We participate in the Berlin Half-Marathon

Lauf! Du schaffst es!

You’ll have to excuse me for feeling a bit tired these days, but we just had the Berlin Half-Marathon two weeks ago and it’s taken me awhile to recover.

There’s something incredibly exhilarating about the atmosphere of 25,000 runners from 86 countries joining together to run through these cobblestoned streets with 150,000 spectators cheering like crazy. Last September we were on hand to watch the world record set in the Berlin Marathon, and it inspired us to be part of this more accessible goal this spring.

Our youngest cheerleader: her sign says "Run"

It started out early on a cool April Sunday with the roller-bladers, followed by the handbikers and wheelchairs. Then came the amazingly divine Kenyans and Ethiopians, and then the remaining 24,000 mortals consigned to run behind the gods. Those mortals like us.

Well, more like us—except that we were standing in our pajamas with cups of cocoa in our hands, cheering them all on from our fifth-floor balcony.

Our view of the marathon

Oh, wait—you didn’t actually think we were down there on the street, sweating and cramping and heaving? Ha! Surely you know us better than that! No, no, no—our apartment was on the running route, so we participated by cheering raucously from above the trees as they all ran past our windows. We had kept our noise makers and signs from the marathon last fall, so we felt quite official.

And once again we were inspired by the determination and sacrifice and pleasure involved in something so completely foreign to us and our cocoa/coffee-drinking bodies!

Jasper the intern

Let's all hum Pomp & Circumstance, shall we?

As part of the German school system, each 10^th grader in a college-prep school is required to have a two-week internship in a company of his or her choice. Our friend Charlotte interned with the "new music" radio station in Berlin; Mo got a position in Hamburg with AFS, an organization that prepares and sends exchange students. And for the last two weeks we've had our friend Jasper living with us while he participated in a translation internship with Jost.

Each morning they sat at their desks in Jost's office (also known as our bedroom!) and talked about the day's tasks, or Jasper listened to an impromptu lecture on the finer points of translation: localization, the use of technology, and the art of networking. And then they fired up their computers and got to work. Jost had fun having a sidekick for two weeks, and we hope Jasper learned a lot. He's a good listener and was eager and willing to put it all into action. German readers can check out the blog he kept about his internship at http://jasperspraktikum.blogspot.com/.

Here are Jost and Jasper at the graduation ceremony in our living room

We loved having him here with us for fourteen days--especially Hannes, who could temporarily assuage his lifetime regret that we didn't provide him with any natural-born brothers. You're welcome to come back any time, Jasper, and bring your family with you!

Jasper and his twin brother Mo (left) with parents Jan and Ulli