Aachen

Aachen, Germany. On the border of the Netherlands-Belgium-Germany. Sorta like Texarkana. Guess it could have been named Belgermnet?

It is a city of 259,000, but it felt much more quaint than that.

It is also a spa city and there are currently two places where you can visit the hot springs and less than an hour from our house, we may venture back soon.

There is evidence of a settlement in Aachen indicating it has been around since at least the Stone Age (2700 to 1900 BC). Kinda makes the Middle Ages (5th to 15th century) seem like recent history.

For 600 years (936-1531) Aachen was the place for the coronation of Kings of Germany. The Aachen Cathedral was the site of the coronation of 30 kings and 12 queens. The last was Ferdinand I in 1531.

Aachen was also the favored residence of Charlemagne. He was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He is called the Father of Europe because his empire united most of Western Europe.

The Aachen Cathedral was erected on the orders of Charlemagne in 786 AD.

On his death, his remains were interred in the Aachen Cathedral and are still there today.

Charlemagne collected quite a few relics in his lifetime and they are also kept at the Aachen Cathedral. The four most important and indeed impressive are:

• the cloak of the Virgin Mary
• the swaddling clothes of the Infant Jesus
• the loin cloth worn by Christ on the Cross
• the cloth on which lay the head of John the Baptist after his beheading

The first German city to be captured, Aachen was heavily damaged in WWII.

Aachen 1944

Incidentally, in 1372 Aachen became the first place in the world to place an anno domino date on minted coins.

Also, the annual CHIO (Concours Hippique International Officiel) is held in Aachen and is the biggest equestrian meeting of the world and among horsemen considered to be as prestigious as Wimbledon is for tennis.

The city is also famous for its aachener printen cookies.

They look delicious, but after our first bite we both said "Ew, licorice". They had the distinct taste of licorice and my daddy is the only person I've ever known who actually liked licorice.

The store was packed with people and everything was displayed beautifully. Fortunately we only bought two of those cookies.

I took this picture as we were eating lunch to show how crazy the weather is around here. You can see it's pouring rain and the sun is shining. I believe I've seen more rainbows in this year than I'd seen in the first 40+ years added together.

And for a bit of trivia . . . Paul Julius Reuter noticed with the electric telegraph news could travel long distances quickly. In 1850, Reuter was based in Aachen. He began the Berlin-Aachen telegraph line. However, there was a 76-mile gap in the line between Aachen and Brussels (Belgium's capital) so he sped up service by using homing pigeons. You have heard of Reuters News Agency.

And . . . I took this picture 'cause there was a crowd gathered, but I've yet to figure out what it is and the significance, if any.

Was Dr. Seuss Dutch?

He was actually an American, but certainly must have known some Dutch. His grandparents were from Germany and while Dutch is not as harsh as German, it is very similar. From time to time, particularly when we are in our Flemish class or when I overhear an animated conversation by two teenaged girls, I feel like I'm listening to someone read from a Dr. Seuss book.

A while ago I did a similar post on quirky Flemish words and Dr. Seuss. We owned pretty much all the Dr. Seuss books and read them often to our kids. Well, we read lots of books to our kids.

And then there were some we read only once.

We worry about what kids see on TV and that's probably warranted, but have you ever given a second thought about the "classic" children's stories we read to them?

We had a beautifully illustrated book of Mother Goose rhymes. We read these a few times until I started really thinking about what I was reading.

Like this one . . .

Goosey, goosey, gander,

Whither dost thou wander?

Upstairs and downstairs

And in my lady's chamber.

There I met an old man

Who wouldn't say his prayers;

I took him by the left leg,

And threw him down the stairs.

Threw him down the stairs? Is there a moral here I missed? Honey, did you say your prayers? You know what happens when you don't.

But Mother Goose doesn't have the market on strange. The Brothers Grimm wrote more than their fair share of frightening tales.

Take Rumplestiltskin.

Starts off with a miller lying about his daughter spinning straw into gold. A dwarf comes along and does it for her. First for a necklace, then a ring, and then of course the first born child. Fortunately she figures out his name and all is well. I guess.

Sweetie, don't lie - especially if you want to keep your first born child some day.

Or how about Little Red Riding Hood.

Sweet little girl goes to grandmothers only to find she's been eaten by a wolf. The woodcutter saves the day, but not the story.

Best to stay out of the forest, dear.

Or Hansel and Gretel, a young brother and sister who discover a house of candy and cake in the forest. A cannabalistic witch basically fattens the two of them up until she decides they are fat enough to eat. Somehow they survive, but still!

Remember Red Riding Hood - don't go walking in the forest.

Now, if that's not bad enough, the Good Book has some pretty bizarre stories as well. We had a book of Bible stories and it only took one time reading from it for me to put it away forever.

Like Judges 19:22-30. I believe this story goes something like this. A man and his concubine are wandering the streets when they decide to seek shelter for the night. A kind man lets them stay, but that night a group of men show up and want to have sex with the man. Not wanting to offer up his male houseguest, he offers up his virgin daughter instead. That's not enough so the owner now offers the man's concubine to the group. After the brutal rape, she bleeds to death. Now if that weren't bad enough, he chops her up and gives the pieces to the 12 tribes of Israel. I won't even attempt to understand the message here.

I'll assume taken in context, there is a perfectly good explanation for this. I'm no Bible scholar. I grew up Catholic, after all.

Here's another good one. 4 Kings 2:23-24. Elijah, though a wise man, is cursed with baldness. One day he is attacked by a group of children making fun of his baldness. So he curses them in the name of the Lord and poof, two bears appear and maul the 42 children to death.

Heavens! Okay, these probably weren't in the Bible story book we owned, but still.

Again, taken in context, no doubt there's a perfectly good explanation. I just don't know what it is. You know, growing up Catholic and all.

Even Beatrix Potter came up with some pretty scary yarns. And I couldn't come close to doing justice in the way Randi did in this post :)

So, back to Dr. Seuss. I'm no Seuss scholar either, but Green Eggs and Ham. Try them, you'll like them. So Sam-I-Am finally tries them and likes them. That's it.

The Cat in the Hat. Entertains two kids on a rainy day. Makes a huge mess then cleans it up. If you make a mess, have fun and clean it up.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Even this one with a bitter creature trying to prevent Christmas from coming ends up welcomed in Whoville realizing gifts aren't what it's all about.

Fah who for-aze. Dah who dor-aze.

Moral of this post. Teach your kids a few Dutch words . . .

I zit on the zitbank (sofa) with my hondje (doggy). He blaft (barks) and kwispelt (wags his tail) when bezoekers (visitors) arrive. I kijk (look) at him and glimlach (smile). We are now off to the winkel (store) boodschappen te doen (grocery shopping). So many dingen (things) to kopen (buy). Wortels (carrots), kip (chicken), kokosnoot (coconut). We wait at the kassa (checkout) to betalen (pay) and we get wisselgeld (the change) back. We lopen (walk) home again. The End. Knuffels and kusjes (Hugs and kisses)!

and by all means, read Dr. Seuss to them.

Hallmark

Receiving a Hallmark card was really something special. A long time ago. Their quality was unsurpassed by American Greetings or any other off-brand.

Greeting cards probably started with the Chinese, but by the 15th century wooden cutout and handmade paper Valentines were being exchanged in Europe. Hallmark actually didn't come along until 1910. Their cards are still nice and special, but they have so much competition now.

There was a time when I would spend an hour looking for a greeting card. If a card made me laugh, I would buy two of them. I even have a few of these extra cards somewhere at our house in Jefferson and I wish I'd brought them over here with me.

On our son-in-law's birthday recently, I told him I wish I had a weirdly humorous card to send to him, but if there are any here, I haven't found them. Plus the fact that I can hardly read Flemish at 1st grade level, let alone interpret adult humor in a greeting card.

But I do miss the quest for the perfect card. You know, that one that makes you laugh and you are sure that the person receiving it will either laugh or think you're insane? And either one was okay. I've always thought if someone gives you a great greeting card, you can be sure they spent way more time picking it out than the gift itself.

I searched the internet for cards I was either familiar with or ones I'd surely buy if they were on the shelf. They just make me laugh.

"Jesus-Jesus, Bo-Besus!, Banana-Fana Fo_Fesus!, FI-Fi-Mo-Mesus!, Jesus!"

Blank Inside

:)

Soap Box

Disclaimer: I am ranting.

You are forewarned.

Still with me?

Sometimes I just shake my head. Do you ever think about the prejudice, injustice, oppression in our past? Not a long time ago. Recent past. In my lifetime.

I shake my head and wonder "what were we thinking?" And frankly, I still do.

When I was in high school, there was a restaurant on Lake D'Arbonne where blacks sat on one side and whites sat on the other. My high school days may seem like a long time ago. They weren't. Segregation was the social norm. Blacks were considered inferior to whites and were treated as such. In my lifetime.

In my hometown, blacks were relegated to the balcony at the local movie theater. They bought their tickets and entered at a separate entrance from the whites. I also remember my oldest brother telling the story of hauling all the old textbooks from his high school over to the black high school once they were worn out or outdated.

What was wrong with us? Yeah, I was just a kid, but we all thought that was okay?

Fortunately the Supreme Court in Brown vs Board of Education did away with some of that inequality in 1954, but it was long after 1954 when the first black child entered my 3rd grade classroom. And I guess even Brown vs Board of Education couldn't resolve all the prejudice.

Obviously Lake D'Arbonne didn't get the message until something like 1980.

____________________

I remember accompanying a field trip when Randi was at A. E. Phillips. One of the children in her class was handicapped and in a wheel chair. Thankfully, she and her classmates thought nothing of it. One of the kids was always assigned to this child to assist by pushing his wheelchair or pulling him in the wagon. They considered him normal because he was. When we walked into the Civic Center in Monroe, heads turned to look at this child in the wheelchair. What a pity. All I could think was how grateful I was that my child never thought of the handicapped child as different. Because he wasn't. This was 1992.

The Americans with Disabilities Act became effective in 1992. It seems before that if you were physically handicapped you were surely mentally handicapped as well. It's true. That was our thought process. If you can call that a thoughtful process.

____________________

I remember when interracial marriage was illegal. Seeing a mixed race couple on the street was a real head-turner and maybe even warranted a comment about how awful it was. Finally in 1967, the Supreme Court brought us out of the dark ages and ruled the ban on interracial marriage unconstitutional. I don't think I have the ability to decide who anyone else should marry. I don't think you do either. Much less consider it a crime.

____________________

Women, remember when you couldn't vote? There probably aren't many alive today who do, but it wasn't that long ago. It may seem that the right to vote was inevitable, but not so fast. At the end of the Civil War, giving women the right to vote was unthinkable. They had no need to vote. They were represented by their husbands who voted for them.

Between 1909 and 1912, black women, working women, and immigrants joined white reformers and won the right to vote in Oregon, California, and Washington.

Think about that geographically.

The 19th amendment was finally passed by the House and Senate in 1919. Even after every other state ratified it, several states went to court to try to stop it.

The Supreme Court finally dismissed it in 1922.

Several states still waited decades to ratify it. Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina between 1969 and 1971 and Mississippi not until 1984!

Think about that geographically.

____________________

Still with me?

On the topic of geography and the Civil War. Did you know that the first African slaves arrived on our soil in 1619? I have to say that actually is a long time ago. However, the 13th Amendment freeing all slaves didn't happen for centuries. Literally.

We actually thought having slaves was okay. For 250 years. And worth dying for. There were over 600,000 deaths in that war.

____________________

Do you look back on all these events in awe of our audacity? We privileged white conservatives who know what's best for everyone on Earth.

Ironically, at any given moment it seems we temporarily set aside our bias against one issue and replace it with our bias against another. After all, we only have so much time to solve all the world's ills, people. You know, whatever the bigotry of the day is or what our current media has convinced us it is. We've taken turns over the centuries with witches, Catholics, women, gays, immigrants, Muslims, blacks, Jews.

Now, here's what I really want to say . . . despite all this history, I believe that most of us are just well-meaning worriers.

Well-meaning worriers who are simply manipulated by the media, by our neighbor, by an authority figure. I don't think we're all warriors for any particular cause. We're just ordinary people wanting the very best for our family and our country and ourselves. Out of fear or ignorance or both, we become irrational and unreasonable. Even reckless.

I'm a worrier extraordinaire. I am often resistant to change, but . . .

I'm not Black. I'm not gay. I'm not Muslim. I'd like to think I'm rational, but what do I really know?

Whether it's immigration, gay marriage, abortion, segregation, universal healthcare . . . Why would I think I can look from the outside and decide what is best for someone I know nothing about? Someone I really can't even identify with.

I think history has proven we aren't very good at it. Mercifully, the Supreme Court steps in and rights our stupidity. Or fear. Or ignorance.

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Weerbericht

That's weather forecast.

I often mention how often if rains in Belgium. And it does rain. A lot. I still occasionally forget to take my paraplu along and I have gotten wet a time or two as a result.

Jim and I were downtown recently when there came a downpour. I wasn't too happy we'd forgotten the umbrella and were a 15 minute walk from home. So . . . we stopped for coffee, before you know it the sun came back out, and we found a nice new spot for coffee.

So despite the frequent rain, there are also some really perfect weather days here too. Actually, a lot of perfect weather days here.

And one of them is today.

Wed

71°F | 53°F

And for those of you practicing your metrics . . .

Wed

22°C | 12°C

Tomorrow ain't lookin' too bad either :)

Thu

73°F | 55°F

Thu

23°C | 13°C

Vuurwerk, Kermis, and Company

We had a really nice weekend! Ross and his neighbor and friend, Charlotte came for a visit. Jim grilled steaks which were lekker and we even roasted marshmallows.

The kermis (fair) is in town and the opening of the fair always begins with vuurwerk (fireworks) so of course we went.

There was quite a crowd.

This went on for about half an hour. It was great.

Then on to the kermis.

And a few games.

I had no idea Jim and Ross had been target shooting in their spare time.

But it resulted in a big win!

Een heel fijn weekend.

The Bubble

This poster, which measured about 4 ft. x 6 ft., was displayed throughout Hasselt - as you can see from the dates - March to June of this year.

What was your first thought when you saw that?

This billboard is currently standing along the road in several places around Hasselt. And it will be until the event at the end of October.

What was your first thought when you saw that?

This is a shirt our 17-year-old neighbor wears all the time.

How do you feel about that?

Out of your comfort zone?

This societal openness and comfort level made me curious.

That being said, having an open mind can go a long way. Think for a moment if you hadn't grown up thinking a photo of a naked woman was illicit or that a condom dispenser on the street was taboo or better yet, think for a moment that sexuality isn't a morality issue or uniquely dangerous for young adults.

So, here's what I learned.

Blame it all on the Catholic Church. At least in the beginning.

From their staunch opposition to sex education in 1913 when Chicago public schools began teaching it. For the next few decades educators experimented with various health and morality approaches.

Then in 1964, the Sexuality Information Education Council of the United States was founded. It attempted to teach youth a value-neutral method (birth control, teen pregnancy, STD's, etc.) without moralizing it. Given all the information, young people could reach their own conclusions.

Well, that didn't last long. Beginning in 1968, conservative and religious groups attacked this method and in the 1970's began the divergence of the U.S. approach and the European approach.

I was in high school in the 1970's so I have a little knowledge of what it was like to be a teenager in this decade.

When the HIV/AIDS crisis began in the 1980's, almost every western European nation and the United States adopted programs for education. As conservative opponents of this program realized education was inevitable, they launched their own abstinence programs.

I was in college in the 1980's so I have a little knowledge of what it was like to be a young adult in this decade.

Religious conservatives, in particular, helped add provisions for abstinence programs to the 1996 Welfare Reform Act and tens of millions of dollars went toward abstinence education. So there you have it.

European programs were still under the medical community control with little religious or political challenge and sex education was all about public health.

Public health policy is greatly influenced in the States by political lobbyists and religious organizations. In Europe, they have little influence.

Who determines the sexual morality of the coming generation?

In Belgium and most of Europe, teens are seen as young adults long before age 21. The legal drinking age is 16. Is it possible that poor decision-making skills are due to teens not being seen as young adults?

Did you know that about 80% of young adult Americans are sexually active before age 21? So while abstinence may be the preference for some, it simply is not reality.

So this societal openness and comfort level in Europe seems to have kept the bubble from forming. I'm from that 1970's generation and although the "shock factor" has dissipated (as evidenced by my even posting these photos), I won't say my comfort level hasn't been challenged, but as indicated by the latest data, there is room for change.

This ad below was in the Women's section of our local newspaper. It wasn't on the front page, but I don't think I'll see this on any page in the Ruston Daily Leader any time soon :)

Sometimes there's a little lost in translation, but I think you'll get the message . . .

Men are proud when they think their genitals is greater than that of another. But exactly how big it is, do you turn a simple condom know. It is often difficult to determine the exact size of your penis to learn. And even if size does not really matter, it's still nice to know if your penis in the middle or to the larger class. The condometric helps you a hand in there now. The condom is printed with a ruler that you can read the exact size. For the health freaks: the ruler is printed on the condom with antiallergic ink.

Oh, and welcome to Europe.