Travelog for: SaruMaru

Big Bird is celebrating his eighth birthday today.

He had eight candles and we were allowed to taste a sip of sparkling wine. Of course I took a larger sip.





We celebrated and went to bed early because the sparkling wine really made us tired.

Bye
SaruMaru

Hi Mummy,
the weather is fantastic here. It is cold and the sun is shining. So Katja took us out in her lunch break when she had to do some shopping.

We walked along the Route of tools (Trasse des Werkzeugs). This route is about 5 km long and is leading from the central train station to the district Hasten. Today we started somewhere in the middle of the route and walked towards the train station.

On the backside of a supermarket replications of  pictures of a local artist who died in 1988 are installed.





You can also see abandonded factory buildings.



These buildings are part of the former slaughterhouse. This complex is under preservation order. Nowadays these buildings are used by different companies.



Here are more signs showing names and company logos of sponsors.



This is a discarded carriage which was used  to transport alcohol which was extracted from agricultural products by ethanol fermentation.





We were close to the railway station now.



We reached the central railway station. Oh dear, the whole railway station is a complete building site. You can see it in the background.



We went shopping then. We even bought some firework. We are invited by Katja's sister-in-law to celebrate New Year's Eve.

Happy New Year, Mummy!

SaruMaru

Hi Mummy,
we were invited to spend New Year's Eve at the home of Katja's sister-in-law and her family. We went there at dinner time.

We had raclette. In Germany raclette usually is not made only with cheese and potatoes but also with several sorts of vegetables like sweet pepper, tomatoes, mushrooms, onions, sweet cornand sometimes meat or shrimps  which can be boiled on the of the raclette grill. We also had bread, potatoes and several salads.



You take your little pan, fill it with vegetables and put chesse over it. Then you put it into the raclette grill and it will be scalloped. It's delicious!

Everyone ate too much so we needed a booze. We had a fantastic one from Spain, a Licor 43.



After dinner we played a card game whose rules are similar to Uno. We had a lot of fun.



Shortly before 12:00 pm.



Happy New Year!

At midnight we toasted with sparkling wine and went outside to launch our fireworks.











We went home at 03:00 am. I'm still having a headache today.

Bye
SaruMaru

Hi Mummy,
it was time to say good bye to Katja today.

She was very busy with packing some envelopes when I had a closer look at a small bottle. Maybe it is ...



Ugh!



Cough syrup! That's not what I thought.

Anyway, I climbed into my envelope today. I'm travelling to my next host now. I had a lot of fun here and I hope I also will in Homburg.



Bye
SaruMaru

Hi Mommy!
I arrived at my next host's place. I had to wait half of the day outside, protected only by my envelope. I was freezing! There isn't much that's yellow or sunny here at the moment.

When I was finally taken somewhere warm and let out of my envelope I requested a little something to warm me up. It seems my previous host warned my new host and she already had the tequila bottle ready.

When I was at working temperature again I had a look around the appartment while helping my host collect the Christmas cards.



Jan 6th is the end of Christmas here, so I put most of them in a box. We decided the neutral 'winter cards' are going to stay for a while longer. 


After that it was time for the news on TV. This is a well-known politician here:

Apparently many Germans are interested in this sport, which they call "Skispringen".

There was a lot of news about the weather as well. It's not only my sensibilities that make me think it's cold. Here's a satellite picture of Germany today at midday with the temperatures: -8°C here.

These are the predictions for tonight: (We're a bit east of Saarbrücken.)

and tomorrow:

I need some winter clothes!

Tonight we made salmon-spinach lasagne for dinner. Yummy!

My host had to run some errands in the city center. Here I am (front left) in front of one of the churches. It's hard to take good pictures outside because it gets dark so soon.

We were all sick with the flu this week. We had lots of tea and stayed in bed most of the time.

Now it's better and I tasted some German white wine. It's from the Mosel areas. It doesn't have a lot of alcohol, only 8%Vol.

I met an alien today. Mr. Grey has arrived, plus Emil has come back home. We all bonded over some beer apple mix. It's from the brewery in this town.
Mr. Grey wants to study humans and their lifestyle. He read something by a human philosopher called Aristotle who made some 'scientific research'. He found out that beer is a great sleeping draught. Well, I can agree with that. But Mr. Grey said he also claimed that "beer has the peculiarity that it makes those who drink too much of it fall backwards, while excessive consumption of wine causes then to fall to all sides". That I want to see. I think we should do some research and have a big drinking night with beer for one half and wine for the other and see how it ends.

Hi Mommy!
This morning I went and got some rolls for my hostfamily for breakfast. It wasn't as dark as it appears in the photo.
After breakfast we let the budgies out to fly and I tried to play with Loki but he was wary of me and only walked around me.

Hi Mommy!
Today we were packed in a bag and taken on a road trip. It took hours. There were smaller traffic jams and rain and salty water on the roads. It was made better because we were all in the car and had air-conditioning and could listen to a story from a CD. It was about a serial killer who really doesn't understand humans, their behaviour and emotions. Freaky!

When we arrived I felt lazy.

There wasn't anything interesting outside so I settled down for a nap.

Roadtrips are exhausting!

Hi Mommy!
Mr. Grey was so nice to wake me becaus ehe had found lots of interesting stuff. See here:
Wine in 3l boxes

different beer like Pils from northern Germany

from the black forest

from a city close to where I am now

from the neighboring city (cark beer and beer mixed with lemonade)


Someone here has the same hobby I have but more selfcontrol!
Limoncello and grappa from Italy

Ouzo from Greece

Russian water

good old sherry

something mysterious from Brazil

and something Germans call Korn for short


Then there's wine of all kinds and origins.


Such a choice of cold beverages... whatever will I take?

Today we drove around in the car. We passed a horse farm and my mentor's former elementary school.


Now we'll need to pack because tomorrow we're going to take a plane to my home country.

We are starting from Düsseldorf International Airport. I have to stay in the big bag with mr. grey. It's dark and kind of stuffy in here.

We arrived in Texas and has a good night's sleep after a very important shower. I had a look out the bedroom window. Looks very brown to me.