From time to time I like to imagine my life as a movie, or
at certain times at least, I imagine that something I’m doing or experiencing
would be or is like a scene out of a movie.
I just experienced one such moment.
As I finished working at our booth on the Weihnachts Markt, I bought a
gluhwein and a bratwurst and thoroughly enjoyed them as I walked home through
this small city lit up with Christmas decorations and a light snow falling. It was the perfect scene for either the
opening of a Christmas comedy where soon after I would get hit by a car or come
back to find my apartment turned upside down with a note from my (now)
ex-girlfriend saying she and the neighbor had gone off to Mexico together, or
the ending to a drama where the town had just come together to save my tiny
(and the last of its kind) handmade, wooden Christmas toy shop. All that was lacking was the music to play
with your emotions and make you feel like the director wanted you to. And the aerial camera view to really capture
the entire scene.
Whatever, in case you didn’t catch it before, I’m working at
our booth on the Christmas Market here in Zeitz this week. It has been very cold, but also a good
time. I have gotten to watch everyone in
Zeitz walk by once or twice and since one of my hobbys is people watching it
works out pretty well. I have also
gotten a very small view from the other side of the Christmas shopping
season. Since I have never worked in
retail, this is the closest I’ve come to being the person that has to stay in one
shop the entire day and sell things to people that are just looking for a
deal. The Weihnachts Markt is much
prettier and “magical” when you don’t have to look at it from the same booth
all day. And much more enjoyable when
after you have strolled through all the booths you’re able to head home to
somewhere nice and warm.
I haven’t written in a while, but a week or two ago I got to
have a very interesting conversation with two older ladies. I am sure that one of them is Russian and was
married to a German man, but has only lived in Germany for somewhere around 10
years. The other woman I am not 100%
sure about. They speak to each other in
Russian, and I think the other woman is German, but lived in Russia until
sometime in the last 20 years or so.
Anyways, they both have some very interesting life stories. You could probably make blockbuster hits out
of both of their lives. Well, at least
out of one of them. I couldn’t actually
understand the other lady well enough to say that for her, but from what I
could understand, it’s probably true for her too. The woman that is German (or so I think) and
that lived in Russia for a while has definitely experienced a lot. She told me that she lived in Russia during
the war and that afterwards it was very difficult for Germans. At some point she was sent to a kind of internment
camp in Kazakhstan because she was German and had to live there for 14 years. She said it was only because of Jesus that
they survived. She said that if you were
German then you were treated especially rough and that they barely had a thin
blanket to cover themselves with during the cold, winter months. She said things got better for them after
Stalin died. I really wish I could
understand them better because I feel like they probably have a lot of very
interesting stories and wisdom to pass on.
I find it fascinating to hear these kinds of stories about things we
learned about or heard about in school, but could honestly never really fathom
or understand what it all meant to the people who lived through it. I think that hearing firsthand accounts like
this really makes the history that we learned with all of the numbers and
statistics much more understandable and touchable. I think our lessons would be much better
learned (so that we don’t keep repeating our mistakes) if we were able to, or
took the time to listen to people that lived through all of this history and
especially ones from different parts of the world than ours.
Anyways, I don’t know what else to update on. I’m headed home for the holidays on
Wednesday, so I’m pretty excited about that.
The past few weeks have been pretty busy with a seminar and then lots of
special Christmas programs at the church.
We had soup kitchen for 4 days in a row and now we have a booth at the
Weihnachts Markt. It’s been good, but I won’t
be sorry to leave this cold behind for a little while. I also got to speak with some foster parents
that are in our church here in Zeitz. It
was really interesting to hear about a different system and compare the
similarities and differences between what I experienced in Opelika and how it
is here. They get a lot more financial
support here in Germany for foster kids, but the biological parents also have a
lot more rights than they do in Alabama.
That might sound like a good thing, but I don’t think it is when the
parents are so messed that sometimes they cannot even take care of
themselves. Clearly there is not really
an ideal situation in regards to this, but I think that it is better in Alabama
where after a certain period of time for the parents to try and get things
together and when they clearly just are not able to provide a safe environment
for their kids that their rights are terminated and their children are then
able to be adopted, as opposed to here where the parents have to say they don’t
want the rights anymore and before that can always decide they want to take
their kids back, maybe for a year or two, and then decide they are not quite
ready and put them back into the foster system and continue that cycle for as
long as they want to. It was also sad to
hear that, at least in this area, the social workers are also way overworked
and there is no more room in the children’s homes so that sometimes children
that should be are not always immediately taken out of a dangerous
situation. I had wondered why several of
our children from the kids afternoon programs still lived with their parents,
but I suppose that is why. I am hoping
to start at least one or two of the Bighouse programs here in Zeitz in January
to help out some of the foster families.
I think it will be good to raise awareness in the church here and
hopefully also in the city about what is needed and what small things everyone
can do to help out.
