{"id":500,"date":"2020-01-02T14:25:28","date_gmt":"2020-01-02T20:25:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/?p=500"},"modified":"2020-01-02T14:25:28","modified_gmt":"2020-01-02T20:25:28","slug":"mein-hut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/?p=500","title":{"rendered":"“Mein Hut”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Christmas I turned nine, my family lived in Germany,\nbecause my Dad was in the U.S. Air Force. \nThat year, my main gift was a special hat, called a Bavarian Hat, or\nsometimes called Tyrolean hat. Usually these hats are green, but mine was a\nnatural wool color, not quite white.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My brother woke me up very early, really in the middle of\nthe night, to go open our presents.  That\nyear, my brother and I each got a Bavarian hat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We were in the front room of the apartment, by the\nChristmas tree, being silly, and noisy. \nWe had already opened our hats and put them on.  Our parents heard some commotion, and still\nhalf asleep, my Dad came out to see us. \nThen he went back to the bedroom, and we heard him say to our mom,\n\u201cThere are a couple of German kids in the front room, I don\u2019t know why,\u201d and\nthey went back to sleep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The custom for these hats is to buy little pins in each place one travels, and put the pins on the hat.\u00a0 There are 6 such pins on this hat, and a little jeweled salamander pin.\u00a0\u00a0 There\u2019s a white fluffy feather, and a green band.\u00a0 You\u2019ve maybe heard the expression \u201ca feather in your cap\u201d?\u00a0 It means you accomplished something.\u00a0 This tradition comes from hunters putting a feather in the hat band from birds they had killed.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This hat has always reminded me of my childhood and that\nvery special Christmas celebration.  The\npins on the hat show my travels while we stayed in Germany. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The Frankfort Zoo\nat that time was magnificent.  It was the\nfirst zoo I remember visiting.  The\nanimal enclosures were set apart by moats, not fences, so the animals appeared\nto be in the wild.  It was there that I\nsaw the okapi, a strange animal.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heidelberg is a town famous for its university, and Koln for its cathedral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Schwetzingen  is in\nwine country, as shown by the grapes and wine glass, and has an amazing castle\nsurrounded by gardens.  Maybe my love of\ngardening was begun when I toured those gardens.  I think my dad was in the hospital in that\nplace, and we went to visit him there. \n(I know my dad was in the hospital, I think that is the town where the\nhospital was.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Hansel & Gretel pin, the word is faded, but I\nthink it is Eisen \u2013 hard to say.  There\nis a part of Germany now called \u201cFairy Tale Road\u201d and maybe this town is on\nthat road.   I know that we went to the\nHansel & Greta operetta, and that is probably when I got this pin.  I still remember a song from that show.  It was a very special occasion for us.  You\u2019ve heard of The Brothers Grimm?  They came from this part of Germany.  They were scholars of language, but they\nbecame famous for their collection of folklore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worms\/ Rhein    \nThe Rhein River is a major river in Europe.  Worms is famous for its cathedral, and as the\nplace where Martin Luther was the subject of a court case in 1521.   The mushroom, red with white spots, is\nconsidered \u201cgood luck\u201d as is the chimney sweep. \nI\u2019ve never seen that kind of mushroom and I don\u2019t know why it is \u201cgood\nluck.\u201d  I\u2019m sure the sweep brings good\nluck because a clogged chimney can start a fire.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Berchtesgaden is town up in the Alps where I rode a ski\nlift to the top.  I remember being\nterrified!  But the view was wonderful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The salamander is also considered \u201cgood luck\u201d because he\nis thought to be able to withstand high heat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year, 2019, I asked my granddaughter if she would\nlike this hat and she accepted.  I had it\ncleaned and cleaned all the little pins and put them back.  I researched the places they represent to\ntell her about them, and to suggest she might someday make a trip to retrace my\nsteps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a small child in her grandparents\u2019 home, my mother\nwould gaze at a picture above the table while her grandfather said mealtime\nprayers.  The picture showed a waterfall\ncoming over a mill in the German home town of Grandpa.  One day he said to her, \u201cMaybe someday, you\nwill go to Germany and visit the old home place.\u201d  And, decades later, she did.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have suggested to my granddaughter that just as my great grandpa\u2019s words came true for my mom, my words may come true for her.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Christmas I turned nine, my family lived in Germany, because my Dad was in the U.S. Air Force.  That year, my main gift was a special hat, called a Bavarian Hat, or sometimes called Tyrolean hat. Usually these hats are green, but mine was a natural wool color, not quite white.   My brother woke […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=500"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":503,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500\/revisions\/503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkingwithjulia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}