Paper to Partridges

Liebe Familie und Freunde,
This project that I had been working on with the elementary students about paper is now coming to an end. It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed working with the kids. There is now just some closing-up work to do with that, then I can focus on my new projects. Last week I started this project that tracks the population of partridges (yes, the one that sits in a pear tree at Christmas time) in the open fields near Göttingen. The partridges are most active at dawn and dusk, so it requires getting up early in the morning and then heading back out in the late evening. Luckily I don`t have to do both everyday. In the mornings ( about 5:00am) we go out and try to catch them by surrounding an already captured partridge with traps and waiting for the other partridges to come inspect the scene. When we catch them, we put different transmiters on the male and females, which enables us to track the amount of mating pairs there are. In the evening we use telemetry to call them and record how many called back and therefore get an idea of how many there are in a area. It is a lot harder than it sounds!!
I have been continuing my office work at the environmental protection center, doing whatever they need me to do. I stay pretty busy and enjoy it a lot.
Last week my grandmother came for a short visit from where she was staying in England. It was really nice to see her, it`s just too bad she couldn` t stay longer. We only had time to walk through the old part town and see the botanical gardens (where I will be working in April!) and have some "Kaffee und Kuchen" that my grandmother so fondly remembers from her previous trips to Germany.
I did some visiting my self two weekends ago to see my German friend, Phyllis, who I met in Argentina. She lives in a nearby city called Osnabrück. It was so nice to see her again and hear her speak German! I had only ever spoke English and Spanish with her. Phyllis`s father is from Texas and he speaks English with her and her siblings, but they respond in German. It´s the funniest thing to sit at the dinner table with them and listen to their 2-language conversations. Osnabrück is a very pretty city with lots of huge, old churches and cobble stone walkways. Very European. We went to the outdoor market on Saturday morning and strolled through all the very colourful stands and displays. There are so many different types of produce that I had never seen before, and I worked at a grocery store for a year back in Rhode Island. My favorite new discovery was dried chinese lanterns or in German, Physalis. There were also dried kiwis and strawberries--yum! But the best part of these Wochemnärkte is the relationship the vendors have with their customers. Its very cute. It makes me think of that opening scene of the Disney version of Beauty and the Beast where Bell is on her way through the town to the book store and all the towns people are doing their daily purchases. There seems to be a movement in the US to try to get back to this familiar way of grocery shopping. My question is, why did we let ourselves run astray from such a lovely thing??

So the trip to England is a definite. I´m so excited! March 19-25. It´s coming up fast and I still have to work out the details. I´ll write again when I get back! Have a great spring break everyone!
Liebe Grüße,
Elena