The Big Halfway Point and Christmas Flashback!

Last week, on January 10th, I hit the exact halfway point of my time here in Germany. For me, that is honestly a really weird thing to contemplate. The reality of it is, from that day forward, I have lived more days in Germany than I have left ahead of me. It's easy for one to simply look at the big picture and think about that 5 months extremely long time, and I'm not getting anywhere near the time when I'll have to leave this place that I've built a new life in. It's easy to put things off, thinking that there'll be time later. It's easy to take these precious moments for granted. But the reality of it is, the clock is ticking. The past 5 months have gone faster than any other time of my life. But instead of dwelling on this, and continuing to think about when I will leave this home, and go back to my other home, I'm making the choice to embrace the time I have here and make the most of it. Having a timeline truly puts a different spin on life, but I've realized that maybe that isn't always the worst thing. Knowing that I won't be forever is in some ways helping me to live a more fulfilling, enjoyable life. At home, I tend to put things off, figuring that there'll always be another day for whatever I'm considering doing. Here, I'm trying my best to take advantage of every opportunity I get, because I know if I don't I might never have the same opportunities again. Pretty much comparable to the "what would you do if you knew you only had X amount of days to live" concept, but obviously not quite on the same scale.

Enough said about that! Now here's the Christmas post that I've been wanting to post for the last few weeks.

For Christmas, I was lucky enough to get to travel with my host family down to Baden-Württenburg to visit their relatives! We stayed for 3 nights, and pretty much every waking moment was spent eating, talking, laughing, playing games, and having an overall amazing time.
We had school on the 22nd (apparently in Germany they just can't resist fitting in 2 extra days of school). Anyway, school got out super early on Tuesday (11:30), so it wasn't too bad. So after school and lunch, we packed up the car and set off on our journey. It's pretty far (4 hours or so, which is at least really far by German standards). Upon arrival, we enjoyed some yummy "Abendbrot" (Evening bread) with the family and chatted for a few hours before going to bed.
The next day (the 23rd) we went into Karlsruhe and checked out the Weihnachtsmarkt! Yup, yet another to add to my list from the last blog post. It was actually one of the nicer Christmas Markets that I visited (at least in my opinion), so I'm really glad we checked it out. Great atmosphere, nice booths and goods, not too big, not too small, and not too crowded. What more could one ask for? :) Also I finally got to try "Gebrannte Mandeln" (almonds fried in this sugary sauce which turns crunchy when it starts to cool). They were absolutely amazing! Perfect ending to my month of "Christmas marketing"in Germany. :P And when we got home, we had "Reiskuchen" (translates to rice cake, but it's actually not an american rice cake, and also not like a regular cake). That's pretty much one of my favorite foods here, which may be attributed to the fact that I eat rice like once a week at home and very rarely here. But don't worry, there's also plenty of other more "German" things that I like to eat. :P

Badische Nuss Hütte at the Karlsruhe Weihnachtsmarkt

Karlsruhe Weihnachtsmarkt

The 24th is a day that I would best describe with the German word "gemütlich", which can mean "cozy", "leisurely", "relaxed", or a number of other nice things alone those lines. We slept in, and around 10:30 ate a nice breakfast all together of eggs, "Brötchen" (little bread rolls eaten often for breakfast) with every topping imaginable, and tea/cocoa/coffee. In the afternoon, we went on a beautiful walk on some of the little dirt roads that go around the nearby farm fields. It was so warm and sunny that it actually felt like spring. A few of the other people that we met along the way jokingly wished us "Frohe Ostern" (Happy Easter). Who knows, with the kind of crazy weather stuff going on these days, we'll probably have a blizzard and a foot of snow on Easter. Despite being about as far from a white Christmas as one could get, we thoroughly enjoyed the warm weather while it lasted.

One of my pics from our sunny walk. :)

In the afternoon, we sat outside (yup, outside) and ate cookies and drank tea. Never expected that to be included in my list of Christmas break activities in Germany! In Germany, the main celebration of Christmas occurs on the 24th, although some families celebrate for 3 days (the 24th, 25th, and 26th). My host family celebrates predominantly on the 24th, so this was when we planned to have our special Christmas dinner. I actually did not know in advance what we would be eating, and I was pretty surprised that everyone wasn't frantically working in the kitchen all day to get things done in time for the big meal. Finally, at about 5:00 or so, I found out that we were having Raclette, which is very commonly eaten on holidays in Germany. There are these "cooker" things on the table, and each person receives a little pan next to their dinner plate. The table is filled to the brim with bowls of all sorts of foods, and everyone takes what they want and cooks their own meal right in front of them! I was actually a bit baffled by the idea at first, but also completely intrigued at the same time. I'd say the closest thing we have in America to raclette is fondue, but that's actually quite a bit different. So, for my first pan, I took my host cousin's advice and made a "Pizza Hawaii" pan with ham, pineapple, and cheese. Super yummy! After that I made several other pans (they're very small), with different combos of veggies, meat, cheese etc. Such a great eating experience! If you ask me, every American needs to come to Germany and eat raclette at some point during their life.

Raclette cooker! 

Raclette!

 After we finished up our raclette meal (I think about 9:30 or 10:00) we started in on presents. We did the "one present at a time" method (which I like a lot), so we didn't finish until about midnight! It was really fun watching everyone open the gifts I got them, and I got surprised with some really sweet gifts as well!

Weihnachtsbaum!

You'd think after this we'd be all done, but no, German Christmas doesn't stop there! We still had "Schrottwichteln"! This could be described as a white elephant gift exchange and a silly but competitive game of monopoly mixed into one. Everyone brought a random gift (this gift is not allowed to be bought, so it has to be something old laying around the house, or something handmade). The gifts are all unwrapped and placed in the center of the table. Each participant takes turns rolling dice, and each number represents a different action that the player must take. First, the gifts have to come into play, then they are passed all around based on the rules from the dice. Over time the gifts get unpacked, and then they get traded around some more. We really got into it! Everyone had certain gifts that they had their eyes on, and certain ones they they wanted to get as far away from as possible. In the end, I ended up with a bag of "christmas pasta" (presumably from someone's pantry since you can't buy anything specifically for the event), and two egg warmers (to keep boiled eggs warm before you eat them). Of course none of the gifts are anything extremely outstanding, but the experience made it 100% worth staying up until 2 am for! After that I face-timed my parents for a few minutes. Needless to say, we all slept in quite a bit that morning. :P
The 25th felt a bit weird, because instead of being the special Christmas day like it is in America, it sort of just felt like any other ordinary day. After a late lunch, we packed up and said our goodbyes to the relatives, before beginning our journey to Wiesbaden to visit the relatives from the other side of the family. By evening we got home, and then we got to open our gifts from my mom, dad, oma, and opa in America! Thank you all so much for the nice things you sent!
So thats a wrap on Christmas in Germany! It was an amazing season, and I'm so thankful for everyone I spent it with.

Christmas with my host family <3

Bis zum nächsten Mal! (until next time)
Dana <3