The Tale of Frau Clough

The first two weeks in Germany have been incredible. It still feels like I'm simply on a vacation, rather than now officially living in Germany, but I must say that married life has been wonderful, and each day has been a new adventure. I am gradually getting settled in to my new home of Wiesbaden and moved in to our downtown apartment. It is located in the pedestrian area of downtown and we are on the 4th floor above a bistro, near the Little Italy alley. When we get more settled, pictures will follow.

The weekend I arrived, on May 11th, the Casino of Wiesbaden was celebrating its 100th birthday. There was a great party in the park behind the Casino with bands, beer, and of course, fireworks. They'll use any excuse to have fireworks around here. The picture above was taken at the Kurpark, while we sat on a blanket and enjoyed the festivities with beer, and a fine dinner of fresh cheeses, meats and bread.

I am fortunate to be able to do part-time contract work for Baylor this summer while here in Germany. Working from home has proved to be an adjustment, due to no social interaction, but it is wonderful to be connected with my work again. I am slowly but surely getting in-processed and in "the system." I now officially have my military ID card, which allows me to get on base and use the library, and work-out facilities (which are fantastic), as well as the services of the Laundromat, the commissary (grocery store), the BX (other goods store), movie theatre, etc. It's like a mini America in the middle of Germany with most of the American goods I could ever need. The commissary lacks a great supply of salsas, but I can't be too picky! At least there IS some to choose from.

The weather was cold and dreary when I first arrived, but the past week it has warmed up considerably, to the point of being quite hot. Today, it is back to it's rainy and overcast self, but hopefully it will only be a short phase. Running here has been tremendous, and although it is somewhat uncomfortable to dodge the pedestrians downtown, there are some amazing parks to run in and plenty of hills to climb. There are also forests that surround the city, so I still get to do some trail running as well.

During my second weekend in Germany, Jon and I went to a NFL Europa football game, where his squadron has season tickets. The Frankfurt Galaxy team blew the Berlin Thunder team out of the water, and it was so crazy to see all the Europeans get so pumped about football! I had no idea there was such enthusiasm about a sport that is labeled so American. We took the train into Frankfurt and met up with several of the people from his squadron at the stadium.

Last Wednesday, Jon and I had our first state-side visitor to Wiesbaden. Cliff, Jon's cousin, was in Germany on a mission trip and his last two days of the trip were in Wiesbaden. We were able to spend some time with him and show him our place, some of our hang-outs and catch up since we last saw him at the wedding. We were thrilled to see him and hope that he is a first of many visitors!

I am truly enjoying every minute of married life in Germany and although it's weird to not have an office to go to, and social activities around every corner, that will come in due time. For now, it is nice to be able to see Jon for consecutive weeks (going on one month now) and to explore the adventures of European living together.