Stranger in a Strange Land: Birthday Recap...

Last Tuesday was my birthday, and it turned out to be such a wonderful day! To start the day off, my German class found out that it was my birthday (thanks to my friends, Becky and Val...) so they sang "Happy Birthday" to me in German... That was definitely something I'd never experienced before! After they sang, my teacher began asking me birthday related questions (i.e. my age, my b-day plans, what time I was born....). I was quite proud of the fact that I carried on the entire conversation with her in German... I guess those German classes are working after all! :) After my German course, I had a couple of friends take me out to lunch. While we were there, my friend, Theresa, came in and surprised me with a cake that she had baked for me! She knew that I had wanted some American style cake (German cake is definitely not up to par! :)) for my birthday, and being that she's from the U.S., she baked one up for me... And I have to say that it was quite delicious! :) And, of course, they wanted to do things the traditional way, so they all sang "Happy Birthday" to me in English before we cut the cake. Needless to say, we received quite a few stares from our fellow German diners! :)

After our lunch, I headed over to Brian's company to meet with my new boss about the English classes I'll be teaching. We went over all of the logistics and we decided that I will be working on Mondays from 1:00 - 4:30, and I start the first week of November... Yay! I also found out that I will be teaching business English to all of the participants, so that means that I'll be talking with the participants about, get this... Engines! Yikes! I was given quite a few magazines, that are published by their company, to read and familiarize myself with the technical terminology... This will definitely be interesting considering that my brain is just not hardwired for this kind of information... Whenever I hear things that are related to technology, math, and science, the information goes in one ear and right out the other! :) (But, if you talk to me about Reading, Literature, History, Social Studies, etc... I'll probably talk your ear off! :)) Needless to say, this will definitely be a learning experience for all involved! :) The end of the meeting proved to be interesting as well. At the end of the discussion, my new boss said that we should pop open a bottle of champagne to celebrate this new joint venture... So, sure enough his secretary came in with a bottle of champagne, which we popped open and toasted to this new adventure! You know you're in Europe when they pop open a bottle of bubbly at the end of a business meeting! :)

After my meeting, I headed over to Cafe Aran where I met up with my good friend, Eva, for coffee and a chat. And then I headed on home to meet up with Brian, who took me out to the Spicy Grill Tavern for dinner... It's one of our favorite restaurants here because of the fact that they serve the most delicious American style burgers! We seriously think they must have studied in the U.S.! :) Oh, and my very cute and thoughtful husband knew how much I had wanted an American style cake with Buttercream frosting... So, he had asked one of his coworkers from Detroit to see if he could bring one over to Germany... (His coworker was scheduled to arrive in Germany for work on my birthday...). Well, considering that it's extremely difficult to smuggle a cake onto an international flight, his coworker instead brought over 4 containers of Duncan Hines Buttercream frosting! :) So, now we can make our own cake anytime we want! :) And to cap off a perfect day, I got to talk to my family and then I had my adorable nephew wish me a "Happy Birthday!"... Too sweet! :)

Overall, my birthday turned out to be such a great day! I'm so thankful to have such wonderful family and friends who went above and beyond just to make sure my birthday was special... And, even though I would have loved to celebrate with family and friends back home and it was hard to be apart from everyone, I also realized how many wonderful friends I've made over here. I feel truly blessed. :)