Valentine's Day: New Scripts, New Scrapes

Valentine’s Day in Germany was practically like any other day, and I think many American women would not approve of this. Alex and I had school that day, and it's definitely not as commercial here. I didn't see a single balloon or heart-shaped candy box! I think I would have been appalled by this last year, but I don’t really care about the Hallmark holidays that much the older I get. We had a great night making burritos and then watched P.S. I Love You. What more could I ask for than a guy who will watch chick flicks with me every once in a while and not complain?

Following our very romantic evening, our usual Friday theater meeting had several surprises in store for us. Just as I began handing out scripts to those who auditioned the week before, the younger girls showed up! My head was about to explode because I just revised the script! On top of that, I had yet another student who wanted to join the group. How could I say no, especially since I had a script with more parts sitting at home. I auditioned the young girls and the new student, and told them that they would have their parts by the next Friday. All of that is now taken care of, and everyone has a part in the show. I feel like I’ve revised and edited this script too many times, but it’s worth it. I also locked in the dates with the head theater woman, Sabine. They will perform May 24 and 25. The main focus of this group is to enhance their English, so I need to keep that in mind. We did, however, have a stern talk to them about using email. The students at our school don’t like to email, they’d rather Facebook message. There’s no way I’m getting into that, though.

So far, our rehearsals are just going over lines, which involves pronunciation and explaining content. We treat all of our students equally and force them all to speak English the entire time, but they are all very resilient.

Overall, February has been good and cold. Lots of snow and ice. We both fell on our bicycles a number of times. I had a pretty epic crash on our way home from Aldi. I was rounding the corner by the Sparkasse with a case of water in the basket on the back of my bike, and I skid on a patch of ice. I went down like a ton of bricks, and of course, there were witnesses. A car pulled over and a man came out of the bank to make sure I was okay. Alex assured them I was fine apart from my bruised ego and my bleeding knee that was staining my pants. At least I can laugh at it now… kind of.

We’ve both been especially busy preparing for our parents to come and visit us next month! We’re planning things to do each day in every city that they visit to ensure they get the most out of their European vacation.