Gypsy Woman

Well, it is my last night in Altona for now…the part of Hamburg where I have been visiting.  That is unless something unexpected happens or shifts.  I feel a lightness in the transition and gently spent the day with the town. It’s been a really nice day.  Nothing spectacular or anything.  I’ve been keeping pretty quiet the past few days… to myself. But I find as I am at ‘home’ relaxing into the day… whatever it is… it’s okay….

I went to a yoga class this morning.  It was my first yoga class since I departed for Europe.  Sure I have done some yoga on my own… keeping my body from getting locked in some unnatural position… but there is something about a lead class.  The class I went to today was a Kundalini yoga class.  It was just a bike ride away from the flat where I stay and a friend have given me a postcard that offered a discount on the class. It was comforting to find, like so many other practices, that no matter where you are in the world there are some common things to come ‘home’ to… yogi tea, traditional chants used in Kundalini yoga, and even singing of the ‘longtime sun’ song, in English.  I first learned this song in Austin, Tx where I first tried Kundalini yoga after evacuating from Hurricane Katrina. Happily, the yoga instructor was very easy with English and while I could mostly follow through watching her, it was nice to receive a little instruction here and there in the English language.

And the rest of the day has been… just kind of relaxed. It almost feels like summer today.  The sky is blue and I even wore a tank top… with a sweater tied around my waist for when it gets chilly… but still a tank top!…  And this afternoon I just nested…  curled up on the couch and watched Bridget Jones Diary on the flat screen tv in the flat… and ate bread and butter.  And then after, went for a stroll along the river.  It was like heaven.  Having time to be on my own and being out and still feeling connected with my surroundings, the city, the children laughing outside in the playground.

And it’s all… really okay.  I feel like I have settled into my bones a little bit today.  Relaxed more deeply into my experience of being in Germany.  And next… back to Wettenbostel.  Likely I will take the train tomorrow.  And my lovely flat hosts come home tonight late in the night.

Tags: Travel

It was time to go back to Wettenbostel… for the weekend.  There was a wedding at the seminar house and I offered to come in from Hamburg to help out. I met up in Hamburg with a Reiki Master who was also helping out for the weekend and we traveled to Wettenbostel in her Mercedes mobile home. She lives part-time in a town by the sea called Büsom and we laughed as I practiced pronouncing it, the sounds feeling foreign in my mouth.

The trip there was easy and fluid.  We arrived to friendliness and hugs and a pristine silence as there was a silent yoga retreat at the seminar house.  Warm greetings welcoming us back were offered in hushed voices.  The seminar house was booked solid for the retreat, so I found my night’s sleep in the not yet renovated kitchen in the large Dojo with a mattress and comfy down cover and pillow on top of a wooden table for my bed.  Despite my rough surroundings, it felt good to be back.

The next morning, the visiting yogis were talking once again and it was time for us to get to work.  We began cleaning rooms in preparation for the wedding guests to arrive on Saturday.  I received a facebook message from a friend in Hamburg and I commented that Wettenbostel was a world away from Hamburg!…  Saturday was a busy full day of cleaning and preparing for the wedding.  The semi-prepared menu emmerged in unexpected ways as the mushrooms, and eggplants and other items filling up the kitchen came together in a wedding feast.  We cooked and served and cleaned until late that night.  About 10:30 (22:30 I should say…) my kind American friend gave me liberation to retreat to my room as he stayed and finished cleaning up the kitchen… the kitchen that… all day seemed like no matter how much you cleaned it, it was still dirty…

Sunday we were pretty tired from the intensity of the Saturday.  Breakfast was served to our wedding guests and then we relaxed a bit until mid-afternoon – time to returned to Hamburg.  Then… ahhh… an evening of rest and relaxation in the peace of the flat.   I woke up the next morning grateful to be in Hamburg but also relaxed and somehow restored from my weekend of work in Wettenbostel.

And this week my time in Hamburg comes to a close.  I am still tousled on the inside from my weekend of moving and shaking and some chaos at the wedding… wondering where things will shake out for me…  Is there some other interesting and inviting opportunity to unfold for me?

And yet what is there for me now is… being grateful.  Being grateful for the time I have had in Hamburg… the connections, the people I have met and who have extended themselves to me.  The generous opportunity to stay in this flat and have a beautiful bicycle to ride!…  And the goodness of having some place to return to with a warm comfortable bed, gardens and natural surrounding.

And for now I have some time to myself.  My mind and my body have been doing a little wrestling with one another..but I am in Hamburg for a few more days and then a train ride back to Wettenbostel.  Ah… just relax… relax and trust.

Tags: Travel

It is another day in Hamburg.  The sky is a little gray and I am spending time in the quietness of the apartment… torn between appreciating the quietness of the day and wondering if there is something else I should do.  Fresh groceries were delivered this morning.  With my growing wisdom I buzzed them in from the comfort of the fourth floor flat… rather than running all the way downstairs to let them in.  My marginal faith in my ability to successfully buzz… I listen in bed.. did they make it in?  Did they?  I don’t hear them… and then happily seeing not long after a box of fresh veggies, safely delivered by the door.  This week new deliveries… glad to see some new vegetables.  Fava beans, what looks like arugula, fresh lettuce, tomatoes, carrots and more.  And of course fresh eggs and bread. My extrovert and introvert are wrestling with the lack of activity in the day as I find that I am keeping to myself with the possibility of heading off to Wettenbostel tonight.

And I am finding, I am noticing, that when one is on a journey… while it can be interesting to consider what is next, what is the future… it is best to just take it one step at a time.  And today that step could be cleaning and cooking the fava beans and cooking a little lunch. Perhaps a walk later to the river Elbe.  It could be waiting to hear if I will be traveling to Wettenbostel.  No bells and fireworks.  No electricity.  And for today that is okay, although something inside of me wants something to be something else… more or different or… I can’t really say.  My head, my thoughts no matter how much it thinks it cannot stretch and see the future.  I may get an instinct, an urge and inspiration… but for today it may just be fava beans.  Fava beans and perhaps a little salad on the side.

Tags: Travel

The title of the post today is a new day.  I call it that simply because in this moment that is how it feels… like a new day.  Perhaps some sweeping away of the old, or simply just a freshness in the now… in the present….

I have just returned from an SGI Buddhism meeting with what now contains some familiar faces.  I am feeling like less of an American voyeur in my German SGI group.  When I show up I smile and giggle with some of the members… sort of an appreciation of knowing or recognizing each other even though we cannot communicate much with our words.  It is nice to feel the warmth and connectedness in the meeting and seeing these faces, feeling more related and relaxed.

Tonight was a discussion meeting… so we chanted first and then there was a conversation.  Someone was kind enough to translate the discussion for me so I had a basic understanding of what was being said… and the topic tonight was on the Master/Student relationship in Buddhism… or in German, Meister….  And it was discussed that Germans have a problem with this type of relationship because of its history.  But others shared shaping the nuances of that relationship… the most poignant of which offered the example of a student of a master chef.  The student does not just follow instructions of the master, but learns from them and then ultimately expresses what they have learned from the master with their own essence, their own touch… although impacted and influenced by the master.  After discussion, we ate some fruit and cookies and then headed home.

So now I am at home eating some late night muesli… or late night for me… it’s after 10:30pm…  I may connect tomorrow with my friends in Wettensbostel to return there for the weekend to help out with a wedding being held there.  Still waiting to hear.  In the meantime it is muesli and then a good night sleep for me!

Tags: Travel

It’s kind of a funny thing to talk about being rooted… when one has lost nearly all of their personal belongings… twice and is currently living out of an average size red suitcase with wheels… but still maintains a modest, closet-size storage space outside New Orleans… But rooted is what presents itself to me… today.

And speaking of roots, the German word I learned this week (who is counting… and how many words left to learn…?) is unkraut.  Kind of like Sauerkraut… except not. Unkraut means weeds.  Kraut means herb or plant… add the “un” and it is saying “that is not a plant” … or something along those lines…  Of course what is unkraut is subjective… One man’s weed is another man’s feast.  When tending the garden at the seminar house in Wettenbostel, the weeds I look out for the most are called stinging nettles.  They grow like wildfire, are very lightly rooted so easy to pull out and if they touch your skin it hurts and you get a red prickly rash in that area.  But, not to worry… I am told the sting is good for you… medicinal in some way.  However, this same unkraut, the nettle,  to a new friend I met this weekend is, well, I guess “kraut”.  He loves the stinging nettle.  Says it is filled with vitamins and blends them up in his vitamix in the morning with fresh fruit for breakfast…

Well my American visitors from New Orleans have left today on their way to Berlin, just the next step in their unfolding exploration of the planet… route and plan determined as it goes….  and I too have a taste and wondering of what might be next for me.  Being in Hamburg has built my curiosity to explore other areas, but I also look forward to returning to the quiet and new-found familiarity of friends and place in Wettenbostel.  For now my pocketbook and my instincts remind me to keep it simple… even when my mind, fears or ambitions are scattered with ideas.

And…I have found so much joy in keeping it simple!  Just this past Saturday I went with a new Hamburg friend on a bicycle ride up the river Elbe settling in on the beach.  A rare sunny almost summer like day in Hamburg.  And this day my naïve American self gets introduced to the easy nakedness of Europe as the beach is dotted with casual naked bodies – young and old… some at ease in conversation like they were talking to a neighbor while checking the mail.  And others standing strong and proud like a peacock.  I try to be relaxed and at ease with the unfamiliar nakedness… Later that day I was treated to a home cooked meal of fresh German potatoes with Cauliflower cooked up with a little green onion and a light cheese sauce… salad on the side.  It was yummy and felt good to my heart.  I love being fed.

Sunday morning I joined my New Orleans visitors as they went to the local fish market.  We left the house at 6:30 am… a time my body has not willingly seen in … a very long time… and we soon found ourselves down by the river in a sea of people, fresh produce and fish, and even beer and a band playing 80s rock cover songs.  We were there early enough to see the night crowd spilling into the morning as well as the fresh early morning faces, dancing among the tables and beer.  I ate a fish sandwich for breakfast and greeted the morning scene with curiosity and… hesitation.

Later that day I met a friend of a friend for coffee.  Having been an introvert for so long, sometimes it takes all of my courage to leap out of the flat and meet new faces…pushing myself out the door like when I was 15 and my mother had to force me out of the car to meet a boy on a first date.   But I go and connect and we have much in common – reiki, Buddhism, love of the outdoors.  He has recently left Hamburg and moved to a small town to live simply on the land, which of course I could relate to.  He also eats stinging nettles….

And where am I today… well in my temporary space in Hamburg shortly to return to Wettensbostel for the weekend to help out with a wedding event… and wondering what is next or what else is out there… not knowing how it will unfold and in all of that strangely… rooted.  Not rooted in this or that or anything in particular… but rooted in me.  Like a seed has grown within me and sprouted wings.  Oh sure I still feel a bit neurotic.  Am more moody than I wish to let others see… but just today and a little bit last week I noticed something new in me…. it was…happiness…  And I found it…odd… So this is happiness… a little “kraut” growing in me.  Taking root… without expectations…

Tags: Travel

It has been a few days since I have been able to tend to my blog.  Water it and tell it hello, say positive things to it so it will grow. A challenge of having interesting times and experiences is actually having the time to capture them, share a view and an experience.  These past few days have been filled with Buddhists meetings, making connections and Reiki Treatments.  And yesterday friends from New Orleans came to Hamburg to stay and visit for a few days bringing a piece of comfort and home to Altona with them.  So I am full.  Satisfied.

Loslassen is my German word for the day although I find even as I type the word it seems to drift away from my mind, memory and lips.  Perhaps that is the very nature of this word as it means “let it go”…I grabbed this word at a local SGI Buddhist meeting I went to a few nights ago.  Put it in my pocket and took it with me.  So refreshing to hear and always a useful reminder!  This meeting took me to someone’s private home just behind the Altona train station.  It was a group of all women gathered in a pretty soft room with magical containers of sparkling lemon water, tea and crackers.  The quieter softer energy of their collected chanting nurtured me and treated me like a friend. Afterwards I received the gift of their company over tea for me and wine and beer for them at a local cafe.  We talked of horoscopes and yoga, cats and gardens, and it was fun. Fun to be and connect and spend time with other women.

And then recently I connected with a Reiki Master who lives in Hamburg.  We escaped to her flat in the suburbs of Hamburg and I took refuge in the spaciousness of her place.  We met for a Reiki exchange and I spent the night.  The next day we had some time to walk around her neighborhood – an integration of suburban shopping and old homes and fields and paths in the woods.

A gift of our meeting was hearing and learning more about her Reiki teacher, Phyllis Lei Furumoto.  For those of you who don’t practice Reiki, Phyllis is the Grand Master of the traditional Usui System of Reiki.  Phyllis’ grandmother Hawayo Takata was the Japanese American woman who brought the teaching of Reiki to the United States. There are many systems of Reiki in the United States and in the World.  The traditional system seeks to maintain the integrity of the practice as brought to United States from Japan by Takata.

I learned that Phyllis has her own internet radio talk show called Reiki Balancing Form and Essence.  We listened to a segment and I got to hear the warm but powerful and soothing voice of Phyllis and be reminded and guided in the practice of Reiki.  In her show she interviews Reiki Masters all over the world, many of whom I knew and recognized.

And for now… there is a moment of time.  Time and space and a quietness moving through the air as the sounds of construction assemble themselves in the background outside my flat.  The air is cool today and I have not seen the sun.  But for now I am content…giving way to the comfort and solemness of the soft lazy day.

Tags: Travel

This morning my computer beeped at me from the other room, letting me know a friend was chatting with me on Facebook.  Happily it was my new friend in Altona inviting me to meet him and his daughter at the local market.  We made arrangements to meet, I washed off my morning face and headed on my bicycle to meet him. He is a new member to a co-op here in Hamburg. While he picked out his fresh veggies and dairy for the week, I got a chance to chat a little bit with the owner of the farm, Kattendorfer Hof.

First a little German lesson… Kattendorfer, that is the name of the farm, and hof according to google translate means court.  Okay, next I was excited because I got to learn a little bit about his farm.  They are an organic farm just North of Hamburg and they practice a method of farming that in Germany is called demeter, known in the United States as biodynamics.  As he described, demeter pays attention to the farm as a whole and how all things are interconnected which gives the food and the farm a sense of quality and balance.  So they make and grow everything!  They grow their vegetables organically, the raise their own animals and sell milk, cheese and meat products and they even grow their own grain which  they sell to a local baker who bakes the bread!  Fabulous.  Biodynamics is more complicated than this, but when following this method, my new farmer friend says, the food just tastes better.  He says his customers say there is just something about his food that is different from the others.

We talked a little bit about the co-op and how the farm sells its food. In the States it’s called CSA, community supported agriculture.  In German it is Wirthschaftsgemeinschaft…. ugh… for now I will stick with CSA… at any rate, the way this works is the farm, in this case Kattendorfer Hof, creates a budget for the year of their expenses including costs and salaries for workers… essentially how much they will need to run the farm.  At the beginning of the year, they divide that budget up monthly and pass that cost on to their co-op members as shares.  So the co-op is paying not for the food, but for the cost, the expense up front of running the farm.  Then every week the farm brings fresh food to drop off points for the co-op members to pick up.  For the purchase of a share, co-op members have a general agreement of how much food they get a week.  Kattendorfer Hof is pretty relaxed about this and doesn’t weigh the food. The members come and choose from the abundance of what is there and take what they need while still leaving plenty for the other members.  It’s a win/win for everyone!… The farm and the farmer is well supported and the customers get wonderful fresh food every week at an affordable price.  At Kattendorfer Hof, co-op members pay 165€ a month and they get fresh meat, cheese, milk, yogurt and vegetables.  And plenty of vegetables!  Right now they are growing carrots, cauliflower, zucchini, sugar beets, lettuce, potatoes, green onions, leeks, broccoli!… The farm is very happy with this arrangement and are getting 60% of their business through CSA… the other 40 at local markets.  But they are expanding and would like to be 100% Community Supported Agriculture!

I thought this was such a delight, I wanted to share it.  Almost like a small miracle.  One of the few things in this world that actually makes sense!  Mmmm.. yummy fresh food!

Tags: Travel