1969 Catherine's Letter -Dec.2

Münster, Tuesday

December 2, 1969

Dear Mother, Dad, Roberta, Serena, John and Mary,

Hi!  I was glad to get yor letter today including the one from Grandma and the clippings.

I'm glad you had a nice Thanksgiving.  Our banquet went pretty well.  The hotel manager's wife is a 24-year-old American from Kettering, Ohio, so she knew a little about traditional Thanksgiving dinners.  The parents all seemed to enjoy themselves.  We supplied a little entertainment, singing, etc.

The big news is that we finally have our itinerary finished for Christmas.  We have to go to the Bahnhof (train station) and reserve all our first class tickets yet and also write to the youth hostels for reservations and on the 19th we take off.  Since we are required to check every 48 hours for messages I will give you the addresses:

[See details on the scanned letter for the details which include Lucerne, Switzerland; Vienna, Austria; Rome and Florence Italy; Nice, France; Ibiza, Spain; Madrid, Spain; Lisbon, Portugal.]

And then on Sunday [Jan.11, 1970] we'll be back home.  The AE stands for American Express Office.  It took us a couple hours to get all the train schedules figured out and getting over to Ibiza by boat.

I was really glad to get the pen.  It sure makes writing alot more pleasant.  I haven't written hardly any letters the last few days.  Not only do I have other things to do but I just haven't been in a letter writing mood.  If you'd like a few statistics I received 45 letters in November, 11 of which were from you all, Joe or Grandma.  That compares with 34 letters in October with 8 from you all & Joe.  In October I spent 360.5 DM and in November 238.56.  The difference is about one week in Berlin.

I've been working at "Die Brücke" about 3 afternoons a week.  I enjoy working there as Frau Völlmer helps me with German, I can more or less choose what I want to do, and it gives me a chance to ride my Fahrrad [bicycle]-- as otherwise it is too cold to budge out of the house.  It is now pitch dark between 4:15 and 4:30 PM.

The department stores downtown have pretty big grocery stores but mostly there are alot of stores about twice the size of Sweeney's with about the same variety of stuff.  there are also lots of specialty shops -- butcher, bakery.  Most close between 12 and 3 every day and all of Wednesday and Saturday afternoons.  The closest thing to an American 5 and 10¢ store is a Woolworths, which is exactly like Woolworth's in the U.S. except the prices are in German.  Also for some strange reason the sales clerks speak German.

I've been getting old Herald-Tribunes from "die Brücke" so now although I'm always about 5 days behind I have some idea what is going on in the world  I really like the paper.

Gee, I hope I have a stamp to mail this.  Write soon and send me your christmas plans!

Love, Catherine