Staff Retreat to the Swiss Alps

Today is quite balmy - a huge 5° C last time I checked. This is actually pretty good considering the weather we had just last week. As I may have mentioned in another blog entry, even the Germans and Swiss are getting a little tired of this winter. The cold and snow are coming more frequently than in the last couple of years, but it is probably closer to normal patterns -I guess last year we were just really lucky. As I look back over last year's February blog entries, I see that the weather was still rather cold, but man, we didn't get this much snow. On the upside however, we have hardly been sick at all this year! Yaahoo! Here is a picture of the school about a week ago. You will note the parent parking to the left and staff parking on the right. I took even a tumble off of my bike for the first time last week on some ice - Oy! that was no fun. I'm still limping a little from where the steel bike pedal hit the knuckle of my left foot.

Okay, so where else in the world could a school take a staff retreat to the Swiss Alps without it sounding like one of those boondoggles that a bailed-out bank had to cancel after receiving BILLIONS of our taxpayer money? Well, our staff retreat probably cost less than a similar trip to the Oregon Coast. We were able to stay at a hostel where the accomodations were basic - twin beds (no sleeping together), bathroom and showers down the hall, etc. But the view - Oh, the view...
This was actually the view out of our window. Okay, I can take bathrooms down the hall for one night for a view like this. I created a panorama of our room's view below. If you click on the picture itself, you should be able to get it to open in a seperate windows with a larger image view - it is fantastic.

This is a view of the other side of the valley. Our hostel can be seen along the very left edge of the picture. It is the small tan'ish colored building almost half way up, above the red tile roofed building. Whether or not you see it, what you can see is the glory of God's creation in the Alpine region of Switzerland.

From our room, there was a really beautiful church to our left. There were several terraced levels as one approached the entrance. We took a walk over and up to the church and what do you think we found on those terraces? (Any guesses?)

For those of you that guessed graveyards, give yourself a gold star. It wasn't necessarily what I expected, but they were beautiful none the less. I don't know if we have mentioned it before, but graves and honoring those who have passed over is significant for most Europeans. Since many families live in the same town or village for generations, this shows their respect for family after they are gone.

The many markers were primarily made of wood - this is just one example. Isn't it just wonderful? The grave sites are well tended and quite beautiful.

The church also has some magnificent stained glass windows. (I know Jesus didn't look like this, but I appreciate the beauty and craftsmanship)

Since this was a staff retreat, I wanted to give you a picture of our staff. There were a couple of folks missing, but these are the souls with whom Delynn and I have had the priviledge of serving for the last 18 months. The woman in the back center, Aubrey, hails from the Pacific NW, actually from Eugene, and she has the same birthday as I do - 12 June - but obviously she was born many, many years later. She teaches are 1st and 2nd grade girls (well, the entire class of 8 students are all girls). She is a really excellent teacher and we are proud to serve with her. We could tell you great, compelling, touching stories about each of those here but we will save those for another day. What a blessing it is for us to know each one.

We took a day trip on Saturday further up into the Swiss Alps. The last picture is in the village of Lauterbrunnen. Delynn and I will be returning here in a couple of weeks during our Fastnacht break to recreate some more together in the Alps. Obviously, this day had quite a bit of cloud cover, so we are hoping for some clearer weather the first part of March. We'll see - whatever happens, we look forward to our break.


We pray God's blessing on everyone who reads this. When we see the wonder and beauty of His creation, we are continually amazed that God would make this for us. May you too see something of God today. Keep your eyes open; expect that God will cross your path in some way today - maybe big, maybe small. In all, be thankful and give Him the glory He is due.

A day in Strasbourg

Well, we promised you pictures and during a recent day trip to Strasbourg, France, we (well, the Michael-half of 'we') took a lot of pictures. We met up with our friends and fellow RIA'ers, Cam and Jen to take a trip up north to Strasbourg. Strasbourg is the principal city of the Alsace region of France, home to some 3/4 million people. The city celebrated its 2000th anniversary (no, that's not a typo) in 1988. It was founded as a Roman military outpost in 12 B.C. (right about the time my old home town of Augsburg, Germany was founded). It is now home to the European parliament and the European Court of Human Rights. A fairly significant city just an hour away by train.

We were blessed to get a discount ticket on the French railway - this is essentially a day-ticket on which up to 5 people can travel in a given region or state for a single price. In our case, it cost us only 44 Chf for the four of us to travel round-trip to Strasbourg (That works out to about $9.00 per person which is an outstanding bargan). As as added bonus, there were no strikes, so we got quickly to our destination. The day was clear and cold but those are the best days to travel in winter. We caught an early train so that we could spend a full day in this beautiful city before returning back home to Weil am Rhein.

This is the main train station in Strasbourg. You can't see it very well, but the domed building in front of you actually covers the original stone train station. When you exit the old station building, this curved structure compeletely envelopes the facade and pedestrian area in front of the station. It was not until we walked out and across the square that we noticed how pleasing the architecture of the covering structure was. We knew we wanted to get to the center of the old town. In most cities of this vintage, all that means is looking for the church spire that usually signals the most important part of the oldest section of the city. In Strasbourg however, there are lots of more modern buildings reaching several stories high but that is no challenge for the Strasbourg Cathedral.

The Strasbourg Cathedral, the Cathédrale Notre-Dame-de-Strasbourg, is incredible to behold. It held the record as the tallest building in the world for 250 years until the late 19th century. Even as I write these tid-bits of information, I find myself shaking my head in disbelief. It is still the 6th tallest church in the world.

As you can see, it is hard to get this baby into a single picture, the scales are not to be believed. People walking around the Cathedral square look like so tiny when contrasted with this immense Cathedral. The interior is just as soaring with airy vaults and lots of stained glass. I appreciate so much that even with the throngs of visitors, churches like this also have areas reserved specifically for prayer and not for photos.

The Romans normally established outposts on riverbanks and Strasbourg is no exception. Today, much of the old city is between two branches of the Ill river (really, that's its name -it is a tributary of the Rhein). With old sections of cities, there is always beautiful old buildings to admire.


Here we are next to the Tanner's building. Delynn still doesn't have a hat on despite the sub-freezing temperatures, but she is at least wearing ear muffs. We are dressed in our standard two-layers bottom, four-layers top configuration for winter travel.

THIS IS WHY WE LOVE FRANCE! ('nuf said)

This is called the Kammerzellhaus (Maison Kammerzell) and is one of the most ornate and well preserved medieval buildings found anywhere in the Alsace. It is situated on Cathedral square and was built about 70 years before Columbus "sailed the ocean blue". It now houses a restaurant (we didn't even look at the prices) but pictures are free!

We didn't actually eat any of those cakes in the picture we took earlier, we just drooled over them. We did however find a quaint little place that served a brilliant French onion soup (they just call it "onion soup") and Tarte Flambé. By the time we stopped for lunch, we were all really, really chilled so when we found this restaurant, we were more than ready to enjoy the inviting atmosphere and warmth we found inside.

True to french culture, we sat and ate and talked until we realized that we had been in the restaurant over one and a half hours - just for lunch! We had arrived rather late for lunch so by the time I remembered to take a picture, most of the other customers were gone. Most every table below was occupied with happy, contented french-folk during our wonderful meal.

Our whirl-wind day-trip to Strasbourg was a delight. I know we say this a lot, but we feel so blessed to be able to live here, to experience new cultures (french and german culture are certainly different...) and have the priviledge of sharing our lives and faith with new friends and our precious students. We will be forever changed by our time here. God is good.

Good news and bad news

I've been struggling to get myself to start this blog entry because it carries with it some sad news. As some of you already know, Rhein International Academy will close at the end of this school year. The president of our parent organization, the Network of International Christian Schools (NICS), came to the school to meet with the staff and parents to deliver the news. The decision by NICS was not an easy one - NICS has never had to close a school before. It was a decision that broke the hearts of the board and needless to say, it broke our hearts also.

In the end, the sustainability of the school just wasn't there. Over the last five years, NICS has faithfully supported the school and covered each year's shortfall. Last year, RIA was able to finally have a year when no outside support was needed, but several of our families, some with multiple children attending RIA, were rotated back to North America or other countries and we just could not make up the shortfall.

Our focus right now is to continue to deliver the very best education possible for our students and to finish the year well. We are also working diligently within the international school community to insure that each of our students has a place to attend next year. This can be especially difficult as we support a number of special needs students. We would ask our praying friends for their support as we move forward with this tremendous task.

On a more personal note, Delynn and I have made our decision for the next chapter of our lives. We had been pursuing several ideas which included staying in the Dreiländereck region or returning to the States. When Delynn returned from her trip back to Vancouver during the Christmas break, we spent much time in discussion and prayer over where we would be in six months. I had my CV (resume) submitted to some companies in Switzerland as well as back in the U.S. We began to sense that our next home should be back in the Washington-Oregon region so that we could be close to family; to be close as Delynn's father battles cancer. To remain here, as much as we love the area, the relationships, our church, seemed a little selfish. But, as most of you know, the economic climate in the U.S. is not exactly stunning to say the least. Still, we felt a sense of peace, a peace which passes understanding.

Our answer came in the form of an offer from my previous employer, Intel. I had sent off an email to an old colleague seeing how the job environment stood. Once my former boss found that I was interested in perhaps coming back to the OS group, he and his boss went to work on a job requisition to which I could apply. The request for hiring had to get approval at the group's general manager (this is the person that reports directly to our CEO, Paul Otellini). In this environment, it was a miracle to get the approval. I was really humbled when they came back and made me an offer. It was truly and offer that I couldn't refuse and was an answer to our prayers.

We feel incredibly blessed to be moving forward with this decision. It is and will be a bitter-sweet time for us. We appreciate the prayers, responses and emails from family and friends as we work through the next several months. Thank you for your support.



Next week I promise to post some more beautiful pictures of our staff retreat. Promise.