Container Christmas

Greetings of the day! If it's Sept. 2nd, then it's Container Christmas...at least for us. This was a term coined by my friend Anne, who had her own container Christmas last year, except hers was full of goodies from the Middle East and South East Asia. 

Our stuff is from Canada, so not as exciting, but there are gems that we discovered, oh yes, like the garlic press and our bikes, and pots and pans, and plates...oh wait, the plates didn't make it, nor did our beach towels and some clothing and tools and Steven's keyboard. So one or two boxes were either:

A. Highjacked

B. Made its way to someone else (it was a shared container) 

C. Fell off into the ocean and floated far, far away (thinking of Madagascar movie here)

Soooooo...Someone else is having their very own mini container Christmas...somewhere....

Waiting to hear what happens next, but it doesn't look good because we signed a whole bunch of papers that were in German and we didn't know what we were signing, much like signing lawyer-speak papers for buying a house except it's in another language and there's no friendly realtor in the room to explain what it actually says. Could have signed away my first born for all I know ! Plus, no one spoke a lick of English and the German words were bigger than the English alphabet, so google translate was useless, as usual. Folks, there is money to be made to create a reliable translating system APP. I would gladly plunk €10 on the table for such a thing. Whoever created this would be a freakin' billionaire! 

But enough on that. The huge orange truck arrived noisily at 8:15 am making us popular with the neighbours. It had gone down our narrow medieval, cobbled street, gingerly avoiding all the dozens of bins parked everywhere, because, yes, it's garbage day too! Miraculously, the driver found the ONLY two empty adjacent lots right in front of our apartment. They squeezed as close to the side as they could and the truck let out a final sigh, (of relief?), as it cut the diesel engine. 

Yay! They started right away to unload crates and wooden boxes of our stuff. It took us hours to unpack, and put stuff away. Glorious to now have a can opener, and my cutting knives! It has been HELL cutting everything with one small paring knife for the last 5 weeks. A PARING knife, people! 

And, I will enjoy all the extra feather pillows I packed. Missed those! One pillow just doesn't cut it. Elowyn missed all the excitement as everything was put away, and I personally folded her clothes, organized her drawers and wardrobe cupboard, then called Steven to show him the result. He admired my handiwork by saying, "Better take a picture of it because you won't see it like that again!" Sadly, it's true; Elowyn has not discovered the joys in keeping her room tidy and organized...and her room is virtually empty too! You would think... Oh forget it.  

Later in the evening, I stopped at a shop to look at their book collection. Steven, buoyed by his success in the kindergarten, grade 1 lesson book we got for free is moving on to short stories like 'Plötzlich Vampir' meaning 'Suddenly Vampire' about a kid I guess who becomes a vampire? Haven't read or translated it and I could be wrong, but Steven is really eager to sink his teeth into that one! He also bought 'The Little Prince' in German called, 'Der Klein Prinz'. Elowyn pointed out Princess and Unicorn books to him, but he said he'd pass. 

Unpacking was a lot of work, but we celebrated by a night out for dinner at an Italian restaurant, followed by ice-cream and a leisurely stroll home. The market square was full of people having dinner and enjoying the lovely night air. A nice end to a busy day.

First thing we're going to do today is take our bikes out for a spin to another town. Germany has lovely bike paths, and we're hoping one goes to Linderhof because they're having a street festival of craftspeople and their work in carving wood, blowing glass, spinning clay etc. All the craftspeople will be dressed in medieval or traditional costume and of course there will be wine, beer, all sorts of food and music. My kind of party!