1 Week in Dessau!

Well, a lot has happened since we last updated this! In the week that we have been here we have started gathering furniture and ordering appliances and things, and our home is coming together a bit!

On Monday Meg (Pastor David’s wife) took us to this gigantic thrift store-type warehouse that has just about everything a person could want, including complete bathrooms and kitchens. We were able to get a small dresser for London’s clothes, a monstrosity of a wardrobe for our room, a kitchen table, 4 kitchen chairs, an armchair, and 2 cushioned stools for about 230 Euro, which is very cheap! I went back again on Wednesday and got sauce pans, kitchen utensils, silverware, dishes, a large floor cabinet for storing things, a coffee table, 2 small side tables with drawers, (like for in a bedroom), fabric to make all of our curtains, a large laundry hamper, and some other miscellaneous things. I need to go back one more time to look for a bed for London and just a few other things! (Oh yeah, and kitchen cabinets… just a small item!) David and Meg have been very helpful with translating and helping us get things settled and we have been so thankful for their help!

I guess it is not very common for Germans to shop at those kinds of second-hand places and only buy used things at the flea market, plus not many people know about this particular warehouse, Meg said. I asked her how people get rid of things they don’t want, since they don’t do yard sales here, and also there are not thrift stores around like you would find in the States or the UK. She said that aside from selling things on the bulletin board at the grocery store or posting them online, or giving things away to people you know of course, you have to buy a permit to put things you don’t want out on the curb and your neighbors can come take it, or the city will pick it up if nobody wants it. At this warehouse Meg took us to, they will come and pick up used items from your house for free, so there is a lot of incentive for people to give to this place! The lady we have been working with there has been so nice as well.

Also this week we went to a big Macy’s-type department store in the mall and ordered a washing machine and fridge, which came yesterday. We also ordered a nice sofa-bed (futon style, but nicer!) and a bed frame for our room at another store yesterday and they will be here in a week, which means after that is delivered we will be almost ready for guests! (hint, hint!) Those things we ordered all by ourselves and just hoped someone could speak English when we got there. So far, we have done okay! It is rarer in this part of Germany to find somebody who speaks some English, but we are finding a few! It will be nice when we can learn enough German to feel more confident in doing these things, but for now it is stretching.

Yesterday we went to the City to apply for Jason’s work visa and to get Londie’s and mine figured out, and that was very interesting. The people at the language school were confident that someone there would be able to speak English and help us, but that person must not have been there. We think we have to fill out some papers and take them back next week. The poor lady who was trying to help us! Everyone has been SO nice and gracious. Next time we go there we will take someone with us. The visa thing is kind of important (aside from the obvious reasons) because we cannot get a contract from the phone/internet people until Jason has his visa. Once we can get Jason’s visa and sign up for phone/internet, it might take 2 weeks to get our stuff sent/hooked up, so we are going to be waiting a little while longer before we have communication with anyone. That has been very hard because even our friends here in Dessau have to come to our house to talk to us. Meg has lent us her cell phone a couple of times so we can call them, but other than that we have felt kind of isolated. Be praying that the visa thing will go smoothly and that we get connected soon!

One last thing, yesterday we saw our first bit of German countryside and it was beautiful! So green! Tim (one of the church leaders) took us to a lake to go swimming and it was great! We had a bit more of the European culture shock, though, as there were some old nude sunbathers and older children (8 to 10-ish) running around without swimsuits. SO much different than we are used to! I had the most modest swimsuit there, the type that has a short skirt on the bottom, and felt kind of odd!

Anyway, we are settling in and adjusting! London is still figuring out what has happened because she has been asking me, “Where’s Yaya? Where’s Uncle Will?” etc., and yesterday said she wanted to go to music class tomorrow. Today she told me she wanted to go play on the swings with Ella. I keep telling her that they are all far away and that we will not see them for a long time; remember the big airplane? Then she says, “Did you cry at the airport?” She has been dealing with the change by acting out A LOT and that has been frustrating. She is certainly testing the boundaries to see if they have changed in this new place. We want to give her grace for all the change that is happening, but we still have to teach her acceptable behavior and that has been so hard to judge.

Well, that is all for now! Thanks for your prayers and we hope to post another update soon!