by the Hamburg American club. Funny thing about the Hamburg American club. It's members are majority German. I'm not really sure why. One of the board members of the club (a rare American) said they are trying to recruit more Americans, preferably younger. Whatever. All I know is that these cats are hoity business types who must know what to do with expat money: how to keep it from the peering eyes of the IRS and how to take advantage of a weak dollar. David is committed to occassionally fraternizing with these people. They had Michael Chertoff at a recent event. Given this, I'm not really sure how long David will want to suffer their company.

Quickly back to the picnic - there was no beer. Huh? Hotdogs, check. Cans of Jack and Coke, check. Mounds and mounds of potato salad, check. Wine, che...See these are the little differences you notice in Germany. No beer, but they had wine. Decent wine. And the kids and the dogs were well behaved. I guess I can get used to this.

Finally, we went to see the U of Hamburg symphony on Sunday. It was great. The building was old and beautiful and we knew one of the violinists. I'm no fan of symphony, but really. How can you beat the symphony in a grand old hall in Hamburg?

Furniture update: we've added houseplants. Lots of houseplants. We went to the fish market and bought a box of plants from the crazy Hollander and his friend with the big moustache (see earlier post). It was a riot - David and I hauling home a 4 foot ficus and 6 other big plants in a cardboard box on the train. We made it and the whole deal only cost 30 euro. For a ficus! Woohoo. We are planning to decorate the ficus for Christmas. I just hope Stella doesn't pee on it. She is a liberated woman lately who has taken to lifting her leg to pee on anything and everything out of doors, for now. I blame Louie.