Host Family Day: Easter Sunday!

I was SO excited to spend Easter Sunday in Switzerland. Who gets to do that - I mean really! Even though our host family wasn't religious, Giselle and I wanted to attend church, so we made plans to meet up with other Uppies at a GORGEOUS Catholic church in Frauenfeld. As we were driving into town, I saw a steeple and thought to myself, "Wow...I hope we're going there." Turns out, we were! We attended St. Nicholas Catholic church and it was stunning! I walked in and my jaw dropped because I'd never attended church in such a stunning building!

I'm not Catholic, but I was raised Episcopalian, so I know the rundown of the Catholic service pretty darn well. I'm not out of my element when I attend Mass, normally, but boy was I this time! Let me count the ways!

1. I couldn't understand a word of the service...besides "Amen" and "Jesus Christus" Oh...and "Mary." I eventually learned to recognize the phrase "Please stand," but now I can't remember what it was in German!
2. They had a full choir, orchestra, and soloists in the balcony to perform a GORGEOUS Mass. I was being an uber music history dork and loving every second of sitting in an old church listening to a beautiful mass. I've studied these things before in college, but I've never lived them out! Imagine that that's what church services were like EVERY SINGLE SUNDAY in the past!
3. I sat, along with everyone else in attendance, wearing my winter coat the entire time!
4. They had communion, but it was only a wafer. No wine to be found anywhere. Hmm. I thought that part was kind of important...
5. It was a lovely Easter service, but it was nothing like a U.S. Easter celebration. Things were very subdued and not as extravagant. There were some flowers, but no bright colors, lots of excitement, or big celebration (that I could detect, at least. Maybe the Swiss German are just a calmer bunch! lol). 

We had a great time and I loved getting to experience something as awesome as Easter Mass in the German part of Switzerland! AWESOME! I would definitely consider our morning a moment of Regional Learning! =)

St. Nicholas Catholic Church

Website picture

Website picture

Our Uppie group. Giselle (Mexico), Dylan (CO), Mika (Japan), Gwendoline (Belgium), me, Amilee (NJ), Mallory (CO), Tara (CO), and Abby (MA)

 Our host neighbor, Manuel, picked us up afterwards and took us to Turnfabrik, the gymnastics studio that my host family was very involved with, so we could have Easter brunch and playtime with a bunch of other Uppie families! We had a blast playing around on the gym equipment all morning (with the exception of Katy...poor Katy. Her face collided with a little host sibling while jumping into the foam pit and she ended up breaking her cheekbone. Yikes!)

Turnfabrik

 

 

We arrived home in the afternoon and us "kids" decided to take off on another adventure. Manuel, Kevin, Giselle, Raphael, Milena, and I drove to a neighboring little town called Stein am Rhein to explore for the afternoon. Naturally, we ran into other Uppies, yet again!

Riding in the back with Raphael!

The most intricate building I've ever seen!

Uppies and some host family members!

Imitating the weird postcards we found

When we got back from Stein am Rhein, had dinner (well, Raphael ditched us to go eat with Frank and his homemade Chinese food...lame!), packed, and had our hot tub ritual one last time! The siblings and Uppies all had a fun time playing games and talking in the hot tub on our last night together. 

Oh, I should mention the hilarity that ensued with my host mom and my red pants while doing laundry! She had them drying over the railing, but they're fine to go in the dryer, so I was going to dry them for a bit so I could pack them. She grabbed them out of my hands and INSISTED on ironing them, even though they were still damp...and jeans...who irons jeans? lol No matter how much I tried to explain, she just REALLY wanted to iron them! haha. So, after tons of laughter and hand gestures trying to explain that I just wanted to dry them, I gave up and Dagmar delivered my ironed, damp red pants so I could pack them! =P

 

Overall, we had a fantastic Easter Sunday. It was VERY different than my traditional Easter back home, but I'm all for new experiences, and my time in Frauenfeld and Stein am Rhein was definitely a new experience!