Early December 2002 - news from Raoul and Helen
[This page is also available in German/auf Deutsch.]


It's almost Christmas again and with it come our best wishes for a joyful and peaceful celebration of Christ's birth.

Both of us have had a good year for which we are very thankful. Our various commitments have continued much as before. For Helen there were weekend courses in pre-marriage education for young couples, and in Grief and Loss for family therapy students. She continued working part time in pastoral care at Calvary Hospital as well as visiting Lutheran patients there in her role as Lutheran chaplain. Her role as mentor in a program for mothers of young children (MOPS) run by our congregation has given her much pleasure, especially since our own grandchildren are far away in Germany. Raoul continued to offer two 12-week courses at the University of the Third Age (U3A) to interested and interesting groups of students. He has also again headed the committee that put on forums (short lectures followed by discussion) on the 13 Tuesdays in June, August and October. This year's series has been hailed as U3A's best yet.

Raoul enjoyed himself in the early part of the year preparing for our overseas trip (Aug.-Oct.). We left Sydney for Vancouver on 11 August and enjoyed Victoria, especially the Butchart Gardens in their summer splendour, on Vancouver Island, together with Raoul's friend from Cornell College days, Gary Menges. From Bellingham, WA, we took the ferry Matanuska of the Alaska Marine Highway System up the Inside Passage, visiting Ketchikan, Wrangell, Petersburg, Sitka, Juneau, Haines and Skagway where we followed the Klondike goldrush trail of 1901. On one of the four nights on the ferry we saw the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) in its shimmering midnight glory, an awesome experience. Since seeing pictures as a child in an encyclopaedia Helen had been fascinated by this polar phenomenon. From Haines we travelled to Fairbanks by shuttle bus, from where we took the Alaska Railroad to the entrance of Denali (Mt McKinley) Park. A shuttle bus took us 130 km westwards to our Backcountry Lodge. We stayed for two nights and studied the tundra, Arctic vegetation (wild berries), and wildlife (bears, Dall sheep, moose, caribou etc). We did see Mt Denali (6311 m high), though only just. Fortunately, because it was late in the season the billions of mosquitoes for which Alaska is known were already dead. Another stunning ride on Alaska Rail brought us to Anchorage where we rented a car to explore some of the Kenai Fjords National Park with its icefields, glaciers and fjords. We enjoyed discovering traces of earlier human settlement, especially the Tlingit Indians and the Russians. James Michener's Alaska greatly enriched our enjoyment and understanding of the most northern US State. The General Menaion, the church order Raoul's great-grandfather Nicholas Orloff published for the Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska in 1899 still seems to be known, but little used today.

We flew from Anchorage via Seattle and New York to Frankfurt where we recovered from our Alaska adventure in Wiesbaden with Richard, Keryn, Martin (6 ½) and Thomas (5). Martin is now a schoolboy. Thomas is desperately hoping he will be allowed to start school in August 2003. He is a "kann Kind," rather than a "muss Kind," i.e. he may start if there is room and he is considered ready for school but he does not have to start. Helen enjoyed early breakfasts with Martin, then walked part of the way to school with him. Both boys are now fluent in German as well as in English and with Keryn and Richard, well settled into life and work in Wiesbaden. They are involved in an English speaking church in Frankfurt where Helen enjoyed helping out at a Vacation Bible School one Saturday. While the Wiesbaden Middelmanns hosted other Australian visitors, Raoul and Helen visited Berlin, Raoul's sister Astrid near Munich and his brother Udo and family in Gryon, Switzerland, returning later for more time in Wiesbaden.

On 29 September we began the third 'chapter' of our trip, spending time in Istanbul, Turkey. This magnificent city of 12 million on the Bosphorus is a meeting place of Asia and Europe with 3,000 years of history. It is truly worth a visit. Mosques, palaces, bazaars, carpet sellers, the sights and aromas of many spices, persistent shoeshine boys (two of them, one middle-aged, finally "got" us) all make for a fascinating and vibrant city. Helen's birthday present (shared with Raoul) was a day trip by plane to Kayseri where we were met by a car with a driver who took us to visit the dwellings and monasteries in the caves of Cappodocia, some of which go back to the 4th century A.D.

Life returned to normal on 11 October, back in Canberra with our tax returns to complete (Raoul) and exams to mark (Helen). Raoul has again written a detailed travel report, which is available on request.

Miriam met us at the bus from Sydney with spring flowers from her garden. She continues to work at Geoscience Australia. Robert works at Angas Park (dried fruits) in Loxton, S.A. Nicola is doing a social work course while Craig continues his work with CSIRO in Geelong, VIC.





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