Rheinstetten

July 28/07

I decided last minute to skip the program today and go for a surprise visit to Tante Rita’s for pizza and a visit with everyone. The rest of the group went to Colmar and had a Taize service in the morning and then free time. And since I’ve been to Colmar before and am familiar with Taize I thought pizza and visiting was a better option. The wonderful woman at the hotel who has been so kind and helpful to me, drove me to the train station in Obernai from where I took a train to Strasbourg then Karlsruhe. From there I walked to the Europaplatz and then took the streetcar to Rheinstetten. It was a lot of fun surprising everyone. Tante Rita was speechless for several minutes, Anke threw up her hands and yoohooed, Rebecca was confused for a while, Bianca acted as if it was completely normal that I should be there, Alban kept poking me to make sure I was real. There was lots of good catch-up conversation with everyone. Patrick and Jan drove me back all the way to Strasbourg. It was a great day!

I met the group in Strasbourg at St Thomas’s for the organ concert. Patrick, Jan and I managed to find parking and get to the church in plenty of time. Everyone was happy to see me again and about 8 people had saved me seats. I sat with Lilian so she didn’t have to sit by herself and plus I had asked her to save me a seat.