Easter Coffee and Cakes

I just recently wrote about how European I was turning and how I had officially embraced the culture and lifestyle over here... enjoying afternoon coffees with cake, loving sparkling water and even dressing the European part…In reality, it took me less than a weekend with a true European family to realize that I was in fact mistaken... I am not European, but rather just more European than my American counterparts, which doesn't say a lot.

With our crazy schedules and remaining days numbers, Martin and I decided to forgo an Easter holiday in a random destination and instead spend the weekend relaxing with his family in Germany. In hind sight, I think a weekend in Egypt would have been less stressful than meeting the German parents, grandma, aunt, uncles, cousins and family cats for the first time.

The weekend started out great with tennis on Friday with his sister and her boyfriend, followed by afternoon coffee with the parents and grandma. The mom even served two homemade cakes and brought out the porcelain tea set and silver for the occasion, which I thought was the sweetest thing as it reminded me of the tea parties I used to throw as a child. I, of course, dressed the part in a cardigan and ballerina flats. The conversations and my energy level began to drop by the time dinner rolled around, and with my limited conversational German skills exhausted, I reverted to sitting quietly, enjoying my food, smiling on occasion and finding an ally in Grandma, whose limited hearing prevented her from participating in the conversations as well.

On Saturday I got a small break from the action as Martin and I borrowed the family car, a BMW of course, hit the autobahn, and drove to Weimar, an old East Germany town where Martin study architecture. The quaint town, with its famous architecture and historical sites was a nice reprieve from the weekend and surprisingly reminded me of a European version of my own college town.

However, after Easter brunch in Weimar, we headed back to Dortmund for Easter dinner with the extended family and my anxiety was back at high alert… But before the arrival of the whole family, we enjoyed another afternoon coffee with the parents and sister, again served in the porcelain tea set and with yet another home made cake and me again in another cardigan and flats. Not wanting to be rude I enjoyed both the cake and coffee, however, the overload of sugar was starting to give me the shakes, and wired with coffee, my child hood tea party was quickly turning against me. Two days of the true European lifestyle and I was slowly falling apart...my fabulous European haircut was starting to look less chic and more shaggy dog, my feet were starting to stink from the cheap leather shoes, I desperately wanted a glass of still water, a bowl of fruit and something salty and all I could think about was the comforts of a plain white wife beater and elastic waist pants, rather than the cardigan and jeans I was stuck with. I clearly did not fit in...

Despite all of my short-comings, Easter dinner turned out great, and I was able to meet most of his extended family and hear some great stories about Martin. And in case I hadn't already gotten my fill of the European life, we wrapped up the weekend on Monday, not with lunch as most people do before heading on their way, but with more cake and coffee Thankfully Martin’s mom packed us salami sandwiches and sticks of sausage for the train ride home.