Ich wäre im Bett geblieben, als ich krank war, anstatt zu glauben, dass die Welt ohne mich zusammenbrechen würde, wenn ich nicht an diesem Tag zur Arbeit gehe.
Ich hätte weniger gesagt und mehr gehört.
Ich hätte Freunde zum Abendessen eingeladen, auch wenn mein Teppich einige unbedeutende Flecken hatte oder die Farbe der Couch verblasst war.
Ich hätte Popcorn im ′′guten′′ Raum gegessen und mir viel weniger Sorgen um den Dreck gemacht, wenn jemand den Kamin anzünden wollte.
Ich hätte bei den Geschichten, die mein Vater über seine Jugend erzählt hat, genauer hingehört.
Ich hätte die „mehr“ Verantwortung mit meinem Mann geteilt.
Ich würde niemals darauf bestehen, dass die Autofenster an einem Sommertag geschlossen werden, weil meine Haare gut liegen.
Ich hätte vor dem Fernsehen weniger gelacht und geweint, als ich das Leben beobachtete.
Ich hätte mich auf das Gras gesetzt, auch wenn meine Kleidung davon Flecken bekommen hätte.
Ich hätte nie etwas gekauft, nur weil es praktisch war.
Anstatt mir zu wünschen, dass bald die neun Monate der Schwangerschaft vergehen würden, hätte ich jeden Moment geschätzt und verstanden, dass das Wunder, das in mir wuchs, meine einzige Chance im Leben war, Gott dabei zu helfen, ein Wunder zu vollbringen.
Wenn meine Kinder mich küssen würden, würde ich nie sagen: ′′Jetzt nicht. Geh dir erst einmal die Hände zum Abendessen waschen“.
Es gäbe mehr: ′′Ich liebe dich”. Mehr „Sorry“.
Aber mehr als alles andere, wenn ich nochmals eine andere Chance hätte, würde ich jede Minute nutzen, um meinem Leben wirklich Aufmerksamkeit zu schenken, intensiver zu leben.
Hör auf, dich um unbedeutende Dinge zu sorgen. Schenke niemanden, der dich nicht mag, deine Aufmerksamkeit.
Fühle und schätze stattdessen die Beziehungen, die du mit denen hast, die dir und deiner Seele gut tun.”
Jane Goodall 🦋
Jane Goodall (* 3. April1934 in London) ist eine britische Verhaltensforscherin.
We are both back home. Home home. One in Ireland. And the other one in Bavaria.
Heimat ❤️
Time to meet family. The favorite great aunt. Time for coffee & cake. Time for Bali spa. Enjoying mums & dad’s delicious cooking. Getting spoilt & enjoying it. I had a fabulous time with my family.
Bali spa. Japan meets Rhön.Bavarian Brotzeit Bavarian deliciousness.Home office buddy.The end of winter? The beginning of spring? For sure very stormy days…Favorite great aunt.
A culinary trip. As usual. The whole family likes eating. Haha.
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder” – an Irish saying. And very true. Already looking forward to have us back home together ❤️
Stuttgart. Not a town to fall immediately in love with. But at a 2nd look. In our case it took a little longer due to pandemic & lockdown reasons. But here we are. Maybe Stuttgart is not a city like Shanghai… but it’s a town with a lot on offer if you look at it and give it a chance.
A new blog idea: happy places in Stuttgart. Today: soup & theater.
Cuisine & theater. We tried something new: eating soup in the theater. It was delicious & entertaining.
Cool concept! A stage feeling like sitting in a living room.
We are also working on becoming Swabian: we ate our first “Seele” (soul). With butter! Super delicious!
A group of professional people posed this question to a group of 4 to 8 year-olds, ‘What does love mean?’ The answers they got were broader, deeper, and more profound than anyone could have ever imagined!
‘When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn’t bend over and paint her toenails anymore… So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That’s love.’ Rebecca – age 8
‘When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.’ Billy – age 4
‘Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.’ Karl – age 5
‘Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French fries without making them give you any of theirs.’ Chrissy – age 6
‘Love is what makes you smile when you’re tired.’ Terri – age 4
‘Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.’ Danny – age 8
‘Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and just listen.’ Bobby – age 7 (Wow!)
‘If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate.’ Nikka – age 6 (we need a few million more Nikka’s on this planet)
‘Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it every day.’ Noelle – age 7
‘Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well.’ Tommy – age 6
‘During my piano recital, I was on a stage and I was scared. I looked at all the people watching me and saw my daddy waving and smiling.He was the only one doing that. I wasn’t scared anymore.’ Cindy – age 8
‘My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don’t see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night.’ Clare – age 6
‘Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken.’ Elaine – age 5
‘Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford.’ Chris – age 7
‘Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day.’ Mary Ann – age 4
‘I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones.’ Lauren – age 4
‘When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.’ (what an image!) Karen – age 7
‘Love is when Mommy sees Daddy on the toilet and she doesn’t think it’s gross…’ Mark – age 6
‘You really shouldn’t say ‘I love you’ unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.’ Jessica – age 8
And the final one: The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman’s yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his mother asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, ‘Nothing, I just helped him cry.’
Happy Valentine’s Day! We all should be acting more like children & spreading the love!
Give the ones you love a big kiss, a hug and a huge thank you that they are in your life. Every day!
Storm. Wind. Rain. Fog. Snow. Ice. Cold. Sunshine. Blue sky. Drop from +12 to -2C degrees. Repeat. Not even the dog wants to go out anymore. Hello winter!
A dog born in South Carolina can get a bit nuts at 5mm snow.
Baking bread and trying other new things like beef filet sous vide or simply “steak in a bag”. Burger party with dear friends. Fondue & Berliner.
Beef filet sous vide – delicious!
Restyling some rooms is fun and keeping me busy. So many more ideas in my mind…
Quite a few friends in Covid quarantine. Supporting them.
Working from home. A massage. A facial treat.
Spring feelings. Blue sky! something really rare…
Transferring my Shanghai blog into a book. Lots of editing. Lots of great memories refreshing my mind & creating Kopfkino.
Newest discovery: Korean BBQ in Germany.
Sooo good! Feels like being back in Seoul. Kind of.
The Beatles on the biggest cinema screen in the world.
Dreaming of vacation destinations 2022.
Watching the last episode of sex and the city “And just like that”.
Hubby finished his rehab training. Yeah! Physio continues. And training on the Mini Cooper will also continue.
Love is in the air this week. Valentine’s about to approach…
For everyone who started a diet in the beginning of January… in case you didn’t do well… take the Chinese New Year as a restart 😉 very practical, isn’t it? I wonder which country celebrates a new year next… haha.
A ladies night. A hot pot and chopsticks. Friday night. Chat Night. Lots of laughter & exchange. Serious discussions. Apple crumble topped with vanilla ice-cream for dessert. Ingwer tea and gin tonic.
We all know each other from Shanghai. Connected by one man. His “5 angels”. Smart ladies. Business ladies. World travelers. So many stories to tell & share. Enjoying a dinner night together in pandemic times. It felt like being back in Shanghai. Well, a little bit.
1st half year 2020: Covid? What’s that? A bird flue from Asia? Business trips canceled and working from home for 2 weeks? Love it! My new work mate: hubby. Cooking our own lunches, yeah! So healthy! Face masks are great fashion accessories (made out of silk & real fun colors).
2nd half year 2020: Ehm, this pandemic doesn’t seem to be a short-term thing… damn. Working from home was extended to … forever? Maybe that kitchen chair needs to be replaced by a proper office chair. The back hurts, the neck cracks. The step watch is no longer challenged with 300 steps between kitchen, home office & bed room. Delicious food & cakes (jogging pants remained accordingly). Too much of it (and extra from the neighbors). Not only the scale exploded. Oh dear.
31.12.2020: what a year! We somehow made it. Hope & high expectations for 2021: everything will be back to normal next year! What a fairytale!
4.1.2021: lockdown continues…. Happy new year! Uff… until 6.2021. Summer holidays. Yeah! Vaccine available for everyone (love it or hate it). We all figured out that masks are not just accessories but that they really have a purpose (goodbye silk masks). Free FFP2 masks for everyone >60 years old. You even recognize the Germans with their FFP2 masks abroad. Lol.
10.2021: wave #130 – what a surprise: it’s fall and Covid cases are increasing. What? The pandemic isn’t over yet? Is that a repeat of 2020? Kind of. Not as bad thanks to the available vaccine.
11.2021: hello Omicron! Christmas shopping completed early – you never know what’s shutting down next (and for how long)… lessons learnt from previous year.
1.2022: Booster! Booster! Booster! No or low expectations. Just wondering: how long does a pandemic last? The less news the better! Fingers crossed for the future. Our future. According to The NY Times half of Europe will catch Omicron in the next 6-8 weeks… well, stay healthy! Good luck to all of us 🍀
Back to you, my friend: Covid, who are you?
We (still) don’t know much about you. Spiky & nasty. A murderer. A world traveler. All the way up to the Antarctica research station. Who are you?
Congratulations & happy 2nd anniversary… You showed up in Europe about two years ago. And you have been keeping us busy since. Pretty successfully. In fact, you keep the whole world busy. You got everybody’s attention (you should hear those fights about the tennis player these days who tried to enter Australia…). You are topic #1. Globally. Since 2 (!) years! If you were music or a film you would get awarded! No meeting or conversation is ending without having talked about you. You are famous! And definitely annoying! Covid, you affected almost every aspect of our daily lives.
Who are you?
You already killed a lot of people. Some still don’t believe that you exist (that’s causing the biggest trouble!). You are the reason for the on/off closure of country borders, restaurants, bars, cafes, theaters, hairdressers, spas, schools, Kinder-garden… not cool!
You scare us. Some time ago you started mutating. Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Omicron… what’s next? That scares us the most. You are wild and out of control. Yeah, keep challenging us! The whole world is tired of you. Our patience is used up. You give and you take our hopes. Frequently.
(I believe) thanks to you, Mr T. wasn’t elected again. Well, that was kind of cool.
Traveling remains difficult. In fact we should only leave the house for good reasons these days (that’s why we keep discovering new grocery stores in 30km distance one way. Those are happy kilometers. Alternatively we love spending fortunes on soaps and hair gels just because there was no other shop open).
Because of you we had curfews in the past and nowadays restaurants have to close at 10:30pm. Sperrstunde. WTF?
Nobody exactly knows who you are and what to do to get rid of you. At the same time we are struggling finding out how to make friends with you. All we want is to accept and live with you. Really! Promise!
Some of us became survivalists. Some people became creative. Others feel paralyzed. Lonely. Sad.
Dear Covid, because of you we have been working from home since 2 years (if you are lucky to still have a job). Can we ever go back to the office 5 days a week? I don’t think so (but that’s not a bad thing).
Most of us became real good chefs in the kitchen (or nonstop food delivery service users). It was also leading to a couple of additional kilos…
You made us stop and breath for a while. Made us re-think our life style. Or you made most parents nuts.
A lot of us became more interested in news and politics. But also frequently fed up. People even „walk“ in bulks on streets now. Demonstrating against restrictions, limitations and vaccine.
Thanks to you air pollution is reduced. Globally. That’s cool! Also did you speed up the digitalization in the country I currently live in. It was about time! But it caused a new problem: how to recycle too many Amazon cardboard boxes?!
You make us slow down. Which is cool (if there was an end in sight it would be even cooler).
Family & friends have time again to call and talk. Most of us are desperate for talking. For hours on the phone. On a Tuesday night! Our chance to get closer again.
People seem friendlier. Older people talking in the supermarkets. Apologizing if they are in the way with their shopping trolleys.
It would have never come to my mind that a virus can stop the world from moving! Wow!
Covid, who are you?
We are really tired of you! I know people who haven’t seen their families in 2 years! Time to say bye bye! Go away, please. Thanks, Merci, Grazie, xie xie, Dankeschön!
Stuttgart547 