Across the Fence

Remember those days when you were little and you knew soon it would be Christmas? You had no clue when exactly, and every day was filled with wonder and worry whether Santa, in a German’s case the Christ child, would bring you gifts? Because you hadn’t been all that good as expected? But you were […]

When I grew up, meat was on the table only scarcely. Which made the Sunday roast my mother prepared for lunch ever so much more special. Besides she had quite a variety of recipes. It could be a sauerbraten or a beef roast, a larded beef roast, a pork roast, a crusted pork roast, a […]

Do you remember November 9, 1989? If you have a German background or were traveling there at the time, you will. Thirty years ago, the Wall in Berlin fell, the Iron Curtain was lifted, and apparently Communism as known in the Western world was defeated. This is what Germans will be celebrating this Saturday. But […]

The other day, at a book stall at a fair, a fellow author was appalled that I didn’t have a Square to my phone to have potential customers pay with a debit or credit card. Her face fell even more when I told her that I didn’t even have a smart phone. “But you have […]

Now that the weather is more and more iffy again, we tend to dress ourselves in layers. How convenient to discard one or to don another layer just at a second’s whim. In my mother country it has even received a specific name: Zwiebel-Look (pronounce ‘tsvee-bul-look). Meaning onion look. And indeed, the onion, though so […]

Remember that I still owe you an article about the Zoological and Botanical Gardens in my German hometown of Stuttgart? Because I had been raving about the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle a while ago, which reminded me of this marvelous institution that was such a great destination during my childhood and teenage years. It […]

Have you made your annual Christmas card list already? Don’t think it’s too early for that; because if you are crafting yours and if some of them go overseas, you want to be ahead of the postal cut-off date. But I’m also talking of a different kind writing. Another long winter season lies ahead in […]

Would you know what day it is, this upcoming Sunday? Yes, October 6, right. It’s also German-American Day, celebrating the first German settlers arriving from Krefeld in the United States in 1683; they founded Germantown, PA, and organized the first petition in the English colonies in 1688 to abolish slavery. But this year it’s also […]

Has it ever occurred to you that food you are used to might look totally different when you order it in Europe? Or you might not even get it? Just mentioning the concept of “biscuit and gravy”, which in England would probably cause your restaurant staff a frown if not an outright “blech”. Because a […]