Tap a keg for Jesus!

Summer is here. This diagnosis comes from a calendar, not the weather. It is cold. It hasn't gotten past 71 degrees in northern Germany and I couldn't be happier. There isn't much air conditioning here, so it is usually miserable here for about three weeks.


In America, we escape the heat by going to malls and movie theaters and partake in their free air conditioning. In northern Germany, a lot of movie theaters and malls have no air conditioning. When it gets hot, the big mall here in Kiel opens the windows on the ceiling two floors above the ground. Accomplishing nothing.


So it is cold now and I am happy.


We recently finished a bunch of religious-related holidays -- Ostern, Himmelfahrt and Pfingsten. Ostern is Easter. In honor of the holiest of Christian observances, there are two days without work. Himmelfahrt [Travel to the sky] marks the day that Jesus went to heaven after crucifixion. Pfingsten honors the day that the Holy Spirit came to Earth. These holidays are related to religion but no one does anything church-like. Most people take the opportunity to go out of town or barbecue. Himmelfahrt is the unofficial "Father's Day". On this day, men get together and get drunk. Some men, usually in small towns, outfit a wagon with a keg and a radio and walk around town annoying people and getting drunk.

"Father's Day" wagon and its supporters.
Father's Day landed on the first day of the Kiel Beer Festival. I don't think that was a coincidence.

Now there are no more days off from work until October 3, the observance of the reunification of East and West Germany. On that day, no one does anything civic.