Handball

Wednesday I will be skipping German class to go to the Handball World Championship tournament at the Sparkasse Arena in Kiel. I cannot contain my excitement. Those of you who know me are aware that I´ve never been a serious sports spectator (though I sometimes have a weakness for minor league baseball and KU basketball), but this is going to be an awesome event. I´ve heard that Kiel has the best professional handball team in Europe, and they are expected to win this Wednesday. I was really lucky to get the tickets. My friend Anna´s host dad somehow managed to get the last three for sale, and gave them to Anna, Nanna, and myself. Amazing! I think I´m mostly excited because handball is so HUGE here in Germany - especially in Kiel. So I feel like by attending this event, somehow I´ll be taking part in something that is very important to the culture in my region. Both Paul Luis and Emma Sophie are on kids´ handball teams, and I´ve watched a few of their practices and weekend matches, but I have a feeling this will be nothing in preparation for Wednesday! I´m interested to see what the crowd energy and dynamics will be like, in comparison to American spectator sport events. It will be intense.

I promise to give a less superficial post sometime soon. But right now I just have to express my elation for handball. Send happy energies to Kiel! I fully expect them to win for me. :)

A Bike´s Lament

I finally feel up to writing again. It took much longer to recover from my nova virus than I expected. I basically slept for 3 days and nights, and just ate my first "real" meal today, which didn´t involve pretzel sticks and Coke. Tomorrow I´ll be back to work again. I´m actually kind of anxious to get back to work again - simply to get out of the garden house ad move around a bit! The cabin fever is setting in... :) Thanks to everyone for your good wishes this week!

Here is my promised Sunday bike story. It was such an adventure for me. If I had known what I´d encounter in advance, my logical side never would have let me leave the house - but I´m so glad I did!

The sky was bright and clear and blue, so I decided to take out my bike for a spin. I found an awesome new country route south of Bordesholm and Wattenbek a couple weeks ago, and was excited to explore it again. After about 12 km, I was pleasantly enjoying myself until I noticed a wind shift and saw a dark cloud move in. I stopped to watch for a minute, and soon realized it was snowing! There was a break in the tree line about 100 meters away, and it looked like a blizzard blowing in behind it! I took a photo, which didn´t really give the moment justice but still provokes my memory of that moment. I watched the snow move across the trees toward me, but my flight response didn´t kick in until I was pelted by painful little snow-ice pellets. I turned by bike around and remembered a little hut with a bench near a farm in a village that I just passed through. Sure enough, I found it and took shelter. Fortunately I brought along a sketch pad and pencils, so I sat and drew a few barns and trees until the storm passed. Soon enough the sun was out and shining again, so I decided to continue my planned tour instead of heading back home. The next 5 km or so were really beautiful, without a cloud in sight. I even stopped on a quiet little road for about half an hour to practice my "step on left pedal with left foot, kick off, swing right leg over back to the right pedal while taking off" technique. I´ve always wanted to be able to do this smoothly, and people in Germany are amazing at making things like this look natural (probably because they really are). But somehow I never had the right balance or confidence to pull it off. I´m still not completely there, but am much improved! :) As I was amusing myself with practicing bike tricks, I noticed another cloud shift. Sure enough, I was being pelted again by snow and ice. This time my nearest shelter was the forest. So I parked my bike under a tree and took a wander into the thicker part of the woods. On my way, I walked past some strange green boxes with little drawers and holes, weighted with rocks on top. I think they were honey-bee crates, and REALLY wanted to open a drawer to find out. But my fear of death by bee-sting alone in the woods won me over, and I went on my way. This storm only lasted about 15 minutes before the sun was out again. I decided it was a sign for me to make the loop back home again. I´d try to go further next time, but the forces of nature were definitely against me this day. Of course after just a few minutes yet another snowstorm blew in!! This time fortune was with me, as I happened to just be passing the old farm again with a hut! So I stopped in the shelter and took out the sketchbook again. A girl on a blanketed horse passed by - the same one I remembered from earlier. She probably thought I was crazy, but at least I wouldn´t get sick. This storm took much longer to pass - nearly 40 minutes, and the ride back to Bordesholm was much more difficult as the winds stayed strong and my back tire started to deflate... I even had to work hard pedaling downhill, the wind was so strong. What should have been less than a 1 hour bike tour turned into nearly 4 hours! I came back to the garden house flushed and exhausted, but jubilant and alive. It was by far the best bike experience of my year. Though I´ll admit that I´m ready for that spring sunshine...

Well now, I should go to bed. I must have energy for my first day back at work again tomorrow!

Photos

I finally caught up with uploading new photos onto my flickr.com account. There are new photos in the January, Hamburg, and Winter sets. There is a epic story of adventure about my bike ride during the end of the January album, but that will need to come another day. I am very ill right now, and fear my story-telling abilities will not be very colorful...

Enjoy!