20-26 December 2010

Apart from the afternoon ski, we had a very traditional English Christmas just the way we like it, with family, crackers (budget ones with the same joke in each), stockings, mince pies, and Queen's speech.

13-19 December 2010

We have a new home. So do 27 other families, couples and singles, and we all moved in on the same day. One lift and 67 steps to our apartment on the third floor. Demands on the lift exceeded its capability and we really got to know each of those steps. It is customary to take your entire kitchen with you when you move, so as well as the new inhabitants there were a large of amount of kitchen fitters squeezing through the doors, each with their own vans. To add a little more stress to the whole scenario, there is no such thing as a removal firm. Of course, you just ask your brother/uncle/cousin who has a farm and a trailer. We are lacking in the family farmers department but our good neighbours were aware of that and we were overwhelmed by offers of help, some from people we had never met before. We managed with a posse of ski instructors and 2 lads with a lorry who, when they had finished helping their own friends at 10.00pm, came and moved our stuff for us. Pizzas and beer all round and everyone was happy - a veritable barn raising experience.

6-12 December 2010

In this week, a week when we are surrounded by huge packing boxes before we move to our new apartment, another huge box arrived, Caspar's new accordion, paid for with his own hard-earned money from playing to the Oberammegau guests in the Summer. It is too heavy for him to carry and too loud for us to be able to get on with our new neighbours, but he is very happy.

29 November - 5 December 2010

Maria Alm has two banks which vie for profile by sponsoring anything that moves, paying for the bus on school outings, providing free accident insurance for every child and throwing sweets and gifts at the children when they so much as step through the door. The tradition of the 'Sparverein' (savings clubs), began before there was a bank in the village, and thrifty villagers would each have a little box in a local guesthouse to put their small change into to save up for Christmas. During this week, once a year, the boxes are opened and much of the years savings are liquidated in a big booze up. The boxes must be topped up once a fortnight during the year otherwise the savers incur a penalty. Some of the not so conscientious ended up with a considerable debt, but the fondness that Austrians have for clubs seems to override the inefficiency of this saving scheme. Justine had to pay about as much in penalties as she recouped in tombola prizes.

22 - 28 November 2010

As a 10 year old, Caspar is developing more sophisticated tastes and chose to celebrate his birthday at the new spa in Kaprun. A welcome change to the usual visit to McDonalds birthday request, although the choice is just as overwhelming. If you fancy a sauna you can choose Finnish, Bio, Oven, Aroma, Outdoor, Panorama, Herbal or Laconium followed by a plunge into the naked swimming pool.

15 - 21 November 2010

Justine passed her LS1 ski instructors course this week, just. On the bumps course, on a snowboard, freestyling, carving or doing short turns it cannot honestly be said that she earned masses of cred, however everyone was well impressed with her cool crochet skills because crochet is just a free-styley kind of thing don't you know.

8 - 14 November 2010

Last time that Simon took sole responsibility for the children whilst Justine was doing a ski course (see blog Nov 1 2008) it was not uneventful. This time they managed an uneventful 6 whole days before having to visit A&E!

1 - 7 November 2010

Caspar had his first 'Schulearbeit' this week. These are the first important exams in his school career. Good results will give him more options when he chooses which secondary school to attend next year. They are graded from 1 (best result) to 5 (fail). Having got a 1 in his mock maths exam he had hoped to get a 1 again but got a 2 in the real test. According to Caspar that is OK because, as he carefully explained, 1 plus 2 equals 1. To clarify he explained that 2 plus 2 equals 2, but 4 plus 5 equals 4. They seem to teach maths a little differently over here!

25 - 31 October 2010

This week Caspar has particularly enjoyed spending time with his young cousins. On a family walk he was overheard to say, as he led the two boys over a crevasse, "Stay close to me, because if anything happens, I think I'm responsible". They followed him over the crevasse and into the garden with the ferocious dog, back out of the garden with the ferocious dog, and then Hamish fell in the river.

18 - 24 October 2010

We have reached the conclusion that 'the book' that we are always endeavouring to do things by, is an incomprehensible tome. High on a small dose of entrepreneurial spirit we visited the Wirtschaftkammer (Board of Trade) with a modest money making idea, only for the wind to be sucked out of our sails with a bureaucratic vacuum cleaner. Of course we can run a little business which will require us to perform simple tasks such as book a hotel or drive a minibus, but only after the required three years of training and study. It seems that it is not only the French who don't have a word for entrepreneur.

11- 17 October 2010

It can be pretty quiet in Maria Alm at this time of year. Evan and Gemma, visiting for a few days, popped into the tourist office to ask if anything was going on at the weekend, and were possibly not suprised to be told that absolutely nothing was going on at the weekend - and then were again surprised to find out by chance that in fact Maria Alm was hosting a meeting of choirs at the weekend with 800 singing visitors from far and near, some with big hair and fur coats, open air performances, gluhwein, schnapps, associated merchandise. It would not be an exaggeration to say, given that this is just a little village, that something was going on at the weekend. Maria Alm is becoming infamous for the unusual methods of promotion employed at its tourist office. Popping in with a simple question or request is a 'must do' experience for all visitors.

4 - 10 October 2010

A flying visit to England at the weekend for Justine and Simon to attend the wedding of friends Polly and Rufus. When not sitting in traffic on the M25 they enjoyed wonderful company, food and music at Hampton Court Palace where Rufus is organist and the nuptials were celebrated.

27 September - 3 October 2010

The 41st Oberammagau season is over for another 10 years and, after a two year beard and hair cut embargo, the villagers will probably be keen to get new coiffures. After being crucified (and boy was it convincing!) 5 times a week for 20 weeks, in front of 500,000 visitors (tickets at €125 a pop - that should build a village hall or two), Jesus also really needs a holiday, as do the 2000 other villagers who were involved in the production. Although maybe not the hairdressers; following their recent slow period they are looking forward to a boom and have a special offer on - the longer the hair the greater the discount. We said goodbye to our last guests and went to find out what the big deal was. And it really was a big deal.

20 - 26 September 2010

There is no possible way that the farmers are going to lose their cows, now that they are no longer roaming the mountains but in fields in the valleys. Justine would like to suggest, for the sake of her (and the cows) tinnitus symptoms and sanity, that they take their blooming bells off.

13 - 19 September 2010

Elizabeth started school this week. She is in a class of 13. In her first week her biggest anxiety was oversleeping and missing the whole school day. It is, after all, all over by 11.15am. Although we promised we would wake her up, just to be sure she took the egg timer to bed.

6 - 12 September 2010

Simon is still very excited about his voice recognition app and is making use of it with some of his translation work. Justine gets the proof-reading job and was interested to read that "South Tyrol offers challenges for every ability whether skiing, snowboarding or telemarketing. The perfect priest conditions are achieved by means of efficient snow making facilities, spreading a carpet of shite over the mountain."

30 August - 5 September 2010

We got our first taste of winter this week with snow down to 1400 metres and temperatures of 3 degrees in the valley. The farmers rushed to bring the cows down from the mountain tops, two weeks before the official 'alm abtrieb' which takes place on September 18. No doubt the farmers, and the cows, wanted to avoid the experience of three years ago when the cows dangled in harnesses from rescue helicopters after being trapped by avalanches.

23 - 29 August 2010

The six degrees of separation were reduced to one this week when Simon discovered that one of his guests is a work colleague of his first ever love-heart from thirty years ago. Upon learning this, Mary wondered if Justine came next on the roll call of previous girlfriends and was interested to learn that there were a few in between. Simon was then obliged to give details of all past loves as Mary repeatedly asked 'and then who?'. Finally Simon reached Justine - 'and then who?' asked Mary.

16 - 22 August 2010

At his hospital check this week the surgeon was astounded at Simon's remarkable recovery from his back operation. There are a few reasons for his rapid return to health: it could be that both Simon and Justine's Oberammergau groups over the past four weeks, that's 400+ christians, who really must be in God's good books because they've just done a big pilgrimage, are all praying for him; it could also be the healing stone (Aragonit-Calcit gebändert) that he puts in his pants; and the other is the fantastic, devoted, special, unconditional, loving care that Justine gives him, and that she is looking forward to receiving in return when he is completely fit.

9 - 15 August 2010

Simon is very excited about his new voice recognition app for his ipod. He can speak in English or German and it translates his voice into text, almost faultlessly. Justine had a go and in her best German said "I speak such a clear German, of course it will understand me." Which it encouragingly translated as "I stand up, oh, oh, clearly I come out of the lake, no here and now I don't disappear."

2 - 8 August 2010

The children have been away for 2 weeks now and it seems that they are taking the opportunity to reinvent themselves. Caspar's front tooth has been knocked out (again), Mary is telling everyone that she is a vegetarian and Elizabeth is being good!

26 July - 1 August 2010

While Simon was busy in hospital having major surgery, Justine went to England for a little jolly. She found it absolutely essential to get as far away from Maria Alm as possible during 'Schlager Sommer' (three days of the most diabolic music imaginable). She swapped her surroundings for Dartington and three days of the most sublime music imaginable.

19 - 25 July 2010

First week of our blessed and valuable time without children, the first time since we moved here almost three years ago, a time for walking up big mountains, staying out late, going to bed early, etc. and Simon is rushed into hospital with a prolapsed disc. Marvellous!

12 - 18 July 2010

At the weekend our friend Clemens packed up his car with snacks and DVDs, his daughter Katherina and all she would need for a exchange holiday with our friends the Walkers from Bradfield, and we squeezed Caspar, Mary and Elizabeth into the back seat to hitch a ride to England for a 4 week holiday with friends and family, with instructions to behave. It didn't occur to us that it may raise a few eyebrows, his car full of children, three of whom he has no official relationship to, and his return ticket showing that he would be traveling home alone. Once he had persuaded the police that he wasn't intending to sell the children then the journey proceeded without a hitch.

5 - 11 July 2010

Justine is pleased to report that at the end of three whole terms, every one of the children in her recorder group managed to perform a piece at the end of year concert. Some of the pieces even had more than three notes in them!

28 June - 4 July 2010

Following a 'musical activity week' in the local music centre, our children were due to sing in the final concert. Elizabeth had diligently rehearsed and driven us spare singing her songs all day every day. 5 minutes before the performance, however, she announced that she would not be singing. After much persuasion, she disclosed that she had only just got the songs out of her head and if she sang them again they would be back in there and it would take her another week to get them out again. That's called an 'ohrwürm' (ear worm) in German.

21- 27 June 2010

Caspar had his stage debut this week (not counting performances as sheep/king/donkey in various nativity plays). He played the part of the old farmer in the school play 'Der Arme Ritter' (The Poor Knight). It was the director Frau Haid's swan song, she is retiring after 30 years of teaching and directing. At the moment there seems to be no-one willing to take up the mantle and if someone doesn't come forward soon, Simon is wondering if he could squeeze it in.

14 - 20 June 2010

Children the world over get at least one good talking to in their school career about the danger of cars. Caspar's school decided that the best way to teach them is to let them drive one. We are pleased to report that given the usual apparent lack of health and safety regulations, on this occasion it appears that they did a little risk assessment and decided that if they were going to let over-excited 9 year olds drive cars they should close the road and issue a few fluorescent jackets.

7 - 13 June 2010

Just a month until the end of the school year, so the season of outings, ice cream, swimming, walking, anything except that which one would expect school children to be doing in school on a school day, is upon us. Caspar and his class mates went to Salzburg for a 'personal development and social learning' day. In the session entitled 'Social Power (self-defence boxing workshop) - fair play for fair life', the tutor, for the sake of health and safety, demonstrated a few techniques on our only son, punched him on the nose, gave him a nose-bleed and sent him to the medical centre for the rest of the session.

31 May - 6 June 2010

You wouldn't think that a group of, mostly elderly, English church goers, our Oberammergau guests, could cause a stir in Maria Alm, but last Sunday, Holy Communion was celebrated in Maria Alm church by, not just 1, but 2 women priests for the first time in the church's 503 year history. If the Pope knew what was going on in this quiet Catholic corner of the world he would be having kittens!

24 - 30 May 2010

Each week the small world phenomenon can be examined, through general chit-chat, as Justine and Simon find their link through six degrees of separation to their Oberammergau guests. This week, on the occasion of her 40th birthday, Justine was delighted to discover that amongst her first guests were some with only one degree of separation, who have now been promoted to 'no degree' friends!

17 - 23 May 2010

When the dust (of the volcanic type) had finally settled, Simon's first guests arrived, just a couple of days late, and his first week of the routine that we are to follow for the next 20 weeks, began in earnest. Caspar has discovered an appreciative audience for his accordian playing, and that music making can be lucrative, a few cents from each guest and he's on to a tidy little earner. He has never been so motivated at practice time. Simon thinks if all the guests are as nice as his first, we'll have a lovely summer.

10 - 16 May 2010

A visit to England always highlights what we lack in Austria - like bluebells and hedges. A wonderful early birthday tea party for Justine with lovely friends, and we were made aware that, no matter how welcoming our Austrian friends are, our shared history only starts in 2007, and with different cultural backgrounds we are unlikely to find common early experiences and memories. These things strengthen bonds, and nothing more so than the shared experience of bringing up children. As someone once wrote in Justine's autograph book - 'When choosing new friends, remember the old, for new ones are silver and old ones are gold'.

3 - 9 May 2010

'There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven.' Right now is our family season and Austria makes that possible for us. We hope for a future England season, Simon for a bell-ringing season, Justine for a book group season, a living in a nice house with a garden season, a proper job again season. The perfect work life balance is balanced out over a lifetime - trying to have everything, all at once, for all time, can be exhausting. We'll enjoy our satsumas at Christmas and our strawberries in the summer and try and stay in tune with our seasons. 'God has made everything beautiful in its time.'

26 April - 2 May 2010

Six months ago, only a few weeks after we moved in to Fort Knox, Justine lost her door key. This week it emerged from its hibernation in a snow covered gutter and was reunited with Justine by a very nice man who could just about decipher the telephone number on the key ring and recognise the rusty lump of metal as something of importance. Now the snow has all gone we think we may earn a good wage hunting treasure on the pistes.

19 - 25 April 2010

In preparation for our Summer jobs, hosting Oberammergau Passion Play pilgrims here in Maria Alm, we were required to get security clearance to go through to baggage reclaim at Munich airport. In order to go through this sacred sliding door to the other side, we were obliged to travel to Munich to attend a three hour theory session and a one hour practical. We survived and have a shiny certificate to show for it, which is not valid until we provide a CRB check, an apostille, which appears to be official confirmation that the CRB is indeed a CRB, and an officially certified translation of all documents. This involves receiving a form from Thames Valley Police, completing and returning it to Thames Valley Police, receiving it back from Thames Valley Police, sending it to a company in London, who send it to the Foreign Office to be legalised, who then receive it back, who then send it to be officially translated, who then receive it back, who then send it to a solicitor to officially certify the translation, who then receive it back, who then send all documents to us which we then send to Munich. Two months and two hundred pounds later we may have been able to go through that door, but instead we have given up and our guests will have to manage baggage reclaim without us.

12 - 18 April 2010

Piste conditions this week: Snow depth - a few centimetres in shady spots still remain; Poo depth - ankle deep, the farmers have wasted no time in mucking out 5 months worth of cow manure and spraying it all the fields. Forecast for forthcoming weeks: hopefully knee deep in spring flowers.

5 - 11 April 2010

The Ski School took its staff to St Anton at the weekend to support our very own demo team in the National Championships (they came 4th) and as an end of season thank you. It seems they had some difficulty finding the usual standard of accommodation for the ski teachers outing, and we ended up in a very plush 4 star hotel. We had our best day skiing of the whole season and were made very aware of the shortcomings of our own dear ski area which is a teeny weeny molehill in comparison.

29 March - 4 April 2010

Elizabeth is now 6, she is funny, lively, beautiful, clever and kind, but boy can she play up when the whim takes her. Our usual, mostly ineffective, method of discipline is to count to 5 and if the bad behaviour doesn't stop, well, then.... At the end of a birthday which also coincided with Easter Day and our wedding anniversary, and involved obscene amounts of chocolate and sweets, she was up to her usual tricks. Number 5 was reached and the umpteenth chocolate egg was denied her. She was furious at being so unfairly treated - apparently, now she is 6 we must count to 6 before she has to stop being naughty!

22 - 28 March 2010

This week Justine endured the bi-annual public humiliation that is the Maria Alm second hand clothing sale. Under operating theatre light intensity, any item you would like to sell is scrutinised by a panel of prominent mums, the guardians of quality. All familiar faces, which rather than putting you at ease just magnifies the humiliation. With shouts of 'Flecken!' (Stained!), and the crushing blow of the occasional 'Schmutzig!' (Dirty!), about 50% of what Justine had hoped to sell was flung across the hall into the box of stuff deemed only good enough to be sent straight to charity. The rest of it was accepted with a considerable amount of tutting and raised eyebrows on learning that Justine doesn't do ironing. That said, we made as much money as we spent, kitting the kids out for another summer, and ate some very delicious cake.

15 - 21 March 2010

The dawn chorus wakes us at about 6.00am these spring mornings, and amongst the bird song we can hear the whirr of a huge crane, busy building what we hope will be our nest. Work on the long promised new apartment block, to house people who live and work year round in Maria Alm, has finally started and is expected to be finished by December. The spring building frenzy has started all over the village and everything must be finished before next winter, so they start early, work late and build quick. Since it took so long for work to start, we didn't expect it to be so quick to finish, and have committed ourselves in our current accommodation until December 2011. It would suit us if all animals and machines would stop being quite so busy.

8 - 14 March 2010

Until two years ago, houses in Maria Alm were addressed as Dorf (meaning Village) and numbered 1 - 215, the newer the house the greater the number. Absolute chaos navigationally. Most of the houses here are built up around an old farm - extended family members build on nearby plots and small hamlets develop. For navigation purposes, everywhere was described in relation to the farms. Caspar is currently learning, as countless generations of school children before him have done, the Maria Alm equivalent of the London cabbies 'knowledge'. He must know, off by heart, the name, location and family owners of about 30 farms. Now that the village has been conventionally readdressed with street names and house numbers, perhaps it's time the school readdressed the need for such a learning exercise.

1 - 7 March 2010

Elizabeth has a wobbly tooth. Our youngest child has reached the age of decay. Speaking of which, the copious amount of sweets that the children receive every time they so much as sneeze, is taking its toll. When Mary was invited by the dentist to choose her favourite colour from a colour chart, it didn't occur to us that she would end up with a bright blue filling that dazzles whenever she opens her mouth. Thank heavens it will eventually fall out, and we will be so much the wiser for our next dental appointment, and the tooth fairy may or may not visit. According to Mary's perplexed class-mates, she is only meant to visit for the first tooth. Ours must be an English tooth fairy, and unreliable too, since she forgot to visit two nights running and eventually got her act together after tears and a sincerely heartfelt begging letter from Mary.

22 - 28 February 2010

German speakers pronounce the W as a V, and a V as an F, but give them an English word beginning with V and they pronounce it W. Needless to say, we have very much enjoyed vatching the Vinter Olympics from Wancouver especially since we were able to celebrate Austrian and English achievements, and local biathlete Simon Eder, for whom Simon translates a daily blog, won a silver medal.

15 - 21 February 2010

Yoghurt, aubergine, marmoset and whiskey. Translated into, respectively, Icelandic, Chinese, French, and Spanish are all words used to get a smile before taking a photo. We say cheese, the Austrians say spaghetti and the Germans say ant shit - what is that about?!

8 - 14 February 2010

Valentine really put himself out, secretly marrying couples for love and for God, against the orders of Claudius II who thought that single men made better soldiers. He was beaten with clubs and beheaded for his efforts, (although did receive a sainthood so I guess there is a positive side), and despite all this, the anniversary of his execution went unremarked in our household. Chocolate, orchids and tulips were instead gratefully received by Justine from Martina, boss at the Waldhaus restaurant, which slightly sweetened the bitterness of having to serve spooning couples all night.

1 - 7 February 2010

Caspar came a respectable 19 out of 68 in a local ski jumping competition this week. Chances are he is one of very few English junior ski jumpers. Justine tried to find out more and discovered that there is a British ski jump team, but one should be careful not to confuse them with the Czech fishing team of the same name, as this message cut and pasted from their guestbook shows!

"It´s impossible:-D , I am from czech republic and me and my friends had team (fishing team) with it same name ( British Masters Team - BMT ):-D. I don´t belive my eyes:-D. I wish you good luck. BMT 4ever!!!"

25 - 31 January 2010

It appears that the whole of Europe has been buried under snow these past few months, except for a little patch of green with white stripes of man-made snow which was Maria Alm. Until now! The snow has arrived! The moles, who had been having a field day, scattering molehills all over the still soft ground, have finally burrowed deeper down, and Natrun is now smooth and white.

18 - 24 January 2010

Time for the annual Maria Alm night race again. Caspar enters the improbability drive and for the second year running wins the prize draw for a pair of freestyle skis. He hadn't planned an exit strategy for this particular situation, so he accepted them, in bafflement, and then anguished for 3 days before finally deciding to offer them up for a prize draw in the school. He can, after all, only use one pair of skis at a time, and he consequently won favour with a very sweet and pretty girl who was lucky in the draw. A good trade.

11 - 17 January 2010

Mary celebrated her 7th birthday this week. The five girls in the back of the car on the way to the swimming pool party, paired each child in their class with another, 'Christina loves Martin', 'Julia loves Daniel', and so on, clutching their sides in uncontrollable laughter, until they were paired off themselves, then remonstrating fiercely. Another year older, another year wiser.