First Days August 2009

Leaving the US was hard on all of us.  We lived very close to family and that was probably the hardest thing of all, to leave them all behind.  The first few days were a blur.  We have a son, Al, who is 7 and a daughter, Lotte, who is 2.  We made a huge mistake by letting them take a nap when we first landed and therefore no one slept the first night.  My husband, Randy, took Lotte for a walk on the haupstrasse in downtown Heidelberg at 3:00 am.  We thought it was a great idea, unfortunately she thought that she would be able to do that every morning at 3:00 am. 

The next day our cat, Ping Pong was due to arrive.  She flew in on a different plane than us and she was due to arrive at noon.  Our first task was to find kitty litter, kitty litter box, and cat food.  Seems easy right...no problem...HA!  We figured we could start about 10 am, all bleary eyed, little sleep, little ability to speak German but an easy task.  So off we went in search of the cat supplies.  We were told there was a hyper market in Rohrbach and that they would definitely sell a litter box.  We find the Familia Center, they do not sell litter boxes but there is a store "across the street" that does.  So off across the street we go.  I go into a huge warehouse store "Getranke" store, not knowing what this means in I go.  I see lots and lots of drinks and some other stuff...no litter boxes.  I asked if they sold katze toilten ( my attempt at German), the woman looked at me like I was crazy and shook her head and shrugged her shoulders.  By this time it is almost noon and we are far from being home in time to get Ping Pong.  I get back in the car and tell Randy it has to be around here somewhere and so we start to drive around.  And there it is a huge store sign with a picture of a cat and dog...has to be a pet store and bingo it is!  Yeah!!! We high five each other so excited that we have finally found the pet store.  As we are parking and I am getting out of the car a man is yelling at me in German and pointing at the car.  I didn't understand what he was saying but I look at the car and lo and behold....a flat tire (FML).

So we were successful in getting the kitty litter box but had to drive the car back with the flat tire as the rental car company had removed the jack from the car and we needed to get back to be home when Ping Pong arrived.  Luckily the person bringing her to the apartment was late so we didn't miss her drop off.  It was good to have her with us.  We got the flat fixed and survived our first day.