My lovely friends invited me over for some "wichteln," which was very enjoyable (but also a bit confusing, because of my understanding of German, or lack thereof). They had decorated for Christmas and even created a jaunty, if not lopsided, gingerbread house.
We ate dinner, played Dixit (my new favorite tabletop game, though it's certainly not new), and exchanged small gifts. Then something interesting happened. My friend had been joking (or so I thought) about eating the gingerbread house. Imagine our surprise when she brought it to the table on its tray and presented it to us, as one would a glorious turkey.
We actually ate the gingerbread house*! Do people actually do that? Where will Hansel and Gretl live**? Did we violate social norms somehow? Or is this not so unusual? Have you heard of anyone doing this? I did make a joke about Germany being really good about recycling so we were merely doing our part.
Despite it being slightly dry as a result of being displayed for 3 weeks, it tasted good. We knocked off the "shingles" (Haribo random gummies) and then started chipping off the gingerbread facade.
It was so enjoyable that we plan to repeat the experience next year. For some reason they want to build me a Barbie gingerbread house. Of course I had to tell them about the Barbie dreamhouse in Berlin and that whole story. Somehow we decided that we'll make a gingerbread house to eat in June so we'd have something to look forward to, and that it would be a Barbie beach house. I love my wacky friends.
*Not all of it, technically.
**Okay, so they probably ran for their lives or something like that after the witch tried to eat them, but still!
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