I stepped off the train into a Christmas card. Or as my fellow passengers on the train to Siegen would say, “eine Weihnachtskarte,” or that’s what they would have said, were they not glaring into the feather-light snowflakes tumbling out of the dusk and frosting the quay.
Before I had boarded the train for my Christmas vacation (Weihnachtsferien) in Germany, Tobi had informed me that while there would be snow in Siegenland, it always fell steadily, never too quickly, and always in an amount that was manageable. How very German, I thought, for in my mind, Germans and Germany were the epitome of the engineering philosophy, marvels in regimentation, beer, and lederhosen.
And, also, Christmas. After all, most of the beloved aspects of an American Christmas – Christmas trees, Saint Nick, and the Christmas Pickle (well, beloved in my family, at least) – originated in Germany. When Tobi had recommended that I spend my Christmas abroad with his family, I agreed immediately. Seeing as my bloodline is almost half German, I thought it only fitting.
From Paris to Köln on the TGV, and then from Köln to Siegen, I imagined the welcome that would await me once I arrived in the land of my ancestors: Tobi waving merrily as the train pulled in to a station frosted in a picture-perfect dusting of snow while a brass band played Stille Nacht in the background.
The snow was definitely there to greet me, but not Tobi. I clutched my duffel bag and tried to look coolly Parisian while all around me rose, not the sound of Franz Gruber’s famous melody, but the buzz of the rich, buttercream-thick, absolutely incomprehensible German language. Fortunately, Tobi appeared almost immediately, his father in tow.
“It has snowed about a foot,” Tobi said, bundling me into the VW. “All the highways were blocked. It is a crisis.”
Having just spent several months in France, a country that defines crisis as a shortage of good Brie, or rioting students, the only think I could think as I leaned back against the seat was: How very German. I’m going to love it here.
It is not possible to understand German just by listening really hard. Trust me, I tried. I tried so hard that, after my first evening sitting around the family dinner table, I had a headache. So instead of using language to understand, I started to learn through gestures. Smiles. Laughter. Pointing and flapping hands and contorting faces into extreme expressions of emotion.
When I pointed out a poinsettia to Tobi’s mother, Ester, and told her that it reminded me of the huge poinsettias my mother would purchase every year, she placed it in the guest room to give me “a little taste of home.” After an evening of slogging through snow and salt, leaving my shoes in quite a disreputable state, I awoke the next morning to find that Tobi’s father, Burkhart, had shined my shoes.
His twin brothers, Ben and Sam, invited me to play games—German games, so they have to be translated every step of the way—but we’d point and wave and sketch figures in the air until, even if we didn’t quite understand each other, the spirit of camaraderie more than made up for it.
His grandmother, Oma Charlotte, would carry on entire conversations with me. We’d grasp each other’s hands intently and then look to Tobi for translation. My attempts to repeat her chirping, birdlike words fell out of my mouth like rocks clunking together, but nonetheless she praised me—and swore I would be fluent when I returned later that year to visit.
Eventually, through the two weeks, I did learn ten German phrases and words—and was able to have a very nice conversation using only those words. I also discovered that if you just listen to what the people around you are saying and repeat what they’ve said (and add one or two of the ten phrases you know), they tend to think that your comprehension is right up there with theirs.
Incidentally, this is a trick that works at cocktail parties in your native language, as well.
To Germans (and Austrians, and Hungarians), it’s Christmas Eve, and not Christmas Day, that is the day of celebration. Weihnacnhtsabend morning dawned crisp and clear, and we decided to take a stroll through the hills of Seigen. A more picture-perfect landscape could not be imagined—and all along the way, we passed families walking, children sledding down hills, and through it all wove the cheerful exclamation, “Fröliche Weihnachten!”
That afternoon, Tobi and I set to work decorating the tree. It was a surprise for me to learn that it’s not until Christmas Eve that the Christmas tree is decorated. When the Kinder are young, the doors to the room are shut and, secreted behind, the parents decorate the tree. At six o’clock, the doors are flung open, and all those assembled are dazzled by the ornaments, the candles on the tree—and, of course, the presents, for the Christkind has come.
Christmas tree trimming has always been quite a celebration for my family. Every year, we looked forward to a nine-foot-tall tree, lit with thumb-sized multicolored bulbs, hung scores of variegated ornaments that we’d accumulated over the years, and tinsel, tinsel, tinsel everywhere.
But decorating a very German Christmas tree was something entirely different. We placed handcrafted straw ornaments and wood cutouts the tiny red and yellow paper stars on the slender boughs. I (I! who stands just over five feet tall) placed the star at the very tip-top of the tree (with assistance from Tobi). And then came the candles. I actually started jumping up and down when the candles emerged from the box. Yes, the stories I had heard were true—lighted candles are placed on the tree. It was almost too perfect to be true.
Later, I sat in the balcony at the Christmas Eve service, making up the pastor’s words as she pontificated to the assembled. Earlier that evening, we had attended the Sunday school Christmas pageant, where I had watched small German Kinder shuffle about wearing robes that were too long, and carrying shepherd’s crooks twice as tall as they.
The German girl on my left, who spoke some English but very good French, was translating parts of the service for me, but had stopped about a quarter through the sermon. But I realized, glancing around at the assembled, that it didn’t really matter that I didn’t understand exactly what was going on. The story was familiar, as was the theme. And, yes, I was a long way from home. And, yes, I missed my family.
But peace and goodwill and happiness don’t really need translation. And the calm and joy I saw in the faces around me, and the peace that I felt in that little church (even if some of the Kinder were squirming in their pews) ... that was what mattered.
At the end of the service, I heard the familiar chords being played on the organ, and I smiled. I knew we would return home after the service and throw open the doors to reveal the lit Christmas tree with the presents piled beneath, and we would open gifts, and laugh, and chatter, and eat until we were sick. But at that moment, my Christmas—my very German Christmas—was complete.
For the first time that evening, I closed the hymnal—and didn’t worry about stumbling over the words—as we sang the closing hymn:
“Stille Nacht! Heil’ge Nacht!
Alles schläft; einsam wacht…”
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