Small German Town Invaded by Americans

Today was the most fabulous day! It started out leiswaking by waking up to some glorious sunshine. Then I went to marktplatz downtown because the chorus of Nabucco was going to do a flash mob as advertising for the Festspiele. Every Saturday and Wednesday there is a large farmers market that takes over the entire market square in the center of town and you can find almost anything there like fresh flowers, large cheese carts, fish and seafood caught that morning, purses, dresses, honey....you name it, they have it.  

When we were first told of the flash mob idea I imagined us standing spread out all around the square singing and passing out fliers. However, since the market takes up the entirety of the square, with only aisles for walking, we stood in a semi circle in front of the city hall building and sang "Va pensiero" (the famous Hebrew slave chorus) for all to hear! By the end of the piece we had quite a crowd gathered and they applauded enthusiastically! It was so much fun! I hope that it helps draw people in to the festival to buy tickets for the productions this summer. The title of this blog actually came from the customs officer I spoke with upon arrival. He must have asked someone ahead of me how many people were in our group and when he saw that I was American he said "Ahh, small German town invaded by Americans for the summer." That made me chuckle.

 

After the flash mob, I walked around the market for a while and then went to have lunch at the opera barn. After lunch a few of us went to the lawn in front of the Schloss (castle) and threw a frisbee around for a while. The weather was so beautiful, but by the end of throwing the frisbee I was ready for some ice cream. So we went and got ice cream! And it was tasty. I had two cones, the first with a scoop of lemon ice cream, the second with a scoop of cappuccino. I think it may have actually been gelato, but I ate it so quickly that I don't think I really paid much attention.

The rest of the afternoon was very calm, we all went our separate ways for a while and I took a short nap before our plans to meet up for dinner. For dinner this evening we had something new (well new to me, because this was the first night we didn't have rehearsal).....it is called doener and it is amazing! Basically it is a large pocket of bread that is filled with garlic sauce, meat cut from a rotisserie and vegetables. It a pocket of heaven and I ate every bite :) With doener in hand we walked back over to the markt platz which now had a stage and bunch of chairs set up for the opening orchestra concert being put on that evening. So I spent the rest of the evening eating doener drinking a beer and listening a wonderful concert. The orchestra sounded fabulous! They played selections by Rossini, Brahms, Smetana, Wagner and more....it really made me think about where I was, and be grateful for this wonderful gift I've been given. This time last year, if someone had said to me "a year from now you will be sitting in an outdoor concert in germany watching the sunset" I never would have believed them. This has been so amazing and will continue to be amazing all summer.