A Tale of Oma's Determination and Haferflockenkuchen

Today is my Oma's birthday, she is 92 years young! So to honor her, today's post is another story from my fabled trip acompanying Oma across the land of her youth. It is actually the story of my 22nd birthday and how Oma yet again, inspired and influenced the direction of my life.

 So far, we had celebrated Easter with the Pope at the Vatican and spent a week in Oma's birth city, Meran, Südtirol. There, we stayed in a 300 year old house as guests of Father Eugen, the man who replaced Oma's brother, Father Stefan, who had been the presiding priest there for 60 years.

Oma was giving me a short tour of the cavernous 300 year old house where her brother lived for 60 years with his fellow priests. I then went around and tried to pry my way into every room, sure I was going to find and entrance to Narnia!

On a freezing morning of April the 18th, in the tiny Alpine village of Teisten, Südtirol where my Oma grew up, Oma and I set off on a walk to the tiny city of Welsberg, just down the mountain from Teisten. From there, we walked back up a rather steep hill to reach the 17th century castle and 11th century castle ruins on the opposite hill behind Oma's childhood home. I was deeply concerned for Oma as even though she was bundled up in a heavy coat and wrapped in a scarf, her whole face was blue! I chidded myself for bringing and old woman yet again beyond her limits. However, stubborn and determined not to let the hills of her childhood defeat her, she trudged along and climbed that hill up to the castles! In the month that Oma and I spent in Tiesten, we walked everywhere and even spotted an 97 year old, former class mate of Oma's riding her bike up a hill that I had trouble walking! I'm not lying! The fountain of youth must trickle down from the tippy tops of the Alps.

This Oma and said school friend looking at an old class photo circa 1925. I swear on my life, she was riding her bike around town!

When we reached the 17th century castle, still occupied by the relatives of the Duke that employed my great grand father to rebuild the outer castle walls and gave him the opposite hill as payment, we were saddened to find that the draw bridge to the entrance had collapsed that winter from the wieght of the snow, so the castle was not open for visitors. However, Oma was able to share her own stories from the outside of the castle, carrying stones to the building site and picking mushrooms in the woods to feed the family.

It is difficult to see, but that is not a complete bridge.

The easiest part of the wall to see that my great grandfather rebuilt.

From there, there was a trail leading up to the 11th century castle ruins. Oma was a little tired and I encouraged her to sit on a wooden thrown just off the trail. I promised to run up to the ruins, take a few pictures and return shortly, which I did. Oma however, even at the age of 90 was never one to sit around. When I returned to the wooden thrown, I found it empty! Panicked, I called out for her and she responded by yodeling half way up the hill to the ruins, which I had just run down! So I started running back up the hill, which quickly became a walk and found her much farther than I ever thought she could have climbed. She angrily accosted me for leaving her to rot on that chair! A lesson, I quickly learned was that my Oma would rather die in action before she sat idly by, letitng me have an adventure.

The 11th century castle ruins directly opposite Oma's childhood house.



The 17th century castle from the 11th century castle ruins. 

 We returned to our rooms to rest and warm up before my birthday lunch with Oma's only two remaining spinster sisters: Pia and Miranda. Their friends and care takers Frau Anna and Frau Rose were also joining us for dinner. We had a simple platter of Speck, the specialty cured meat from Südtirol garnished with quail's egg and cherry tomato "toadstools." My great aunt Miranda insisted on baking my birthday cake rather than letting Oma buy one at the bakery, she made a Haferflockenkuchen, which means "oatmeal cake." It is a dense butter cake with oats and topped with powdered sugar and more rolled oats. Oma, who usually makes her very special multi layered Rum cake for our birthdays, brought 22 candles because she was not sure that the Europeans would have them. They did, but Oma was prepared anyway. So, Oma and Miranda set my Haferflockenkuchen, ablaze with 22 lit candles in front of me to blow out. I drew a great big breath to blow out all of the candles, which I did, successfully; however, I also blew all of the powdered sugar and rolled oats off the top of the cake all over the table! Frau Anna laughed hysterically. Somehow, someone should have seen that coming....

Haferflockenkuchen

Frau Anna, Oma, and Frau Rose crossing the street.

Oma's last surviving siblings, Miranda, Oma, and Pia.

So my 22nd birthday was low key. I spent it with Oma, roaming the hills of her youth and eating at the table where she ate many meals growing up. Oma proved that day and all throughout the trip that age is just a number. May we all be so blessed as to be capable of half of Oma's accomplishments at half her age! As for inspiring the direction of my life, my birthday just happened to occur during that trip, however, every year since then, I have been blessed with the opportunity to travel abroad during my birthday. I hope to continue that trend for as long as is reasonably possible.

Achtung! Giant Mountain Eagles Have Been Spotted in the Area

In the spring of 2009, my Oma(grandma) and I went on her farewell tour of her homeland, the Alto Adige region of Italy or Südtirol as it is known to the people who live there. During and after the turmoil of war, Südtirol was claimed by many countries. In 1990, it was finally, once and for all declared a semi autonomus region of Italy. However, the people follow their Austrain heritage and speak German.

At the age of 89, Oma was probably healthier than me, but it was deffinately her last trip to Europe. Though, last year she went to Peru and climbed up Machu Picchu, crediting her Alpine mountain heritage.
Oma and I had many adventures and misadventures that trip, which amuse my friends for days when I share the stories. There are quite a few after traveling for almost two months through Italy and Germany with an 89 year old, nearly deaf, stubborn Oma without an itinerary.

After spending a week in Oma's birthplace: Meran, Italy, Oma and I travelled to the tiny Alpine village of Teisten, where her family moved when she was very young. I was excited to see the house her father had built and the castle on the next hill which I had heard so much about from Oma. I stepped out of the taxi in the driveway of Oma's house where her only two remaining spinster sisters live. Pia, now 80 and Miranda, now 79 have lived in that house their entire lives. They have never left Südtirol and only Pia has ever had a job, she is the bread winner. Miranda does the cooking,cleaning, gardening and wood chopping.

When I stepped out I was greeted heartily by both of Oma's sisters and a wall of chatter I could not understand. This was the first time I had expirienced this. In Meran I understood everything, my four years of high school German sprang back to life in an instant. This, whatever, they were speaking puzzeled me. I asked the cab driver if they were speaking German and he erupted with laughter. He explained that they were speaking in dialect. We stayed in Teisten for almost a month so I became very acustomed to their dialect but in that first hour I didn't understand a word.

Oma stood and chatted with her sisters while I looked around not able to understand what was being said. Eager to see the castle behind the house, I started marching to the back. Pia quickly came running after me and stopped me. She spoke very dramitcaly about a giant mountain Eagle, spreading her arms wide. Oma had told me at least a dozen times at that point about how giant, black mountain eales used to eat their chickens. Pia didn't want me to go back there because the eagle had already eaten several village children and she was afraid it might take me too. Immeadiately, I thought of an old Popeye cartoon I watched as a kid: "Popeye meets Sinbad the Sailor." Sinbad(Bluto) had a giant bird that he used to do his ill biding.

I stood there in disbelief with an eyebrow cocked trying to formulate the words in German for "I'm not scared of a giant eagle. I can fight it off." Luckily, before I opened my mouth and made a fool out of myself, Oma was at my side listening to Pia. I looked down at Oma as if to say "is she for real?!" and Oma said to me "isn't that great! they have a....a..... (she stumbled for the english word) peacock.
A PEACOCK?! I thought to myself... how the hell do two old ladies who hardly leave their tiny village have a pet peacock?!

Seeing that I didn't understand, Oma translated the story: they claim that it just showed up in the woods on the backside of their house as a young pult. They named it Hansi and hand raised it, but it is very shy because they think several village kids had tortured it. They didn't want me to go to the back of the house because I might scare it away and it might never come back. BOY, was I wrong!

I did go all around the house and climbed all over those hills and I never did get a good look at Hansi. Just a quick snap shot of him running away when he saw me. But the day that Oma and I hiked up the hills surronding Teisten, we heard his screach like caw ringing through the valley.