Bye,bye Germany

(Germany, USA, May 2006) After coming back we had just four weeks left before moving to the USA. A moving company came to pack our furniture; they did a terrific job (uninspected). It was not easy because a part of our household had to stay in Germany, for example lamps, all electronics and carpets. We also left all our books, what I truly regret. But we wanted to be back in two years…As you can imagine we were very busy. Additionally we had to take care of our house project. We were picking our new kitchen, tile, wood floors and different things for the bathroom. Pretty strange, isn`t it? Here we just found a house in the USA, on the other hand we were working on our new “house-to-be” in Germany, meanwhile we were packing everything in the house where we were still living…I don`t know what we were thinking! Probably nothing, otherwise we never could finish this. The Day after everything was done, our son said “Bye” to his kindergarten friends, of course with a lot of tears, and came to an empty house. I`ll never forget his face, covered with tears, so unhappy…At that moment I really doubted that we were doing the right thing. We visited during the last weeks our friends, family, neighbours to say “Good-Bye”. It wasn’t so hard because everything still seemed so unreal-until the moment we were standing in an empty house. I felt so sorry for our son but I had to learn that kids forget very fast. In the next morning he was already so excited about flying in an airplane that he didn’t care about our old house anymore. Our family brought us to the airport. They were standing there and waving. We waved back but our thoughts were already far away. As always when you excited about something new, like a new beginning in a foreign country. We were planning what we will do after landing. Where will we pick up our rental car? How we will find our way to Connecticut? How long we will have to stay in the hotel? From the airplane window we saw the coast, many lakes and woods. And then we saw New York! “Oh, my God! We are really in America!” I was just hoping that I understand this time what the man at the emigration asks me (last time he got very unfriendly because I didn’t answer his question immediately). Meanwhile the airplane landed…