Author Archives: Marcus

Walking in their shoes…

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What an adventure it is to have you and your mum around. I am still reeling from the delightful realisation that we left our home with a docile little newborn a mere two months ago and came back with a small child, with a mind of her own, astonishing abilities and mobility (remember your adventures with the train seat, Tristan’s couch and climbing out of all sorts of contraptions designed to keep you INSIDE of them?.) Before we knew it you could sit up and look around, take a drink bottle and finish it, take things and learn how they feel smell and most of all TASTE, realise that some things may be too big and too heavy for now and that your parents are there when you need them.

In the course of the trip you dazzled so many people, starting from queues of curious and cordial waitresses in Thailand, to your grandparents, uncles and aunties in Germany and Poland and even your grand grandmother to whom your gave the greatest parting present by just being there and smiling, to seeing your dear uncle Claudio for the first time to young and oldies ladies and gentlemen all over Italy and our friends in California who were a catalyst for me so looking forward to have you.

What’s more, i am so very proud of you and your mum which actually is a novelty for me. I may have met and spent time with a number of people in my life but your mum and you took it all to a new level. I just didn’t know these feelings exist in the real world and attributed them to fairy tales and cheesy literature. What i so like about our family unit is that it feels far less obliging than it feels liberating and fulfilling.

We have seen you undergo an amazing development in a very short time. We will try not to let this go to our heads a demand great deeds sooner, faster and better than others. After all, we love you and we merely look forward to have a smart, witty and great daughter.

Just one piece of advice: Man with beards can generally be trusted. Yellow buckets on the other hand are to be treated with suspicion. Ask your dad when you can read this 😉

Poznan, August 2012

What is love anyway

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Dear Haumea,

it is such a privilege seeing you grow and learn new things every day, adding to our happiness with new expressions of glee and seeing your mum taking such good care of you (and not forgetting daddy at the same time) and all this happening thousands of miles away from what we call home. Yet your grand parents and aunties both by birth and adopted already show so much of ‘it’ and care, calling almost every day, melting away when you squawk into the mouth piece and keeping the snail mail man busy with all those lovely parcels for us.

The word in question of course is Love. One day when you understand that the love you receive from your parents and family is not the only kind there is you may ask what this is and frankly i wouldn’t have been able to answer you until recently. Not because without your mum you wouldn’t be here to listen but because i myself did not know and knew i didn’t. People who will bump into your life will tell you how much they care and how much they love you but too often that is just words and so it was for me until i met your Mum who gave the word a true meaning. If you ever need to know, your Mum is a well of information on the subject and your dad a happy witness.

 

Bread and Roof over the head

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My Darling,

things are going rather well at the moment. Your wonderful mum is giving you all the nutrition you need, both your parents love you very much (well that is a constant), you are growing and you are so very beutiful and well behaved.

If one day maybe things become a little tight at least daddy now knows how to make bread. Maybe you already got accustomed to the lovely nurturing smell of yeast and baking today. It will always remind me of my grandfather when he came back from the POW camp and told my granny, never mind us having lost everything material, at least i know how to make bread. And bread and cakes and sweets he made much to my and my fellow grandchildren’s delight!

Ingredients:

  • 500 grams of flour, sifted. Can contain up to two thirds of sifted wholegrain wheat flour
  • 2 teaspoons of salt
  • 2 heaped teaspoons of dry yeast
  • 340 ml luke warm water (below 40 degrees celsius)
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
to prepare:
  • Sift the flour into a plastic bowl and fold in the salt, do not add whole meal husks or any grains yet!
  • form a crater for the yest mixture in the middle of the flour and compact then run your finger around the rim to form a moat for the oil
  • dissolve the sugar in the luke warm water then add the dry yeast and whisk a few times until fully dissolved and let stand for one minute
  • pour the oil into the moat around the flour
  • carefully pour the yeast mixture into the crater
  • start mixing with a powerful mixer with kneading hooks starting from the crater and  working more and more flour into the mix before reaching the oil
  • keep kneading until all water and oil have been picked up and all is well mixed, then add your wholemeal husks and extra grains such as poppyseeds, oats, lintseeds, sesame seeds.
  • keep kneading until you have a smooth but sticky mixture, make sure to pick up loose flour and flakes of oil/flour mixture and incorporate, take care not to get the mixer stuck as this may destroy anything but the most industrial grade appliances. Usual mixing time about 3 minutes
  • When finished mixing, sift some flour over the batter and cover with towel and let rise for 45 minutes in a warm place. In the tropics it suffices to make sure there is no draft.
  • after about  45 minutes rising fire up the oven (our oven is digital, it only knows ON and OFF) and place a tin with approx. half a liter of water in the bottom. This will prevent the bread from become dry and hard
  • uncover batter which by know should have doubled in volume and will deflate upon touching with your well floured hands. Form two loaves on board covered with flour and keep covering hands and loaves with flour until finished shaping.
  • sift some flour on tin and place loaves on it, approx. 2 inches apart as they will rise again
  • leave tin with loaves on top of oven where it should now be nice and warm, let sit for another 10 minutes then cut a lengthwise slit into the loaves and brush the gash with oil.
  • Put tin with loaves into oven which by now should have reached its maximum  temperature
  • bake for approx. 30 minutes or until it looks done and the stick test comes back negative. Feel free to brush with water 2 or three times during baking and at the end of the baking process.
  • let cool on rack
  • enjoy

—-GERMAN—–

Link here

Zutaten für
Portionen

500 g Mehl
1 Würfel Hefe
340 ml Wasser, lauwarmes
1 TL Zucker
2 TL Salz
3 EL Olivenöl
n. B. Körner

 

Zubereitung

Mehl und Salz in einer Schüssel verrühren. Die Hefe im lauwarmen Wasser auflösen und den Zucker unterrühren. Eine Vertiefung in das Mehl drücken und das Olivenöl auf den Rand geben. Die Hefe-Zucker-Wasser-Masse in die Mulde gießen und alles mit dem Rührgerät kneten, bis ein gleichmäßiger Teig entstanden ist. Der Teig kann ruhig etwas klebrig sein. Zur Weiterverarbeitung von außen mit Mehl bestäuben. Den Teig ca. 45 Minuten gehen lassen.

Den Teig noch einmal gut durchkneten und 8-10 Brötchen formen. Die Brötchen im Backofen bei 50 Grad ca. 10 Minuten gehen lassen. Eine feuerfeste Schüssel mit Wasser in den Backofen stellen, die Brötchen mit Wasser bestreichen und den Ofen auf 230 Grad heizen. Die Brötchen einschieben und backen, bis sie anfangen braun zu werden. Wer die Kruste gerne etwas weicher hat, kann die Brötchen während des Backens und vor dem Abkühlen erneut mit Wasser bestreichen.

Bei Vollkornbrötchen kann man z.B. 340 g Weizenmehl (Typ 1050) und 160 g Roggenmehl verwenden und die Brötchen nach der ersten Ruhezeit mit Körnern mischen und nach Belieben auch bestreuen.

 

Kia Orana

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Dear Haumea,

So here you are and out of nowhere our lives are turned upside down which on all, every single one, account is for the better. The stress and pain your dear mum went through, the tender love she has for you and her husband, the outstanding support from the midwifes, doctors, families (from far away), colleagues (so many extra aunties now!) friends and even strangers was truly an eye opener. Not only to the fact that this tiny speck in the huge pacific ocean is a family place or that the place where daddy goes to work is a family business but also that Your parents and you are meant to be a happy family bonded by love and passion rather than obligation and expectations.. Here is to a long and happy life, growing up in one of the most child friendly places on earth. May you bring a life time of joy and happiness to your mum, grandparents and all around you. May you be as special and beautiful as your mum.

Lots of love from your daddy.

Words to the strong and courageous

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Dear Haumea,

it looks like we will come face to face in a matter of hours or at most days. All this time your Mum has been so incredibly strong, funny, loving and light footed that it nearly is a miracle to me how anyone can walk around with some 25 pounds of Haumea (including supplies and baggage) and be such a bouncy and strong person who with such tremendous ease shrugged off everything that would threaten to spoil the experience up to the last minute. So it is my conviction that bringing you into this world will be an equally pleasurable experience. According to my mum and in contrast to a large number of pessimistics that is indeed possible. So here’s hoping for the best and preparing for the greatest.

 

Your dad

 

Reasons….

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Dear Haumea,

it’s just your dad, easy to distinguish because his output is so infrequent. I am hopeful that over time i will learn from your mum and have the spontaneity and freedom of spirit to write a beautiful long post in which nuggets of truth are embedded like raisins in a german Christmas Bread, just like she did last night in between two courses of our dinner. Your dad configures a fully functional e-commerce server in that time span, but writing ? Not yet, anyway.

There are many reason i can think of why i want to commit to Bella and you sure will ask us one day and on that day i won’t have to refer you to this post for the answer. Your mum is spontaneous, righteous, truthful and fair. She can be a bit jealous but that is actually a byproduct of honesty. Most people are jealous but never admit it and that in itself is the root of many an evil in this world you will soon enter. Also your mum is so practical it sometimes breaks my heart just thinking about it. When pressed for time she toast bread on a gas flame (and delicious that is!), she ejects SIM card with an earring, she lets grievances go temporarily of for good and always makes the right choice. Just today she went through a pile of depressing paperwork concerning some of the hardship she came out of with a smile when i heard her sobbing so i rushed to where she was sitting and learned that it was a short note of mine floating in the midst of that endless pile of past disappointment brought tears of joy to her eyes. I cannot think of many if any fellow human beings who would see the glass as being half full at such a moment but once again Bella did and that is why we will be your mum and that with paper, ring and all. There are many other reasons but i keep them for later posts.

We already live in one of the most beautiful places on Earth and yet despite that fact we would be just as merry in good ‘ol communist Poland, sharing a simple meal made of our pooled food stamps as a mere necessity that complements the existential pleasure of each other company. Why else do we sometimes not leave the house on a glorious day except for cooling off in our gigantic swimming pool that we hope will be your playground too and very soon.

1983 Polish Food Stamp

Well, the good news is we could have swapped the Cigarette and Alcohol allowance for chocolates 😉

Today we are no longer worried about the next meal so before we have it let me take your Mum on a nice little walk around the tropical country side around here.

Lots of love and i cannot wait to take you little kicking and spinning (a homage to Bruce Lee?) dervish in my arms so your mum no longer has to carry all that weight.

Your dad.

New Zealand Soujourn

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Dear Haumea,

after a long absence here is your dad writing again. Not one day passes where we do not think of you and neither does any day come to a close where your Dad did not fall in love with your Mum again

Your Mum has so many qualities many obvious many more not so obvious that let my heart melt over and over again. Take for instance one day where I was rummaging for an implement to change the SIM card in our iPhone and before I knew it your Mum had removed her Tahitian pearl earring and handed it to me with the pin first. Or take the way your Mum handles stress and smiles and jokes in the face of adversity. Sadly there are lots of people where there is a massive gulf separating word and action and disappointment is looming but your mum just smiles and already thinks of an alternative. On the other hand your mum has earned the luck the call a handful of reliable, genuine and great friends her own and thanks to them everything fell into place on this trip of ours that we undertook to close or at least temporarily finish writing the chapter titled ‘New Zealand’ in the gripping Novel that is your Mum’s life. What remains are great friends, a handy Holiday and shopping destination and the need to rent a car to get around but a small prize to pay  of we can have each other and you.

We also tried to get a belated confirmation from the Dolphins but their larger relatives and our hearts already made a decision a long time ago so your Mum and I were happy with them turning up in great numbers and frolicking around the bow of our boat. When your Mum and I went out swimming one came up close to your mum so in case you were wondering about all these ultrasound sounds outside of a hospital environment and a cold one at that – yep – that was them whose intelligence and ways of life we still try to understand. One thing is clear, they enjoy loving one another just as much as we do, few creatures are able to.

Things are moving along nicely, you have grown considerably since my last post and all in all give us no trouble at all apart from causing havoc with your Mums hormones which she handles just as well as anything else life has thrown at her and believe you me that was rather a lot.

So from hereon I will simply have to be a good husband and dad and all will be easy sailing like a wake on the trade winds. So long my dear until my next post which I promise will be soon.

Love

Your Dad

Common Dolphins in the Bay Of IslandsANZAC Bay, Waiheke Island