Back in Duisburg again

Here we are for what seems to have become our yearly trip to Duisburg, Germany.  This time we are staying in the International Guesthouse, in the same apartment we stayed in for our first visit, 4 years ago.  They've freshened it up quite a bit, removing our biggest annoyance -- it used to be very dark, but they have added new lights and upped the wattage of others, and we can now even see to read at night.

We just arrived yesterday, so we are still working through jetlag and finding all the things we need to set up housekeeping.  My biggest accomplishment yesterday was that I set up our router and we now can connect all our devices.  The apartment comes with wired internet.  Not too handy when most of our devices don't have even a slot for an internet cable (not to mention the challenges of sharing 1 wire among 8 devices).  Last time we were here, our host lent us a router and other equipment (also a printer, but we never got that to work).  This time, since we had an extra router sitting around (thank you, T-Mobile, for giving us a free one), we brought it. but I thought it might take several days to get it connected, including getting advice from their IT people.  After I got through one major misconception (I thought that since there is a hard-wired IP address at the other end, I needed my laptop, where I was setting up the router, to use that hardwired address), it worked like a charm.  Now the apartment is perfect, or what passes for perfect in small, short term rentals.

Today was more shopping; we got "emergency rations" yesterday, but today I went to the vege store, the butcher and the big supermarket.  (Daily shopping at multiple stores is a German sport).  Here is a photo of the little vegetable and fruit store that I frequent.

I thought I would show you how German food packaging is different from what we expect in the US.  Here is a picture of the packaging that the (carefully handselected by the proprieter) brussel sprouts came in, and the one that the chicken breasts from the butcher came in.  I assume you can tell which is which.  Both of these are just unwaxed paper -- the chicken isn't dripping with juices that would leak all over the paper, probably because it is fresher than what we expect meat to be.

I also had my first German lesson this afternoon, so I'm off to do my homework