GERMAN RULES, GERMAN FLATBREAD
It was foggy this morning so we started late. We went out for breakfast of Brotchen and scrambled eggs and coffee. The day before we downloaded the Luca App and were certified by a pharmacy that we had been properly vaccinated (three times each). Without the Luca App we have to fill out an extensive form for every restaurant we sit down in including address, phone number, email address and when we enter the restaurant and when we leave it.
With the Luca app all we have to do is to point our iPhone camera at the checkerboard square at the entrance to the restaurant and the restaurant and time we enter will appear and the app will convey all of our personal information to some central location on line which will include when we enter and leave the restaurant. Finally I realized what was going on. If we came down with Covid the Luca app would not only give a record of every restaurant we had entered and unmasked in, but would also be able to match this with everyone else who was in each of these restaurants at the same time as us who might have been exposed. Big brother had his eye on us. Every other table was blocked off to give distance, everyone in the line stayed six feet apart, and a sign said that we could only take off our mask when eating and as soon as we stood up we had to put it on again.
Germany has rule after rule, written and unwritten, and all of them are both obeyed and enforced. We’ve been honked at for crossing the street in the middle of the block, hissed at for wandering into the bicycle lane, been very careful about the speed limits, been very careful with our mask wearing and received angry looks for stepping too close to someone in the grocery lane. And in spite of all of this the Covid infection rate is rising again in Germany. Again, we feel safer here than in Madison County and wonder if it is safe for us to ever return home.
Across the street from the restaurant was a large vending machine where we could get eggs in different numbers, sacks of potatoes of various sizes, wurst in cans and glass jars of home made pickles. We had tried it the night before, put in our 5 euros and nothing came out. We had done it wrong. Even the simplest things in Germany are done differently and we make mistake after mistake. Today we got our 5 euros back, no questions asked, and filled a bag with items straight from a farm at the edge of town where the chickens live in a solar hen house that is moved around a meadow.
In the afternoon we walked through Winsen to an outdoor museum of restored farm houses and barns and other rural buildings, all brought here for protection and lovingly preserved.
In one of the buildings is the Kalandhof,
a country cafe in a restored building serving Kuchen and Kaffee as well as paper thin, crisp, wood fire baked flatbread the size of pizzas with delicate toppings.
There is an old folks home nearby and a number of visiting families brought their elderly relatives to the Kalandhof.
We left at 4:30 just as it was getting dark and walked back to our apartment past glowing windows into a pink sunset,
stopping at Nebenan, a church coffee shop for a cup of tea and Kuchen.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 