Family Blog

"You're welcome" - this is a sentence Manuel heared often the last days. His new family is very nice, also the people in Whitefish Bay. Manuel has started cross country running to have fun and to meet people.

His family has also a Xbox and a big TV (as Philip), also three cars. This seems to be usual for American familes. And they go more often in a restaurant as here in Germany. (ob)

The first fotos from USA reach us. The foto above is taken over Greenland, about 4 hours after the start. You find more pictures here.

After breakfast I check my mail - there are two mails we waited for: one from Jeff, one from Philip. Jeff has picked up our "wonderful son" yesterday.

Philip's mail is very enthusiastic. His new family is veeeeery nice and his new sister is sweet. And they have all things you can wish for. And they have a Mac. It seems that he will have a better life than here;-)

Today we receive a mail from our other son. He is for one or two days with a Norwegian student at a typicall American family: donuts for breakfast, Burger King for lunch and TV with more than 300 senders.

The weather in California seems to be very hot (here in S-Germany: cold) and what Philip noticed are the big cars. At the border controll his backpack was examined because there were some wrapped presents inside.

In the evening Manuel called us. He sounds a little bit tired (jet lag) but happy, although he has not much time left. It is good to hear his voice.

The first mail from Manuel arrives. His new Mum and Dad are "cool".

First news from America: Tom, the new father for our son Manuel, wrote, that he will meet Manuel tomorrow. But what means "tomorrow"? The mail reached me today at 3:44, so I guess it was sent "yesterday" at 16:44 in Wisconsin. So "tomorrow" means "today"?

We will wait and see... (ob)

Our two 17year old sons will spent the next 11 months in the USA as exchange students. Today we started early in the morning (3:30) to the airport Frankfurt to bring our twins to the meeting point of AFS and to say good-bye to them. One son flies to Los Angelos, the other to Chicago.

The goodbye from our sons was very, very hard with many tears. It remembers me that they are no longer the little children as I saw them. And when they will come back in a year they will be young men.

Also it was very hard for me and my wife to let them go we know it was the right decision.

Our Sons Are Gone

Now, 10 hours later after the good-bye, our sons will be still in the air. I remember a song from my childhood ("Hänschen klein") which I see now from another view point as when I was young.

To Blog or not to Blog...

I decided to start this blog for the following reasons:

• to share my experience with other parents which may be in the same situation
• to keep our relations and friends informed about news from the US
• to improve my English (this is the reason why I don't write it in German; so please inform me when you find an error or strange phrase in this blog)
• to get some blog experience - I'm a greenhorn in this area

PS: Also this text is in English you can comment it in German if you like.

stay tuned (ob)