You Go Nate!

How I Spent My Sommer Vacation - Part II (July 4th-6th): PARTY and the BEASTS

Back when I first arrived in Germany I spent some time visiting my distant relatives, Sybille & Wolfgang Edelberg. They were very nice to let me stay in their home, feed me, and take me around for those two weeks in February. Before coming back to Munich Sybille said to me, "You MUST come back for my 60th Birthday Party on July 5th!" So I was honor bound.

I had to work from morning until nearly 7pm on the 4th of July. After work I went home and packed my stuff and at 10:20pm I headed off to the train station with my big backpack on my back and my smaller pack on the front. I boarded the night train from Munich to Hanover. The train left at about 11pm and arrived in Hannover around 5:30AM. I was in a reclining seat and was able to sleep through most of the journey. I transfered trains at Hanover and traveled to the town of Bützow near Lüssow where Sybille & Wolfgang live (S&W).

Here is the location of Lüssow in Germany. It's only a small village of a few hundred people.

S&W's daughter Antje picked me up from the train station and I got to the house just as they were finishing the final preparations for the big party.

Everyone Sybille knew was invited to this party. It started at 11AM and was still going when I went to bed around midnight. They pulled out all the stops and there was so much food, beer, wine, cola, cake, and other goodies that even with over a hundred guests there was more than enough to go around. The backyard was all decked out with tents and tables ready for the guests.

Sybille made a few brief remarks and thanked everyone for coming and the party began.

When I first arrived, Sybille very excitedly said, "I have the keyboard for you to play!" Surprise! I get to "entertain" people with this little flimsy keyboard for who knows how long. I set it up and started to go through the pieces that I had in my head (which weren't many, at least that would fit on this keyboard.) But they wanted music so I had to resort to other music I had in my head. Nobody there was Mormon, so I thought if I played some Mormon hymns in a pretty way, no one would be the wiser. So that's what I did. I started playing a very pretty, but party appropriate version of "We Thank Thee, O God, For A Prophet," and "Choose the Right" and others. I really couldn't help but laugh at myself hearing this music played at a backyard party with beer and wine flowing and nobody having any idea what the music is. I giggled to myself all through "Ye Elders of Israel."

Luckily, Sybille's grandkids, Elias and Sidney (my fifth cousins), soon came over to the keyboard with interest to pound at it. At first I tried to stop them, but when I noticed that nobody seemed to care, I turned down the volume and let them play away.

Soon, however, a professional quartet of musicians showed up and I was off the hook.

Of course Sybille had a cake shaped like a golf green.

The atmosphere was very laid back. People just ate and talked and enjoyed the nice weather well into the evening.

The kids would periodically want to play with the keyboard so I had them play "Happy Birthday" each with one finger.

Wolfgang taught Sidney how to golf.

...and played cars & trucks with Sidney and Elias.

Pretty soon the only ones remaining were family members.

The party continued into the night as the tiki lamps were lit and the food reheated. I went to bed and slept soundly until late the next morning. Then the party continued with family members. We ate leftovers and just lounged around the backyard all day. Then towards the late afternoon we started to clean up the tents.

That night for dinner we had smoked Eel! It was excellent.

On Monday we finally finished cleaning up the last of the party stuff and got the yard back to normal. Sybille had a visit from the local Kindergarten kids who sang to her.

It had been a fun party but my vacation was just getting started. I spent the rest of the week at S&W's. Also staying there was Sybille's cousin Unna-Eike from Hanover. She was very nice and we got a long quite well.

Summer in Northern Germany is beautiful. In S&W's backyard there are fresh raspberries, cherries, and currants to be picked and eaten at any time. There is also a family of storks who have a nest on the neighbor's stork tower. There are four young storks this year (usually there are two or three.) The funny thing I noticed is that these young storks would always lean their little heinies over the edge of the nest to relieve themselves. Potty-trained storks!

At the edge of S&W's yard is a lazy mill brook. There are all kinds of birds and bugs to see.

And plenty of frogs....

And even fish in the water...

At night the Mama Stork would perch on top of S&W's house to sleep (The nest being just a little too crowded.)

Coming Up Next: Banana Splits, Boy Sopranos, and Bear Fights!

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