Ronan's Progress in School

Whenever I speak with friends and family, everyone naturally wants to know how Ronan is doing in school. How is he getting on with learning German? Is he making friends? etc. Well, I have some positive news to report. The school principal said when we registered Ronan for school, "don't worry, he'll be speaking German in six months." I was a bit skeptical, but he was right. Ronan is, in fact, speaking quite a bit of German now, even with me and James at home. It's quite exciting.

I met with his teacher a week or so ago to see how he's progressing. She said that in January he was still primarily speaking English with her, but now he only speaks German with her. He's doing fine in math, even handling the word problems despite the langage handicap. He has one-on-one tutoring with a retired German teacher a few times a week and she says he's doing very well. He can read out loud quite well even if he doesn't understand it all and I'm actually quite amazed at his pronounciation. His German spelling isn't all that bad either. But where he does seem to have trouble is handwriting. Germans place great importance on neat handwriting. When we arrived here six months ago, he had quite a lot of catching up to do and has made excellent progress, but he still hasn't caught up to his German peers. To make things a bit more difficult is that children begin to learn how to use fountain pens in second grade. They even get a certificate of proficiency at the end of the year. The fountain pen is making it a bit harder, but his teacher is keeping him writing in pencil for now, til he makes a bit more progress. I do find this emphasis on fountain penmanship rather odd and obsolete, especially when I have yet to see a computer in the classroom.

However, what's really made the difference for Ronan is "Mittagsbetreuung". This is what we would call after-school daycare. We started sending Ronan there in December. To give James a bit more time during the day and to allow Ronan some time to get to know other kids outside the classroom. Since the German elementary school is only half-day, Mittagsbetreuung is critical for working parents and it's very inexpensive. For 2 days a week, we are paying about $14 per month. Ronan stays till about 2pm though there is an option to stay til 3:30pm. Ronan has really benefited from Mittagsbetreuung. He's bonded with other kids in his class. He also gets help with homework in the homework room, but most of all, he's had to get a handle on the language to make friends. The school also has a brand new day care room. It's big, bright, and friendly and the kids can just go wild. Ronan would go every day if he could.

So, though he still misses his US elementary school and his friends there, he is adapting very well here in Germany.

Winter outing 1: Schneekirche

I've fallen a bit behind on blogging about our adventures here in Burghausen. The end of January and beginning of February were just so cold that we did really nothing but hibernate, just going to work, school, and staying home in the evenings.
The first school vacation road trip took Ronan and I and several other work colleagues to the town of Mitterfirmiansreut, a small village and ski area in the Bavarian forest near the Czech border. We weren't there to ski, we were there to see the Schneekirche. A church built completely out of snow and ice. It was very foggy the day were were there, so the above photo doesn't really do it justice. Here is a link to the website for better photos: http://www.schneekirche.com/texte/seite.php?id=. The townspeople of Mitterfirmiansreut built the first Schneekirche 100 years ago to remind the world and the Church of this far off corner and to show its faith.
We walked through the ski resort, following the signs to the Schneekirche. We paid a few Euro at the gate and then climbed the snowy hill to the top where it was located. It was an quite an impressive sculpture of snow and ice. Inside there were several benches made of ice and a small alter lit up in blue. I can imagine that a religious service here would be quite an experience. Ronan liked the church, but was more interested in throwing snowballs at my co-workers outside, in fact, I had a hard time getting him to stop. Next to the church, in true German style, there was a Gluehwein stand, but I resisted. I was a little disappointed that we had left the sled we brought along in the car as I had promised Ronan we would find a sledding hill at some point during the day.

After an extended lunch at a Bavarian-style restaurant, we began the two-hour drive home. Billy and Deede graciously stopped the car at a parking area, which looked like along the way to give Ronan and I a chance to go sledding. Unbeknownst to us when we parked, there was a small ski area across the street with the most perfect sledding hill ever. It was as if we had asked the universe for one and it heard us. Ronan and I had a great time sledding up and down the mountain and had a darn good snowball fight with Billy. Thank you Billy and Deede, and the universe for the perfect day.

Ronan's soccer accident

While I'm catching up on my other blog posts, just thought I'd share this little adventure to the ER with you all.

Yesterday Ronan rolled his ankle at soccer practice, resulting in a severe sprain. As usual, James and I missed the event and only found out about it when we arrived to pick him up. The trainer didn't examine the extent of the injury until the end of practice when Ronan had trouble walking back to the changing room. We were strongly encouraged to take him to the ER, which I never would have done in the US. I would have at least waited til the next day and taken him to the doctor. But this is Germany and we have comprehensive health insurance as all Germans do, it's even mandatory. So off to the ER we went courtesy of the trainer's wife. This will be interesting, I thought.

Burghausen isn't that big a town and it was a Monday night, so the ER was empty. We checked in and were led into an exam room where the doctor examined Ronan's ankle and then sent him off for xrays. If this had been the US, I would have been almost more worried about the costs and my expanding credit card debt than my kid's health. But here in Germany, I could just focus on Ronan. The xray confirmed severely torn ligaments, so two attendents thoroughly bandaged Ronan's leg up and provided him with crutches. The doctor gave us some painkillerwes to take home and at first apologized that she had to charge us a € 5 processing fee. I just laughed. Five euros? No problem, do you know what I would've been charged for this in the US? Then she corrected herself and said, oops, no, we don't charge processing fees for children. Never mind. We walked out of the ER without a worry and without a bill to pay.

This scenario is pretty much unheard of in the US, why is that? Why should we have to worry more about health costs in an emergency than about the health of our loved ones? Don't we as Americans deserve not only the best health care, but health care that is comprehensively covered? It doesn't even have to be "the best," I'd be happy with pretty darn good and that's what we got yesterday.

Ronan will have a few days off school, get a splint fit to his leg to provide additional support for a few weeks, several follow-up visits with the doctor, all covered by health insurance. Ronan can heal with all the care he needs and we don't have to stress about the cost. What a concept! Thank you Germany!

Winter Outing 2: Ruhpolding

Well, I've been so distracted with the spring coming, trying to get my taxes ready for my tax lady, and watching Star Wars on the weekend with Ronan that once again I've fallen behind on getting some thoughts down on my blog.

To finish off describing the rest of Ronan's February or Fasching vacation, we rented a car on the closing weekend and took two day trips: one to the city of Passau and the other to the small alpine town of Ruhpolding, which is a well-known, family-friendly ski area. I had hoped that I could talk Ronan into taking a down-hill skiing lesson with me, but he was more open to x-country, so I signed the three of us up for ski rental and a x-country lesson. It was spring-like when we got there, warm and sunny, which made for granular snow. No matter, we arrived, picked up our skis, met our ski instructor, and headed out for our lesson. Except that for some reason, Ronan refused to take part, so while he moped at the beginning of the trail, James and I enjoyed a good x-country ski lesson. James hadn never really cross-country skiied before, but he did great, and enjoyed the lesson. I learned a few new things as well. Ronan started to give it a try toward the end of the lesson and did a few rounds with me. Next time maybe we'll skip the lesson and I'll help him.

The town of Ruhpolding was in the process of preparing for the World Biathalon (x-country sking and target shooting) Championships the following week, so there was lots happening. After skiing, we went over to the downhill ski area to do some sledding and I even tried downhill inner-tubing or snow tubing, now that was fun!

The School Fasching Celebration

Ronan's school Fasching (read last post to learn about what Fasching is) celebration took place last week. Each class had a different costume theme that was related to the performance each class was to do at the school assembly. Since Ronan's class was performing a cowboy song (which Ronan really disliked), the classroom's theme was cowboys. So all the children were asked to dress up as a cowboy/cowgirl, and if they wanted to dress up as something else, to at least bring a hat and vest so they could change into a cowboy for the performance. Ronan wanted to be a Ninja, so we got him a Ninja outfit along with a toy sword, which he has spent many hours assaulting his parents with.
However, when the day came, we wondered whether we should bring a toy gun with the cowboy outfit. We figured that it wouldn't be appropriate. In the US, it would certainly be frowned upon or worse, especially in consideration of all the school shootings that have happened over the years. So, of course, we figured that bringing a toy pistol to school would be taboo. We didn't bring it.
So we arrive at the school and take Ronan to his classroom and it's complete mayhem! All his classmates were running around crazy shooting off their toy cowboy pistols. It was a no-holds-barred, OK Corral, mass shoot-out. The theme in the classroom across the hall was the muppets, even the Cookie monster had a toy pistol. And here is our child, unarmed, in fact, we'd even forgotten his Ninja sword. He was defenseless and he knew it, we knew it. The tears begin to well up in his eyes and all the excitement of the day disappeared. After all, for a kid who loves to go swordfighting in the park and gets yelled at for pointing his toy guns at his parents, here was his perfect chance to let it all out, to go gun-crazy with his classmates, and what had he done, he had left his weapons at home on the one day when was allowed to have one.
What could we do? Ronan was so dejected and upset. Was there enough time to go back home in the snow storm to get his sword or toy pistol? Hmm, too far. Well, James and I looked at each other. We both thought of the big box store about a mile up the road from the school where they had lots of costumes and toys for kids. Ah, time for a gun run! Yup, we went on a gun run so our child wouldn't feel left out of the mayhem. I just can't imagine having done this in the US. It would be considered so politically incorrect, even though we probably have some of the most liberal gun ownership laws of most developed countries. However, here in conservative, Catholic Bavaria, Fasching is a time where rules are relaxed. Everyone is allowed to go a bit crazy (before Lent) and release some of that pent up energy caused by cabin fever, and that includes dressing up as cowboys and bringing toy pistols to school.
So Ronan donned his costume. We told him we'd be back, we got on our bikes and cycled out in the snow to Kaufland to buy our kid a gun to take to school. We purchased the last Colt 45 in the shop, returned to the school, and made one little boy very happy. However, the irony of this was not lost on us.

Fasching (Mardi Gras) Season

In case you haven't heard, Europe has been experiencing a deep freeze for the past several weeks. Temperatures here in Burghausen have been below zero degrees Celsius for about a 3 weeks. Biking to work and school has been pretty darn cold, but at least we finally had some snow that has stayed on the ground. Burghausen certainly knows how to handle even a minor snowfall by thoroughly plowing and salting the sidewalks, bike lanes, and roads. After all we are near the region of the Salzkammergut in Austria. The name means "Estate of the Salt Chamber" and derives from the Imperial Salt Chamber, the authority charged with running the salt mines of the Habsburg empire. So there's plenty of salt around here. Anyway, that's not what I'm here to talk about.

Today, I want to talk about Fasching! or Mardi Gras as we call it in the States. Most folks associate Mardi Gras only with New Orleans or Rio de Janeiro, but the Catholic areas of Germany also celebrate Fasching in style, Cologne is particularly well known for its Fasching celebrations. In Bavaria, and particularly where we lived years ago in Regensburg, Fasching is celebrated with gusto. From mid-January through to Ash Wednesday, there are costume parties and balls of all kinds on almost every weekend, peaking on Faschingmontag with most pubs in the town hosting all night parties, followed by Faschingsdienstag or Fat Tuesday, which is a wee bit more staid since the bars have to shut down at Midnight. I'm sure the purpose of this celebration is to get us all through the cold dark days of winter and to give observant Catholics a last hurrah before the season of Lent. In the end, what better way to fight cabin fever than to get dressed up and go to parties every weekend, not that I do that any more. But I certainly had my share of Fasching all-nighters, replete with white wurst breakfasts at 6:00 a.m.

I will also mention that the Thursday before Ash Wednesday here is called Weiberfasching or Ladies Fasching. And beware those gentlemen who wear their best ties to work on that day. It is tradition in the workplace, especially banks, for the ladies to cut the gentlemen's ties (so very pagan, I think). I remember walking into the bank each year on Weiberfasching, noticing the ties, and thinking, Ah, Weiberfasching.

There are also Fasching events for children, for example, Ronan's school is having a Fasching party tomorrow. He's even going to wear a costume, he'll be dressed as a Ninja. Ronan never dresses up, he's never even gone trick or treating because he doesn't like to dress up. But he's got costume fever this year. Sorry, I can't show you photos because he doesn't want photos of him in costume going up on Facebook. Smart boy!

So, wherever you are, why not fight off those winter blues by heading off to a mardi gras celebration near you or hosting your own Mardi Gras party! It may not be as wild and crazy as in these parts, but it will take you out of hibernation mode and remind you that you probably have friends out there you haven't seen in a while! Give them a call!

Spinning class

Well, it's been a quiet post-Christmas month here in Burghausen. We have settled into our winter routine, which feels kind of mundane, but I think it's just part of winter hibernation.

We have joined the local sports club, SV Wacker Sportsverein, so that James and Ronan can play soccer and I can take spinning classes. They offer all kinds of sports, including fencing, handball (very popular here), sailing, bowling, gymnastics, and lots more that I can't remember.

I'm trying to get in the routine of doing a spinning class twice a week. The instructor for the Wednesday night class is really good, he plays a good variety of music, pushes us all hard and speaks in a heavy Bavarian dialect, which I'm still trying to get a handle on. Last week he made us climb for 25 minutes, so I just closed my eyes and did the last part of the Mt. Baker Hill Climb. Good times! By the way, I thought my Mt. Baker Bike Club buddies would appreciate the attached photo. Since German shops are closed on Sundays, our local bike shop has an automatic dispenser for bike inner tubes in case you get a flat on a Sunday and the shop is closed. Gotta love it!

So, as far as I can make out, Burghausen doesn't have a road bike group, Mt. biking seems to be more the thing here, we are near the Alps, after all. The spinning group meets for Mt. bike rides once the weather changes, so it looks like I'll be using James' Mt. bike in the spring. The spinning instructor also mentioned that if I want to find folks to road ride with, it would be fairly easy to start a road biking group in the spring, so that will be my plan. Anyway, missing all of my biking buddies. Our door is open if anyone is in the neighborhood!