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Once upon a time, about two weeks ago, I was hiking the
Grossbottwar valley near Heilbronn with some German friends. As we walked
through the dark forest, the light grew dim under the dense treetops. Although
it was only midday, we had to continue onward in semi darkness.
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| Imagine my surprise, when as we came to a crossing in
the road in the middle of the forest, we saw an old woman quietly sitting
at a folding table. She wore the traditional peasant woman’s outfit of
at least two frocks, one on top of the other. God knows how many more layers
were below. (Not that anyone would want to know.)
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| She spoke to us in some incomprehensible
language that appeared to be from some other world. "grussgottwellatihranschnaps"
She said, or so it seemed to my American ears. For although I speak some
German, I didn’t have the faintest idea what she was saying. Her appearance,
and the whole surrounding scene, caused my imagination to run wild. It
all reminded me of that old fairy tale about Hansel and Gretel. Were we,
like they, to suffer some cruel fate in the forest?
I looked about for the gingerbread cottage. Maybe there could even be an oven around somewhere. Then, thanks to my friend’s translation, I finally understood that this old woman was selling homemade Schnaps! After some questioning, the woman told us that she worked every day on the farm - except on Sunday. "Because you just don’t work on a Sunday." On that day, She walks to the forest carrying a bucket, table, some glasses, and a bottle of Schnaps. There she sets up her little stand and tries to sell drinks to passerbies. Some days she sells nothing at all. Other days she only sells one or two glasses. This was her lucky day! We all had one or more glasses - happy in the knowledge that the high alcohol content would kill any germs left on our glasses by her previous clients. The old woman was happy as well. She even recited a poem for us, but it was so full of Swabian slang that it is impossible for my friends to translate it for me. However, the gist of it lay in that curious Swabian concept that the only possible (and allowed) enjoyment comes from a job well done. |
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| When we finally continued our hike, albeit somewhat
unsteadily, we left her with a happy smile on her face - and on ours too.
This was truly a job well done!
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"Und wenn sie nicht gestorben sind…" The schnapps hadn’t killed us, the old woman was a little richer, and we all lived on! |
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