rooibos vanille tee. [arias and rainy silhouettes]

Last night was so wonderful. My parents, Jeremy and I traveled into Regensberg last night, which is a larger city only a short drive away from little Velburg. We met some of my parents friends and caravaned to the center of the Altstadt, Old City, to park in a massive underground parking garage. From there we walked to the square in front of what seemed like a huge church-- until you looked up to the left to see the truly towering spires of the ancient cathedral of Regensberg, lit from the bottom, giving voice to every nuance of the experienced stone and carvings colored with the years of history passing. There in the square, a traditional Christmas market was in full swing, though it was lightly raining, no amount of inconvenient precipitation prevents the Germans from celebrating Christmas right--and as it was, neither did it prevent our party from enjoying our evening out, and it surely made for some beautiful photographs. After sipping on the customary beverage of every Weinachtsmarkt, called gluhwein, a piping hot mulled wine with a purpose to warm your body and your mind, we milled around the stands of gifty wares and tasty treats, stopping for a nutella banana crepe. Soon enough we made our way back to the Dreieinigkeitkirche in which the concert of our primary purpose for being in Regensberg was taking place. Johann Sebastian Bach wrote a Weihnachtsoratorium, which is a concert of both orchestral and vocal beauty based on the Christmas story as told in the Gospel of Luke. It was such a beautiful concert, the acoustics in the kirche were so perfect. The chorus and the soloists were all quite wonderful vocalists, but it was the orchestra that had my heart skipping beats. The sound washed over the audience in a wave of notes and sounds that stayed the heart. At one point, as the music swelled, it filled the room so that there was literally no room to move--all I could feel was music, I could hardly breathe, I didn't want to break the wonderful tension that the soul of Bach created with his passionate composition.
Though the music was so beautifully distracting, it wasn't quite enough once the cold began to creep its way into the church, and slowly began to make its way up my body--I tried to stifle by putting on a woolen hat, as I pulled my scarf closer around my neck. But it got the better of me, and I was glad when the concert ended and we could walk over to a warm brewery to have a hot dinner and a hearty drink. Each restaurant in Germany is so unique, there are virtually no chain restaurants, so everywhere you go is something new and different, and almost always as wonderfully enjoyable.
Speaking of dinner, we are away to have some now. I'll catch up tomorrow or the next day.

Tscheuss,

Caitlin