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September 2008
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Toll Herbst

This is the first of three weekends where I am taking exciting trips to lands more distant an hour from Weimar.

Tomorrow I head up to Bremen for the Fourth Annual Whiney Expatriate Blogger Meet-Up. It’s not too late to join in; if you’re interested you should check out Germany Doesn’t Suck for more details.

Next weekend I’ll be going to the Technical Museums with Kyiv’s Katya—she’s in the country for a week and it seems like a good way to celebrate German Re-Unification Day. The following weekend I’ll be in the UK (my first time in over 18 months!) visiting Bristol and Cheltenham—although I am headed to Cheltenham for work related business, by happy, and completely accidental coincidence, a literary festival will be in full swing, giving me the opportunity to hear some really interesting people talk about their works. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get tickets to everything I wanted to see, but I am quite pleased with the tickets I got.

After I get back from Bristol, I don’t have any trips planned for nearly a month. As currently scheduled, it will be after the US elections before I leave Weimar and its environs again. There is a slight chance that I might pop out of the country for an event, but the current odds for that are something like 20% and I’m not certain I want to increase the odds; I might even try and lower the odds, even though the trip would add one or two new countries to my list of visited nations.

Unfortunately I’ll be missing this year’s Zwiebelmarkt (Onion Market), and, quite frankly, I am a bit surprised that I just wrote “unfortunately”. Zwiebelkuchen (Onion Cake) with Federweißen (fresh wine) is not really my forte, even if I do like Federweißen by itself. I am also not especially a fan of the intensely crowded streets that come standard with each year’s Onion Market—Schillerstraße gets so crowded that it looks more like my imagined New Delhi than like anywhere I’ve ever been, even New York. It can be, at times, more tightly packed than Times Square on New Year’s Eve. I guess I’ll miss seeing the new ways in which Onions are sold to unsuspecting tourists.

So far the worst thing about this fall, which got an early start, is what feels like an exceptionally dark and rainy season. I realize that it is want to be that way, but my memory of past falls suggest that some kind of Indian Summer occurs around Zwiebelmarkt time—that one can expect bright and sunny days for the market. I suppose that Zwiebelmarkt isn’t for two weeks, so I am anticipating the event, but the recent bouts of cloudy and rainy weather are a bit on the depressing side. So is, I might add, the earth’s tilt. Even though it’s actually no different from last year, I feel like the sun is coming up later and going down earlier than it did in previous years. Unfortunately for my mental health, for the moment perception is reality.

Fortunately tomorrow I get to be in the good company expats who will lift my spirits.

4 comments to Toll Herbst

  • J

    I totally agree with you. I’m under a massive amount of stress and getting away this weekend is very much needed. Even better that it’ll be with a bunch of smiling and friendly expats.

  • I wish Hungary has something like that. I’d love to meet fellow expats. I just wrote an article about why they are so awesome…I linked to it above if you want to check it out.

  • Looking forward to meeting you!

  • @J: It’s a stressful time of year, no doubt. I’m happy to say I’ve made progress digging myself out of some holes!

    @NewWrldYankee: It should be possible to make a network in Hungary; there has to be a large number of expats…

    @Diane: I’m looking forward to meeting you, other bloggers I haven’t met, as well as renewing other friendships. It’s going to be a great weekend!