Sonntag
9:00 - 11:30 - Leave from hotel with David, Rachel, and Michelle to go to the Dom for a Lutheran service featuring a full Bach cantata on the Silbermann organ in the great Freiberg cathedral!
11:30-12:30 - Drinks at the bakery across the street with Dr. Maddison
12:30-1:30 - Lunch on my own
1:30-2:30 - Bakery outing with David (lots of these!)
2:30-4:30 - Clean room and complete financial organization via excel; Skype 1: Jonathan and Claire
4:30-5:30 - Bible study with David, Leah, and Melissa
5:30-6:30 - Dinner at Red Box
6:30-7:00 - Sitting in my room
7:00-7:30 - Realizing that my cheap dinner at the Red Box was not enough to fill me and going downtown to find something
7:30 - everything I'd consider is closed
8:00 - Back in my room
8:20-9:15 - Skype 2: Gustavo
9:15-10:10 - Skype 3: Jonathan and Claire. Again.
10:10-10:45 - Listen to Rachel's arrangement
We visited the big local cathedral this morning for the 10:00 church service. I took pictures of the outside and posted it on a previous blog entry. The building is incredibly stunning both on the inside and outside. It's so beautiful and so large that no picture can capture its grandeur. It's as if the architects are telling us God is so great that He cannot be contained in one picture from any angle. The main draw for us was to hear the great Silbermann organ that inhabits this wonderful structure. This particular service actually featured a full Bach cantata prior to the sermon, and the service ended with a really wonderful fugue (BWV 541) as a postlude. The musicians were great, too. The service was run in German, so it was neat for me to try to catch certain words here and there, and I also learned several religious words as well by placing myself in this context. The whole time, I was thinking, wow, I'm really here in Germany in this wonderful cathedral for a Lutheran service listening to this wonderful music by J.S. Bach. That was quite a treat this morning. I may end up eventually not only getting a chance to touch the instrument but also to get a couple of organ lessons on it!
I believe Silbermann was a contemporary of Bach and he built 4 organs that live in Freiberg. This particular organ was built in the early 1700s and was restored a couple hundred years later. Another neat thing to note is that the angels hanging on the organ are holding REAL instruments.
For lunch, I had what's called a "dönen," which is a kind of gyro-like sandwich that you can find all over the place. There are three kinds of shops I see all the time: 1) Bäckerei (bakeries) 2) Eis-Cafes (for ice cream) 3) Dönen shops. I might try it one or two more times while I'm here.
Something that amazes me about the stores here is that most of them close very early. It really is amazing how much more overworked America seems with its places open till 10, 11 or 12 at night and its 24 hour shops. I ran into some trouble this evening after my dinner run with David. I felt a need to find more food, but alas, when I went downtown, the shops I wanted to pursue were closed. Multiple times now, David and I have attempted to get ice cream or desserts at stores that would close before we'd get there, and usually that'd be around 6:30! I really need to be smarter about food this week. The goal is to spend less while still eating adventurously and sufficiently. Both my wallet and stomach will find it to be a challenge.
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