New friendships

We get by with a little help

from our friends

One of the hardest things about leaving for a year was being separated from our good friends at home. But gradually we’ve made some friendships that are filling our lives with joy and already beginning to make us sad about leaving people behind yet again. Today we’d like to introduce you to some of our new friends . . . .

Anna has bridged the biggest language barrier to speak friendship fluently with her best buddy Jessica, a Polish-Portuguese girl who lives a few blocks away and is in Anna’s class. They love to dance and dress up together and babble away at each other so that I can’t tell who’s talking when.

Lara has a wild and crazy girl group that she hangs out with. Here are Verena (Chilean-German), Sophie (Turkish-German), and Lara (American-German) . . .

and here’s a pensive picture of Nuri (Egyptian-German).

These girls are always up to something and always seem to be having a great time. Right now they’re all applying to be accepted into high schools for their 7th grade years and enjoying their last carefree year of elementary school. (Have I mentioned how multi-cultural the kids' friends are? There's hardly a classmate who has two German parents!)

Hannes’s class at his sports school is very tight knit and he feels close to them all, but his best friend is Niko, a classmate and a basketball teammate. Niko’s parents are Polish, and he dreams of coming to America to play college basketball. I’ve got a soft spot in my heart for him because he likes my chocolate chip cookies!

Some of you may recognize the twins, Jasper and Mo, who spent a summer with us in Reedsport several years ago. They’ve come to stay with us several times this year, and Jasper will be coming again soon to do a two-week translation practicum with Jost. They continue to be among Hannes’s best brother buddies.












I had not really thought about making new friends this year—I knew we’d be catching up with old friends and investing in the children’s friendships. So the new friends Jost and I have made have been an unlooked-for and lovely surprise.

First among these were John and Hoi-ling, doctoral students of theology from Hong Kong who have just arrived in Berlin and are helping with the local Chinese church. Their professor was a classmate of Jost’s at the University of Hamburg. They come to our house on Mondays for dinner and German practice and fun fellowship (John does some mean card tricks!).


John and Hoi-ling invited us to a party at their church for the Chinese New Year. They had mentioned that there was a family of American missionaries working with their church, but when I walked in I was introduced to this man . . .

. . . Chuck "Chuckles" Rentz, my freshman college buddy from Seattle Pacific University 25 years ago! I think that’s the very definition of serendipity—or a divine appointment for renewing old friendships. We’ve had fun spending time with Chuck and his wife Jenny and their four children.

Each Wednesday since shortly before Christmas we’ve been going to a Bible study with a wonderful group of folks, all at least ten years younger and much cooler than Jost and me, but still they've welcomed and loved us! We eat together, sing together, study together, and have a great time. Here’s one of them, Sarah Kaiser, a jazz vocalist who comes over to play cards with us regularly.


And here’s Anna with the newest Bible study addition, baby Noah.

We feel so grateful for all these new (and old) friends who have filled our lives here with unexpected warmth and fun and fellowship.

The Saturday market

Let's take a walk!

This morning we strolled down from our house to the Saturday farmers’ market, one of our favorite weekend outings. Jost's photos will provide you with some impressions of our neighborhood as we walked to the market:

Here’s a first curious shot of his new shoes,

an odd pair of rectangular leather loafers

made by a venerable old German shoemaking company.

How will you all recognize him without his clogs?

Our street is lined with an amazing variety of small shops. Here are just a few. (Please remember that this is the real almost-downtown gritty city we live in as you join us!)

A Russian bookstore

An old mom-and-pop corset and underwear store
(well, actually I don't know whether they sell corsets for pop, too,
but you know what I mean!)

The neighborhood brothel
(“You come as a stranger, you go as a friend”)

Probably twenty hair-cutting salons with intriguing advertisements

The Lebanese (!) jeweler and his assistant.
He gives out cans of juice with pineapple chunks in it whenever we stop by.


Thai massage

Big Pimp Hotdogs??
(unfortunately I'm not making this up!)

African art

And finally the Saturday market,
a small village of canvas-covered stands huddling in the church square

There’s a wonderful assortment of almost every imaginable fruit and vegetable. Here Anna and I are filling up with a week’s worth of veggies from this Turkish stand.


Potatoes, potatoes, potatoes—a different kind for every different purpose

My favorites are the flower stands. The Germans really know how to make gorgeous bouquets. Here the salesman scolded us for not coming six hours earlier to get an adequate picture when the flowers weren’t nearly gone.

As we walked we sampled the strawberries from Morocco (3 boxes for 2 euro!), the fresh garden carrots, and some really yummy homemade Turkish delight.

But the best part was setting the table when we got home: homemade Dubai pesto, crusty bread, a couple of new kinds of wurst, and fresh garlic olives. And of course more of those delicious strawberries and carrots.

Treasure hunting

Way back during our Christmas vacation, we visited old Hamburg friends Judith and Til and their daughter Lupine in the beautiful city of Munich in southern Germany. We packed a lot of sightseeing into two very cold sub-zero days:

Anna and Lupine navigating
the crowded downtown pedestrian mall

. . . ice skating on the frozen moat of a castle built in 1385, eating at an ur-typical Bavarian restaurant (massive slabs of meat with canned peas and powdered potatoes), and admiring the famous Rathaus (the city hall) and the cathedral that were completely destroyed along with most of downtown Munich during the war and then rebuilt down to the last detail.

The Rathaus

The kids were especially impressed with our visit to the Schatzkammer, the treasury created in the 16^th century to house the jewels and treasures of the Bavarian royal families. Lara was our photographer during the tour of crowns, necklaces, scepters and balls, and jewel-encrusted toiletry cases.

A delicate queen's crown

Jost was so impressed by the visible weight and majesty of this king's crown.
These heavy things must have caused headaches!

And neck-aches!

Anna was so impressed with the jewels in Munich that she went back to Berlin and got her ears pierced!

Now she carries around her own treasury in those beautiful little ears!