Christmas in Germany

I arrived at the Bed and Breakfast Karlsruhe the day before Christmas Eve. Nava, the owner, was very welcoming and accommodating. Her belief in running this place like a family really made it homey. On Christmas Eve, Marianna (from Bulgaria and working at the B&B) made a Bulgarian bread for all the guests (including 4 exchange students from India) on the floor for an afternoon snack. The bread was layered with sheets of phyllo and stuffed with cheese. Inside each cut piece was a little gift - a paper with a fortune written on special baking paper and tied with a red string. The fortune tells you what you will have this year. You have to eat the bread to find your fortune. Hopefully you don't swallow it before knowing what it is!

After the wonderful snack, I headed off on the train to Bühl to attend my first Christmas mass at Pfarrämter Heilig Blut that also happens to be in, of course, German. I have been raised in Catholic schools in Edmonton and the mass (Christian) was very similar to the masses I've attended before. The only exception was that the context of the whole mass was about Christmas and celebrating it with family and friends. Although I did not understand the mass (getting some words here and there), I did manage to sing Silent Night in English while everyone sang in German. I guess I felt like it was my contribution :) It was nice to experience Christmas mass and I thank the Meier family for inviting me.

After the Christmas mass and wishing people a very Merry Christmas, we headed back for our Christmas dinner. This was a special dinner as the Meiers decided to have me experience dinner using something called a raclette. After mass, people want a simple dinner to come home to and dinner with a raclette does just that. Originally it is from the French living in Switzerland, but have been adopted by the Germans. It is named after the cheese with the same name and is basically an electrical heater/grill to melt the cheese with meat (or anything you would like) and then "scraped" onto boiled/cooked potatoes. You use a small pan to put the food in and stick it in the molded area for it in the raclette. We used cheese, different slices of meat including ham from the Black Forest, baby corn cobs from a jar, slices of red pepper and mushrooms. It was delicious, easy and fun. It reminded me of hot pot or fondue. When I first saw it on the middle of the table, I thought it was hot pot! After dinner, it was time for "Bescherung," which is basically gift exchange though it was very cute that Thorsten's mom said Santa came :) And it was very wonderful of them to get me of gift - Kleidung! So now I have a long sleeve shirt and a matching tank top in XS! I was excited as earlier, Thorsten and I were discussing about clothes sizes in Canada and Germany and I was curious if the XS sizes would even fit me. I guess I will know now :)

It was a nice Christmas and I learnt much including new words in German as the wine helped me become more uninhibited of using German with his parents (I think vice versa as well ;)

I hope you all had a joyous Christmas!

A few photos from the album - Christmas in Bühl.