He is Risen! Alleluia!
Just like at Christmas, I spent Easter with my roommate, Teresa, and her family in Heiligenstadt. It was nice to get away from Jena and have some wonderful home-cooked meals. What could be better?
Good Friday (Karfreitag) we ventured out to the train station early and made it to Heiligenstadt in time for lunch. Since we weren’t sure if the Schaffner (ticket checker) would be on board and didn’t have much time to wait in line to buy a ticket before we left, we rode “Schwarz”, which means without a ticket. Always makes the trip more exciting when you have to wait to buy your ticket.
Anyway, for half the trip we are able to ride for free as we are students and we can take the train about 50km out for free. However, after Gotha, we had to pray that the Schaffner wouldn’t come to our train car. Five minutes before our stop, we see the Schaffner coming. SO CLOSE! But wait…she is at the back of our car, so at the next stop we move farther down the train car to avoid the Schaffner. No worries…we paid on the way home!
Since it was Karfreitag and Teresa’s family is Catholic, we weren’t allowed to eat any sweets or meat, so lunch consisted of potatoes, Quark (sour cream) and tomato soup. After lunch, we got busy and began painting our eggs that we had blown the contents out of the night before. Two hours later, we were finally done painting and decided to bake some Plätzchen, which are basically sugar cookies, just not as sweet.
However, our adventure of baking the Plätzchen turned into somewhat of an experience as the dough kept getting too hard and then sticking together, but hey-the cookies still tasted good!Easter Saturday we went shopping in Heiligenstadt for a bit before lunch since one of Teresa’s nieces was to be baptized the next day in Kassel. After finding her a present, we ventured back through the snow (yes, it was SNOWING!) to “frost” our Plätzchen with white chocolate we melted and then put sprinkles on them. Not too bad, and fairly tasty!
Then we got creative again and began dying eggs. You know, where you stick the egg into a jar with food coloring and vinegar. Teresa had never learned how to make the eggs two colors, so after finding some leftover wire, I brought the American experience of dying eggs to Heiligenstadt.
That night her family and I went to the Easter Mass at her church. Talk about a long service!! Two hours!! But what an experience! It began with candlelight (the eternal flame) and then when Christ was risen, the lights came on. It was pretty sweet! However, I was really missing singing “Jesus Christ is Risen Today” and all the other Easter hymns we sing at my church back home.
Waking up Easter morning was a bit strange. There was about a half inch of snow on the ground! Not kidding when I say we kept joking and saying Merry Christmas to each other. J We ate a typical German breakfast (the eggs we dyed the day before on bread) and then headed out to Kassel, Hessen, for Marlene’s baptism (Taufe). The baptism took place after the actual Gottesdienst (service) and lasted for about another good hour or so.
It was really neat to see how the German Catholics do baptisms. Pretty sure they are similar to the ones in the US, but I am not Catholic, so I can’t really say. After the baptism, it was time to party! We all rode caravan-style to a restaurant on the Fulda River in Kassel and were able to enjoy a wonderful meal. Afterward, we ventured out in the cold (1°C) to the house of Marlene’s parents, Barbara and Torsten for some sweets. There were so many cakes and cookies it was really hard to eat them all, but we attempted it and passed with flying colors I’m pretty sure.
Monday we came back to Jena where it had also snowed. Best part of Easter? The fact that it has only snowed here about twice this entire year: Christmas and Easter. Odd? Just a little cold. Happy Easter all!! He is Risen!! Alleluia!!