I thought I'd keep this blog realtime and chronological, but I'm going to have to let go of that idea for sure. Today is Saturday July 8th, more than three weeks in, and we are in St. Malo, France, but I'm still writing about our first few days of this long trip when we were still in Hannover, Germany. The social media feed is closer to realtime, though usually a couple days behind too. It's nice to come here and share the longer thoughts, though, at the very least to supplement my memory for later.
Sunday after our trip to the castle - a phrase I haven't used much in life but I will end up using a lot on this trip - we enjoyed dinner with the whole family, joined by Hartmut and Martina's children, Rosalie and Elias, two young adults as charming, intelligent, and friendly as their parents.
It was Hartmut's birthday and it was also Spargelzeit - white asparagus time - a very exciting harvest moment in Germany, so dinner centered around these enormous, velvety smooth white asparagus stalks, served with potatoes, cured ham, and a light hollandaise sauce. I was so excited to eat it I forgot to photograph it, but trust me, it's a sight to behold, and delicious. I loved hearing everyone gleefully say, "Spargel" again and again, as it sounds a little like shparrgle, or like someone trying to say "sparkle" while gargling champagne. Here's a link to all you might like to know about the German love of fat white asparagus.
After dinner, Hartmut, Rosalie, and Elias, snuck down to the basement to "prepare a surprise."
About half an hour later we were invited downstairs to discover Hartmut's music studio, outfitted with instruments, microphones, and swirling colored lights. To our great and happy surprise, they invited us to listen to a concert they had prepared for us. I had been told Hartmut was really into music, and I'd noticed musical instruments here and there all around the apartment, but I had no idea that he and his kids had formed a band.
They were wonderful - truly, not just like, "Oh, how sweet," - they were REALLY GOOD. We enjoyed several cover songs, both American and German, old and new, plus one original song by Rosalie she's written for another band that she's in. Photos and video, for your enjoyment, below. You can see a super cool painting of the band behind them. They haven't played professionally enough to have bothered coming up with a band name, but they played a while back at an outdoor concert and were surprised to see in the promotional poster they had been named after their family name "Die Schlegls," which is a pretty cute name.
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| Here they are playing "Blackbird" by the Beatles and Elias is holding up this nifty thing that makes the sound of a bird singing, just like in the original song. |
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| Hartmut seems as proud as a father can be of his talented, thoughtful kids. |
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| Rosalie is a wonderful vocalist with a magical stage presence. |
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| At Martina's request, Elias played an old love ballad that Elias first played when he was 12. |
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