Message from Germany!

Nique finally mass mailed everyone about her first week overseas. Here is what she had to say:

Hello Everyone! I apologize for not sending out this e-mail sooner, but life has been pretty hectic this past week! I'll try to keep this somewhat short, but I do have a lot to tell all of you!First of all, the biggest blessing since I have been here has been the four other people that I came in with, one of which is my roommate, Laura. When I got off of the plane, there were three other girls and one guy that had been waiting with the resort representative until my flight came in (I had a few travel complications due to the weather). All of us clicked almost immediately and have been inseperable since we first got in. Laura is my age and from Kansas. She's just as (if not more) outgoing as I am, and I think that we are going to have a blast together. The accomodations for the staff are really nice. The bathrooms are all very modern and stay amazingly clean. Since there are quite a few people leaving, Laura and I were able to buy a lot of second-hand stuff to furnish our room. The biggest surprise came on Tuesday when we all found out what our jobs were going to be. As most of you probably already know, I'M NOT A HOUSEKEEPER! I will be working in Alpine Adventures, which is the gift shop/activity central. All of the tours, leisure activities, hikes, kids' programs, etc. are run out of our department. Right now they are mainly just exposing me to all of the different facets of the job, so I can get a taste for what I like and don't like. Basically, I will be getting paid to do what I would probably do anyway. Can life get anymore perfect? For my first day of work, I went on the big tour to the Neuschwanstein castle, which is what Disney modeled their signature castle after. Even though the castle itself was beautiful, standing on the Marienbrücke (a steep bridge that goes over the Pollät Gorge) and looking out over the countryside with the castle in the foreground brought tears to my eyes. I felt like I was looking at a life-size post card. On this same tour, we went through various towns in Southern Bavaria, stopping at a little wood-working shop and the Wies pilgrimmage church. On the way back, we swung down through Austria, but due to jet lag and a huge bowl of Käsespätzle (basically really thick macaroni and cheese), I was snoozing during that part.The most frustrating thing has definitely been the language barrier, but I know that will come with time. Every Friday morning, there is a market with fresh fruits and vegetables, flowers, and various baked goods. We went this past Friday and enjoyed coffee on the terrace of a small cafe with the Alps as our scenery. That was enough to make any frustrations that I had disappear. We are planning on going to Oktoberfest in Munich this weekend, so I will make sure to write and send pictures after that.Thank you all so much for all of your e-mails, thoughts, and kind words. It has meant so much and been so nice to know that I have all of you thinking about me! I miss you all terribly! For anyone that is interested in coming to visit, I am able to sponsor guests at the resort. Unfortunately, you have to pay full price, and you are only offered the standard rooms, but it would be well worth it. There are also little apartments in the actual village that you can rent out for about 65 Euro/ night. (I removed the mailing address. If you would like it, let me know.) I would love to hear from all of you and know how everyone is doing, so drop me a line when you get the chance!Lots of love from Deutschland,Nique:)P.S. I'm working on setting up an online photo album, as my pictures are too big to send via e-mail. Please bear with me!

As soon as I get the pictures, I will put some of them up!

Keep going beyond, you never know what's on the other side.

JRH