You know you’re planning something illicit when you hesitate to tell people about it. I mentioned our trip to only a few friends, and said nothing to others, even when they asked.

We had cancelled it twice.  First in March, when our daughter, Angela, asked us to babysit our toddler grandson, Mattias, during his day care’s spring break. And again, in early May. Finally, as Minnesota announced store openings, and with Angela and Joe needing help as they packed to move from their apartment, we decided to drive to Denver.

Like many others, we’ve been bored and irritable at home. We’ve also spent time thinking of the Common Good and how to be responsible citizens. It’s hard to defend a road trip in the middle of a pandemic. To that, I plead grandparent insanity.

Our plans included a large dose of worry. Would it be possible to socially distance while stopping for gas and bathroom breaks? Was it safe to stay in hotels? And Angela and Joe lived in a tenth floor apartment; how would we avoid being jammed into a crowded elevator? Finally, what if we got into a car accident somewhere along the way? It would be impossible to socially distance if we needed emergency help–although at that point, Covid-19 would probably be a lesser concern.

I managed to plan my way out of most concerns. We’d wear masks at rest stops. We’d ask for first floor rooms at hotels. And we discovered we could simply pick up breakfast items in hotel lobbies and eat them in our rooms.

Setting Off

We left on Thursday, May 14. Our first stop was at a Kwik Trip an hour and a half south of Minneapolis, and I pulled on my cloth mask before entering. I usually try to buy something in exchange for using the restroom, but I noticed that none of the other people inside—at a glance, they appeared to be all males—were wearing masks. Perhaps I’m over-aware of mask politics, but I felt a distinctly negative vibe, like I was holding a “Hillary for President” sign. I hurried out.

I understand that some folks don’t want to appear vulnerable. And pressure from certain leaders and media outlets makes them ornery. Wearing a mask feels like submitting to government rules they consider arbitrary.

Unexpected Hospitality

We continued on to Ames, Iowa, where on last year’s Denver trip, we ate sandwiches in our car outside a coffee shop, and then purchased lattes. That shop, in Ames’ “historic downtown,” was closed, but Google informed us we could get a cup of joe at a chocolate shop on the same block.

What a find!  Chocolaterie Stam is a Victorian fantasy offering a delicious array of filled chocolates and nutty barks. The shop is just 25 years old, but the Stam family has been making chocolate for over hundred years, starting in the Netherlands. We were thrilled to purchase a box of their candy, several pieces featuring the Iowa State University logo. And the young clerk kindly allowed us to eat our bag lunches inside the shop, at one of two widely-spaced tables. We did so gingerly; although healthy, we’d been holed up for so long, we felt we were contaminated.

Spring colors along the way were lovely. Both Iowa and Nebraska were adorned in lacy lime green, and eastern Colorado as well.

Not Boring Anymore

Normally mundane aspects of our trip now seemed interesting. At the Fairfield Inn in Kearney, Nebraska (the town is a popular stopping-off place), we had to phone the front desk from outside double doors and answer questions about our temperatures and quarantine status in order to be admitted to the lobby. Inside, we stood behind a tape line and talked to a masked clerk through a plexiglass shield.

We had asked for a first-floor room and, from the noise in our corridor it seemed everyone else had, too. Thankfully, we only passed one man in the corridor.

Breakfast, the staff had assured us, would be provided, so we didn’t pack cereal and milk in our cooler. It turned out to be a mealy apple, a granola bar, and a stale pastry loaded with frosting.

Mile-High City

In Glendale, Denver, the Residence Inn lobby procedures were about the same as pre-pandemic, with the exception of a masked clerk. He gave us a third-floor room, which raised our eyebrows, but it was a quiet floor, and we were usually the only ones waiting for the elevator. The few times we weren’t, one or the other party kindly agreed to wait for another car. Nobody cleaned our apartment-like room during our five-night stay, but we could exchange towels at the front desk. For breakfast, the hotel offered little boxes of cereal, packaged pastries, and coffee. The best part was the price, down from $190 just months ago, to $110.

We formed a kind of Covid unit with Angela, Joe, and Mattias, who had seen very few people in the last two and a half months. Angela and Joe have been working at home, and Mattias has been with only one other child, whose parents do not leave their house, and a nanny who is single and lives alone.

My biggest concern, elevators in Angela’s building, didn’t turn out to be a problem. We were required to wear masks throughout the building, and nine out of ten times were alone in the elevator. Again, when others were present, they or we, politely offered to wait for the next car.

The overall patience and courtesy we encountered reminded me of the weeks after 9/11, when we all treated each other tenderly.

Mattias is an exuberant 20-month-old, whose language skills are exploding, and who loves trucks and buses. Their apartment looks down on the top of a parking ramp, which, from seven stories up, is like watching an animated movie. Paradise for a vehicle-oriented child!

When Mattias is out and about, he scouts the horizon for unusual vehicles and doesn’t hesitate to point them out. BUS!  DOZER!  BEEP! (pick-up truck)  GA-GUCK! (dump truck). After a few days, I also found myself pointing excitedly–even when Mattias wasn’t with us.

Mattias also loves animals, in particular “raffes” (giraffes), “wow-els” (owls), and walruses (he can actually say this word). He is building a collection of stuffed creatures.

Walks and More Walks

I emailed a friend that, in Denver, we “did no socializing, no restaurants, and no shopping except groceries.” At Safeway, I watched an unmasked guy ahead of me groan as he was turned away.

For entertainment, we walked. A few blocks from their apartment is a park with a rugby field. It is apparently one of the best in the country, and groups of men regularly practice on its artificial turf, using the odd, oblong rugby ball. Mattias went after a ball one afternoon and we laughingly picked it up and threw it back to a player, who introduced himself as from Fiji. He told us he played for an Argentinian group that practices there.

Just after that, a pretty six-year-old girl started skipping alongside Mattias. She told us her name was Tomra, and that she was from Macedonia. The next day at the same park, Mattias spent time chasing another toddler who was there with her father, both from Zacatecas, Mexico. It was one of Mattias’ last days in that neighborhood, and I felt wistful that their new community, more upscale, would likely have fewer immigrants.

Across the street from their new house (they picked up the keys before we arrived) is a park with playground equipment, but the slides and swing sets were wrapped in yellow crime-tape in fear of lingering virus particles. That wasn’t a problem for Mattias, who didn’t quite realize what he was missing. He instead enjoyed walking to a nearby field with huge climbing rocks, scanning grassy areas for butterflies, and picking up interesting stones.

The new house has a family room big enough to accommodate the large Fisher-Price toys–a food truck, a castle, a farm–he has accumulated, and he will have his own bedroom. Oddly, on the windowsill of the landing up to second floor was a tiny metal device that I recognized as a Turkish spice grinder. I’m not sure why it was left behind, but it was the perfect welcome for our Turkey-loving family.

Unexpected Tears

On a trip, one’s regular routine disrupted, allowing new thoughts. I realized that so far, this entire year has been one of unexpected change. In mid-January, my 91-year-old mother had a stroke, which precipitated moving out of her apartment of twenty years and into a nursing home. This wasn’t completely unexpected, but it did come suddenly, drawing us into a flurry of emotion-laden activity that didn’t settle down until mid-March, just in time for shelter-in-place. And how could I have predicted that the country would be convulsed with protests before May ended? The upshot for me is a renewed awareness that anything can happen at any time, and a reluctance to believe that any plans I make are completely firm.

Talking with Angela on our last day, I started to choke up because Mattias is changing fast, and I didn’t know when I’d see him again. Driving to Denver isn’t an easy task, and I don’t know how comfortable I’m going to be with flying. She feels the same way. So unlike last year, when I saw him every two or three months, I don’t know how much older he’ll be when we come face-to-face again.

The Drive Home

It was time for the final part of our Covid road trip. We left Denver early on May 20th, anticipating long and uneventful hours between Denver and Omaha. We planned to eat lunch at Subway, either in Ogallala or North Platte. That chain is fortunate to have an optimal pandemic model: food both easy to take out and easy to eat in a car. We chose North Platte, and found its Subway franchise inside a huge Walmart, where about half the shoppers were wearing masks.

As we waited for our sandwiches, we noticed a sizable eating area in which alternate tables were taped off. Only one couple was seated and Sankar said, “Why don’t we sit down?” It sounded like a good idea and so there it was, our long-anticipated First Post-Covid Restaurant Meal, at a Subway in a Nebraska Walmart.

The Unlikeliest Indian Restaurant

On our drive to Denver, just a half hour out of Kearney, Nebraska, we saw a sign on the north side of the road that read, “Taste of India.” It was 8:30 in the morning and we weren’t up for curries or samosas, but we noted the town, Overton. Now, on our way back, we were considering a cup of coffee when we realized Overton was just ahead. We pulled off and found, a few blocks from Route 80, an establishment called The Jay Brothers, “J” undoubtedly standing for some multi-syllabic Indian last name. It was a modest gas station, convenience store, and Indian cafe. Propped up next to the cash register was a hardcover book about Nebraska opened to a page spread about the Jay Brothers themselves who, the article stated, had arrived from India in the 1990s to take over their father’s gas station. The article lauded this very particular American dream.

We ordered masal chai, hot, milky tea containing ginger and cardamom, and walked out with two delicious drinks, shaking our heads in wonder at the range of the Indian diaspora.

In Omaha we stayed near Old Town in an elegant federal building converted to a Residence Inn. Restaurants there had opened, and the receptionist gave us a list of choices, so we decided against take-out. We chose a southwestern grill called Stokes, and made reservations, although we wouldn’t need them. There were only three other parties in the place, well spread out.

Our waiter was dressed in black, including a mask, and was helpful and prompt, although he didn’t stand six feet away, rather two or three. The food was fine, and the experience felt like a thrilling novelty, but also like something we didn’t need to do again for awhile.

Striped Hills

Conventional wisdom has it that Iowa is flat, but I can tell you that isn’t quite true. Heading east into Iowa from Nebraska, we saw what is surely a spring phenomenon: striped hills. These occur when fallow, brown fields are separated by ridges that have greened up. Kind of like mountain terracing, although more modest. These seemed to be a thing only in western Iowa, and they were lovely.

Long hours in the car again gave me a chance to reflect. Although I’ve felt whiplashed by recent events, Mattias’ life is truly a blur of change. His daycare situation collapsed in March due to the pandemic, taking him away from most of his little friends, and it will likely change again in August. He is moving to a new house, and will soon forget that magical parking ramp vista. It’s anyone’s guess what vehicles or animals will steal his heart next — who would have predicted ga-gucks and wow-els? Yet he marches on each day, encountering nearly everything with delight (we’re all entitled to a tantrum now and then!) Maybe I, too, can start to better appreciate newness.

Another few hundred miles, two more Subway sandwiches in Clear Lake, Iowa, and we were arriving home. Our Covid road trip had ended. Purple and white tulips were in bloom, a flyer attached to our front door promoted a nearby two-for-one pizza special, and the grass needed its first mowing. It felt great to be back.

The post Minneapolis to Denver and Back: How to Take a Covid Road Trip appeared first on Sue's Turkish Adventures.

Berlin was at a disadvantage. That’s where we were heading after four surprisingly sunny, whirlwind days in London. I feared that the Germany half of our December trip, organized to use soon-to-expire hotel points, would be a disappointment. And I knew that part of the problem was my stereotype of Germans.

In London we ate pappadums and paisam with Sankar’s cousin and family. We strolled along the Thames with old friends, Matthew and Louise, photographing landmarks such as, “the walkie talkie,” “the cheese grater,” and “the London Eye.” At the British Library, we peered at manuscripts ranging from the Magna Carta to Paul McCartney’s jotted Yesterday lyrics.

I thought ahead to Berlin. I’d long perceived German people as stern and humorless. Exacting, and demanding. Waiting for an Agatha Christie play to start on our last evening, I commented to our friends, with only a bit of hyperbole, “I’m afraid I’m going to do something wrong in Germany. I’ll break a rule or something, and people will yell at me.”

“I don’t think so,” Matthew replied

As we carried our suitcases through Paddington Station the next day, I felt the kind of fatigue that indicated a cold was coming on.

My Stereotype of Germans Goes Way Back

I’d spent just one day in Germany over twenty years ago, and had no significant interactions with Germans. But back in the eighties I’d spent a year working for a German boss who was temperamental and disapproving. I’d found German foods—sauerkraut, dumplings, pickles—lacking.

I also have a kind of psychological back story with Germany. I guess every American does. Although the country has done an admirable job of reconciling its 20^th century history, how can it counteract the near-continuous onslaught of Holocaust-related books, films, and television programs? It can’t. I’d been saddened and horrified more times than I could count.  

Thus, my perception of Germans. I had actually been known to proclaim that I had no interest in visiting Germany. It’s not difficult to make that kind of statement at age 64, because there are so many countries to visit and so little time.

One thing I never did, however, was connect my proclamations about Germany with my irritation over the question, “Aren’t you afraid to visit Turkey?” that Sankar and I receive whenever we travel to that country.

So why, then, did Sankar and I choose Berlin over, say, Bruge or Amsterdam? Well, we felt Berlin was a cosmopolitan “world city,” with fascinating Cold War and World War II sights. A place we really should see. We also knew Berlin had a Turkish neighborhood that might evoke the wonderful years we spent in Turkey. And I think a tiny part of me knew that my stereotype of Germans was ridiculous, and that it was time to challenge it.

A Rainy Start

It was drizzling when our plane landed in Berlin. We caught an Uber to our hotel, just three blocks from the Reichstag. The city appeared spread out, almost suburban. The Tiergarten, adjacent to our hotel, looked more like a forest. Aside from the regal Brandenburg Gate, most buildings appeared modern and undistinguished. They reminded me, disappointingly, of downtown Minneapolis. War—and the Soviet emphasis on functionality—had apparently erased most of Berlin’s charm.

A Worldly New Friend

We checked into a comfortable hotel room at the Marriott. There was a coffeemaker on the side table, but no water bottles, a nice nod to the environment. When we visited the lobby for information, the concierge, to our surprise, was a slim, neatly groomed Turk named Oğuzhan. We were so happy to meet someone from Turkey that we greeted him like an old friend.

Oğuzhan told us he had grown up in Germany, his parents Gastarbeiters, guest workers, who arrived over fifty years ago. When we lived in Turkey, I met several offspring of Gastarbeiters. My elegant supervisor, Dilek, fluent in Turkish, German, and English. Several 3M Turkey wives, well-educated and secularly inclined; their mothers had worn the headscarf, but they did not. One, an engineer, worked for a German company that sold chemicals to Iran, which she told us was the makeup capital of the world. “I go there every month.”

Oğuzhan was warm and eager to help, hardly my stereotype of Germans, and I realized with some envy that growing up trilingual would make a person quite cosmopolitan. He smiled when we told him we had, several years ago, spent a night in his ancestral town of Afyonkarahisar.

Oğuzhan gave us a map of a dozen or so Berlin Christmas markets, and we walked to the nearest one, in Gendarmenmarkt Square. Gendarmenmarkt contains the 19^th century Berlin concert hall and the 18^th century French and German churches, all of which, I later read, were restored after the Second World War. In the center of the square stood several dozen holiday shops in white tents with pointed tops. Some had open sides, but many were enclosed by clear plastic, and even heated. Shopping delights beckoned.

Christmas Galore 

Gendarmenmarkt stores were bursting with colorful ornaments, wooden candle carousels of all sizes, leather wallets and purses, hats, gloves, scarves, and hard candies in long, pointed cellophane bags. Close to a dozen establishments offered refreshments: glühwein, various bratwursts including “currywurst,” which sounded slightly alarming, and dishes involving noodles, potatoes, and pork. I was curious, but not quite ready to dig in.

History Lessons

Over the next two days, we walked through the extensive and up-to-date German History Museum. We learned that Germany prior to unification under “Iron Chancellor” Otto von Bismarck, wasn’t much more than a disparate collection of provinces, each with its own ruler. After an hour and a half, which brought us up to the twentieth century, we sat down for tea in its formal, but somehow cozy café.

The next day we visited the Pergamon museum, located on an island in the Spree river. It was a dazzling (but shameful) collection of artifacts from other lands, including the gates of Babylon and the market gate from Miletus, a Roman site in western Turkey.

Nearby was “Pergamon Museum. The Panorama.” This new site featured a three-story, multimedia diorama that put viewers in the middle of the ancient Roman city. With dramatic background music and evocative lighting, we watched Romans emerge from their homes at sunrise, worship at temples, shop at agoras, and gather to view performances in the evening.  It was a don’t-miss experience. 

On our last day, we toured the Berlin Wall Memorial, a sober, informative remembrance strung out along a quarter mile stretch of former Wall.

Tall, sometimes slightly plump, but rarely fat, Germans dressed in earth tones, wearing sensible shoes and warm-looking jackets. They appeared casual, confident, and unpretentious. I felt the comfort of looking similar in appearance, something I’ve missed in our travels to Latin America, southern Europe, and Asia, where Sankar has blended in.

It was odd, but as soon as I arrived in Germany, I got so caught up observing and interacting that my stereotype, alive for years, seemed to exit my mind. It was like when you imagine a place, but find that when you get there, the old image becomes difficult to recall. New impressions were quickly writing over my old ones.

Patriotic Immigrants Were Not my Stereotype of Germans

We climbed into an Uber early one day with, “Good morning,” only to hear an emphatic “Guten tag,” from the driver. This was the one and only reprimand we received in Berlin, and it was given by a Turk. A recent arrival, he told us in Turkish that he liked Berlin, particularly its manageable size and ease of getting around, and jotted down for us the name of a popular restaurant in Kreutzberg, the Turkish neighborhood.

A-a-a-choo!

The rain kept falling and my cold kept getting worse. Sankar and I both felt tired, and with no social engagements, we found ourselves dozing off in mid-evening and sleeping late in the morning. That felt good, but we were wasting precious sightseeing time.

We had forgotten to bring decongestants, so we stopped at a pharmacy. The woman at the counter was the pharmacist herself, and to my surprise, I had her attention for more than five minutes. “How much congestion do you have?” “Do you have a cough?” “Would you describe it as a lot, a little or not at all?” “Do you want to take something dissolved in water, or would you prefer a pill?” Again, not my stereotype of Germans. The Grippostad she sold me for less than $10 made me feel a bit better, though I longed for Sudafed.

A Splurge

The night after our Gendarmenmarkt visit, I woke several times, thinking about a small black purse I’d seen there. The leather on one of its sides had been worked into a lovely flower shape. We went back to the market and ended up buying it. The vendor was also the artist, one Karin Scholz, from Dusseldorf, her card read, perhaps fifty years of age. After we finished the transaction, to my astonishment, she came out of her booth and gave me a long, tight hug.

Seeking a light lunch, we sat down at a picnic table in a market café warmed by heating lamps, and ordered noodle soup. We were surprised to find ourselves beside four travelers from Guatemala, and enjoyed a lengthy Spanish conversation.

We returned to the market another day, this time for chocolates and candle holders. After making our purchases, we sat down in another café, whose menu highlighted goose products, and ordered potato soup. It came full of various herbs and weiner slices, delicious, but not overly fatty. It was only 2:00 pm, but daylight was fading. We lingered in the warmth of the cafe, feeling a glow of companionship with the other patrons.

Unexpected Kindness

The Marriott charged thirty Euros for breakfast, so each morning we headed to a coffee shop across the street from our hotel, whose counter displayed a tantalizing array of pastries. I can say that German croissants are every bit as good as French ones. On our second morning, with no hint of their availability. Sankar asked if they had eggs. I was a little surprised he’d asked (but it didn’t occur to me to wonder that he—or we—would get yelled at). The young clerk admitted that they did have eggs. In just a few minutes a plump, beaming Fraulein emerged from the back kitchen and placed in front of him a generous plate of scrambled eggs topped by herbs and accompanied by a green salad. 

It was pouring the afternoon of the weekly market in Kreutzberg so, sadly, we gave up on visiting the Turkish neighborhood. Late that afternoon, the sky still dark, we were resting in our hotel room. We had 5:30 Reichstag reservations, made online back home, which had generated official-looking confirming paperwork. But we couldn’t motivate ourselves to put on our rain gear and venture out.

We didn’t even want to leave our hotel, so for dinner we decided to splurge at our hotel’s “American-style Steakhouse.” The menu was limited and expensive, and the waiters a bit snooty, but I was able to order barbecued pork ribs (I think pork is on every menu at every meal in Germany) and Sankar a ribeye. After our food was served, we were surprised by a visit from another smiling Fraulein, whose job seemed to be to make her way around the restaurant asking every diner how they liked their food. She was delighted when we told her we were pleased.

Debriefing

Our Berlin guidebook opens with the phrase, “Berlin is a city of leafy boulevards.” It goes on to say that, “Berliners love to hang out in parks and along riverbanks, as if enjoying a continuous open-air party.” Clearly, the city is at its best in warmer weather, and I don’t really recommend it in the winter. For Christmas markets, we might have chosen a smaller, more picturesque German city or town, although we probably would have experienced rain there as well.

Back home, my cold lingering and combining with jet lag, I slowly completed my Christmas shopping and house decorating. I didn’t download my photos for a couple of weeks, nor did I reflect on my travels. But then a friend asked, “How was Berlin?” and my quick answer, “Fine. The people were really nice, friendly and helpful,” made me realize that my perceptions had changed.

Immersion—even one as brief and lackluster as our four rainy, half-sick days—had produced positive emotions—gratefulness, warmth, feelings of connection and inclusion. And these emotions had replaced my stereotype!

Everything, it seems, boils down to emotions. And now I began to understand “Aren’t you afraid to go to Turkey?”  It’s a stand-in for emotions surrounding decades of sad and horrifying news from the Middle East. But it is also changeable.

Over our three years in Turkey, we hosted 26 visitors. Some hesitated to make the trip. But as they left, they all had the same comment. “Wow! What a great place!”

For additional reading about Berlin, go to: https://www.fodors.com/world/europe/germany

For more on unexpected kindness, go to: https://suesturkishadventures.com/unexpected-kindness/

For more on stereotypes, go to: https://suesturkishadventures.com/perceptions-and-illusions/

The post Is My Stereotype of Germans Fair? appeared first on Sue's Turkish Adventures.