Alpine splendor

Here are a few pictures from our last day in the Berner Oberland. We took the cog-train up from the town of Lauterbrunnen to Kleine Scheidegg - a skiing area with a beautiful view to the alpine peaks Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau. We were blessed with a clear day after several days of very poor vis. You can see in Delynn's eyes the wonder of it all!

Here we are in the alps - it looks like we are on the top of the world and it kind of felt that way.

Michael with the Jungfrau in the background.

This is the Eiger. Pictures just cannot do justice to the majesty of this area.


I took a video showing the three peaks - Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau. I love the little halos of clouds on the peaks.

I know this is a quick entry by our normal standards but we wanted to share a little of our trip to the beautiful Swiss Alps. God bless you all.

This is how God works

Before I explain just one of the ways God has worked in our lives this week, I need to let everyone know that March is CRAZY busy for us over here. It's mostly good stuff, but it is affecting my time and ability to regularly post on the blog, so sorry about that. Then, when April rolls around, Delynn and I will be going on holiday to Dresden and Kraków so that will likely cause some additional patches of non-bloggyness. Just keep checking back and eventually I'll get something posted.

Okay, so this was a great God thing. Last week, spring decided to grace us with days of sunshine and warmth. After the long, cold winter, we are more than ready. It has been a glorious few days and everyone is out walking, riding, holding hands, you know... spring-stuff. Well, some form of allergen - I know not what - also decided to make its presence known.

Last Wednesday, I was hit hard. It worked down into my bronchial passages as well as my sinuses. I was coughing, sneezing, watery eyes - the works. My voice was cracking like a middle-schooler. When we sang at our Lifegroup retreat last weekend, I had to sing down an octive. I do think it gave me a really cool (dare I say sexy?) baritone voice though... (I'm not sure what Delynn thinks...) I don't recall whether I had the same reaction last year, but then Delynn and I were so often down with a cold, any allergic reactions were probably masked.

So, I'm not doing the best, I can't sing AT ALL without sounding like a frog and I had to lead worship singing on Sunday morning. My co-leader was away for the weekend, so we didn't have a backup. During the retreat, my friend Jon came up to me and asked if there was anything he could pray for - I immediately said yes; he gently laid his hands on me and began to pray. I didn't experience a sudden healing or anything but I was grateful for his fervent prayer.

Sunday morning, I got up early to prepare to lead singing. I noticed that I was coughing less. As I showered, I started warming up my voice but it was still cracking as I went up the scales. I figured that I would just have to sing as a bass that day. As I got ready to leave, Delynn was up having her first cup of coffee and I asked her to pray for me. We held each others hands and she simply asked God to be close to me, heal me and give me strength.

As I drove to church (I had borrowed a school vehicle to transport the Weiler contingent to the retreat, so we had it Sunday morning) I continued to work the scales and warming up my voice. I was blessed to have the car because I probably would have gotten some strange looks doing my warm ups on the tram... Anyway, during that 15 minute drive to church, my voice really started improving - it was such a relief. I could hit notes higher than I had in days. I was so thankful that God was granting me the desire of my heart.

We had our pre-worship practice (which was a little rough) but the worship went really, really well. It was hardly a strain to sing praises and speak - it felt miraculous. We had been invited over to supper at a friend's home, so we spent an enjoyable afternoon with them. As the afternoon progressed however, the cough and baritone voice began to return. By the time I was ready for bed, I was back to where I had started the day - but God had seen me through. And I don't even want to tell you about this morning - hack!

Late last night, we got an email from a friend back at Vancouver Friends Church that was simply titled: Praying for you. In it, spoke of the Lord bringing us to mind in his quiet time and although, "He did not tell me what to pray for you but he knows what you need at every moment." Wow! Our friend, thousands of miles away, was led to pray for us, for me, at just the time it was needed.

Now, some may say that it is just coincidence that all of these events came together, but I say no. People of faith do not believe in a God of coincidence but in a God who actively shapes, moves, blesses and directs his people. This is the God in which I believe - He met me in my need and provided. Why don't you give God a try and see what happens...

God is good - all the time.
All the time - God is good.

Fasnacht in the Dreiländereck

Okay - get ready for a monster blog. What a great couple of weeks it has been. The Fasnacht season has just concluded in both Weil am Rhein and in the Basel area. For us, that means parades, music, masks and fire (but more about the fire later). Delynn and I are currently on our Fasnacht break in the Swiss Alpine town of Lauterbrunnen. We wanted to get a few days away before we head back to school next week. Last time we were here, it was a little cloudy, so we couldn't see much of the Alps. Well, as you can see (this is a view out of our apartment rental) the view is beautiful but we still can't see the Alps. We hope to get a break in the weather over the weekend so we can bring you some pictures of the nearby peaks.

So, the week before the break went well. Despite the knowledge that RIA will be closing operations at the end of the school year, it doesn't change our desire for teaching excellence and giving our students the best education possible in the last four months of the school year. When I think back to first grade (Yes, I can still remember first grade those many decades ago) and compare what I did in reading and math to what our students are doing, it blows my mind. Here is a picture of our first grade girls during library (I think I have mentioned before that our entire 1st grade class is girls...). This set of girls represent Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Cameroon, Columbia and Kazakhstan - none of whom are native English speakers. During a recent library class, after books have been returned and new books checked out, they settled down on Hedgy for a read. Hedgy is a hedgehog pillow that the kids love to use while reading.
The thing that really impresses me is their absolute love of reading - some reading books that I didn't tackle until 3rd or 4th grade back at St. V's. They are all at different levels (and this isn't even the whole class) which is a testimony to their very talented and creative teacher, Miss Aubrey. Of course, as an Oregonian and sharing my same birthday, Aubrey just HAS to be special... Now, here are some of the girls again with one of our staff members showing off her Basler Fasnacht costume - the harlequin. Up until Fasnacht begins, each group or Clique's costumes and themes are absolutely TOP SECRET. Janelle is only able to show off the costume before Fasnacht began because it is a classic costume from years past as her Clique celebrates its 60th Fasnacht anniversary this year.
So, Fasnacht activities in our area start after Worship on Sunday the 1st of March. We invited our staff over to ours because the Weil am Rhein parade is the first of our many venues. The Weil am Rhein parade starts at the Rathausplatz and wends its way down the kilometer or so of Weil's Hauptstrasse.
Among the traditional German costumes are Waggi's (these characters represent French farm workers from the Alsace region) ...

and witches...

and clowns. I understand that part of the history of Fasnacht is scaring away winter - Well, they aren't going to scare winter away with these clowns...

Our next stop was the town of Liestal, Switzerland. Long-time readers of the blog may remember last year's Fasnacht. Delynn was ill (it was her turn) and needed to stay home so she didn't get to experience the raw heat of the fire parade, so this was her year. Here we are before the parade, standing in front of one of the fire carts that are pulled or carried down Liestal's Hauptstrasse. I recalled this one from the previous year - it is quite well constructed, including wheels made entirely of steel so that they don't melt in the extreme heat. This is the before - oh, yeah, that wood is ready to burn...

And here is the after (well, more during) picture. As the cart was pulled by our post on the Hauptstrasse, you can see how crazy hot the parade is.

In addition to the fire carts, many, many more individuals - both men and women - carry burning bundles of wood - most configured in the cone shape as seen in detail below.

These are carried by groups of folk who run, dance but mostly trudge under the great burning weight. Some only wear wet felt hats (the purists) to protect themselves from the burning load.

Here's another good picture - look at those three story flames! We would never see anything like this in North America. Can you imagine this happening on Broadway in downtown Portland?
Before I go on, if you haven't already noted it, please check the other post from earlier today that has a couple of videos from Liestal, including a hunka, hunka burning wood. After the Liestal parade, we all smelled like a big campfire. Delynn found a couple of small holes in her coat from burning embers that fell on her - and we were in the back row!!

The next stop on our Fasnacht fun was the Tuesday chaos in Basel. Tuesday is one of our favorite Basel Fasnacht days because it has the children's parade so there are thousands of children and families traipsing up and down the street of the Basel downtown, dressed up in costumes and wantonly tossing confetti. The busses and trams are all diverted to keep all of the streets for pedestrian use only.

This picture above says it all for me: Masks, Drums and Confetti.

On Tuesday, individuals or groups with as few as two people (or in this case three) can simply dress up, pick up their piccolo and drum and start marching around the streets of Basel. Notice too the costumed mannequins on the corner of the building at left.

A huge part of the Basler Fasnacht is the lanterns that each Clique creates and carries through the different parades over the 72 hour Fasnacht period starting at 4:00am Monday morning (Morgenstreich). Often the lanterns have two or more meanings. The one above for example deals with the CERN Large Hadron Super-Collider that many feared would create a black hole and suck the world into it - the more subtle meaning deals with the bankers who are the black hole, sucking the money out of all of our pockets.

As the evening deepens, Guggenmusik bands - most analogous to marching bands in the states - but with much better uniforms - march all over playing wonderfully toe-tapping music. This was a really wonderful few days. I hope that you have received just a taste of it by following this blog.

Don't forget to check out the earlier entry with a couple of more videos.

Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. These summarize the heart and mind of God.

Videos from Liestal

We took a lot of video at the Liestal Fasnacht celebration last Sunday. These two short clips show a pipe and drum corps which gives you a taste of the traditional Basler Fasnacht sound. Only pipes and drums are permitted for any Clique that participates in the parades. This group is poking fun at rich oil shieks making wads of dough from the price of petrol. The themes for the parades are usually picked in late summer when the price of oil was spiking - it was a common theme for many of the Basler Cliques this year.

The other component of the Liestal parade is FIRE! Groups carry or pull carts of tinder-dry wood through the main street. Let me tell you, just holding up the camera to get this video was a feat. We were in a much more sheltered spot this year but it was still HOT, HOT, HOT!

I'll post some pictures later of the various parades in Weil am Rhein, Liestal and Basel.