Dear "Allmachers" worldwide, there have not been any genealogical news recently - but this list is also meant to keep in touch generally - let me begin: What are the news from St.Gallen? The children have experienced the major events last year. Roland had finished school in autumn 2000 and then worked (local supermarket) a few months to earn some pocket money for his US journey. In March 2001 he went to Boston for 3 months to attend a language school. He stayed with a family outside Boston - so he had to travel a fair amount, but really felt at home with the family. Late June / early July he then spent 2 weeks in New York, which obviously included a visit to the World Trade Center: we just don't want to imagine what could have happened in case the terrorists had planned their attack a couple of months earlier! Obviously he spent more pocket money as he had - so back in Switzerland he was working again (post office, beginning at 5 am) - before he started studying geography at Zuerich University in October. Though it's quite difficult to find reasonable accomodation in Zuerich, Mareile finally found a nice, though small, one-bedroom flat in the outskirts, but only a minute to walk to the tramway, bringing him to the University within about 15 min. Like Laura had done, he usually visits us on weekends - so Mareile can look after his dirty washing ;-). "As Laura had done" indicates that she's not doing that any longer: she has finished her course in Chur after 3 years (she's now an "Information and Documentation Specialist") - with the best grading of the entire course! As she was doing her diploma work at the St.Gallen State Library, she returned home before she actually finished: in October we were glad to have a large car, as some of her furniture went straight from Chur to Zuerich, i.e. Roland's flat. She's "taking a rest" at the moment (diploma celebration was only Saturday, Dec. 8th). In January she'll start working in Zuerich (but stay with us) at Credit Suisse, one of the large Swiss banks, to conduct internet research for them - until August. It's not finalised yet, but she then plans to continue her studies and do an M.Sc. in Information Management at Glasgow (Scotland) University. Let's go back two generations: my mother is still very active, though finding that, at the age of 81, she has to take some things a bit slower - which includes walking around the house: in spring she fell and broke her forearm - luckily when she visited my brother Ludwig in Berlin, so she wasn't on her own as would have been the case in Augsburg. Healing took somewhat longer than hoped - but in the meantime she seems to be back to normal. She'll be in Berlin again for Christmas, and then come to St.Gallen on 27 Dec for a week or so. That will give us finally a chance to discuss her anti-abortion web page more effectively: <http://www.lebensfreunde.de/> (sorry - all in German - but you'll see a picture of her, when looking for "Meinungen - Seelentag"). BTW - the cute little girl on the start page is Laura - but a few years back ;-). Nora (<http://www.genealogienetz.de/privat/seelentag/nora.jpg>) also had some surgery: a fairly large mass had to be removed from her hindleg a couple of weeks ago; it turned out to be benign - but healing will still take a while - which doesn't seem to bother her at all. Despite her age (almost 10) she enjoys the present weather (some snow and emperatures as low as minus 15° Celsius = about 5° F) and chases around whenever allowed (we have to be a bit careful near roads, as she would chase foxes and martens, which we see here at the edge of the city quite freqently, instead of watching the traffic). Mareile still is impeded by her knee problems and has given up her TaiChi/Qigong - at least for the time being being, to give her knees a rest. She had been teaching part time at a TaiChi Institute, and hopes to resume that later. Time was another reason for this decision: obviously the two kids moving from an to St.Gallen, finding a place for Roland, and a new tenant for Laura's flat in Chur was quite time consuming. So we had only a short holiday in May, when Mareile and myself visited Roland for 10 days in Boston; Laura had visited him earlier for about two weeks. We all enjoyed the trip and the sights of Boston. Just the return trip was "a bit heavy" - literally: Roland being into HipHop (and planning a "second career" as disc jockey) he frequently had visited all sorts of vinyl shops, and in the end each of us had 2 suitcases (i.e. 8 alltogether) topped up to the weight limit to take home. Finally me - not too much to report: the hospital keeps me busy (as usual) - so do my genealogy webpages (as usual). I have been to a few conferences, including one in Belfast, travelling on 11 Sep and seeing the attacs on WTC when changing planes at London-Heathrow; my luggage was lost in the turmoil - which is of course negligible compared to what other people suffered. In October I was elected for a second 2-year term as President of the Swiss Society of Radiation Biology and Medical Physics. In March we started treating prostate cancer with Iodine seeds at our clinic - the first center in Switzerland to do so, which resulted in some TV coverage, both regional and nationwide. More recently all computers (1400) were replaced, and we are planning a modernisation of the entire clinic, after more than 10 years in the present setting: this will take some 3 years and likely be my last major project at the hospital. We all send you our wishes for a Merry Christmas and all the best for the New Year ! Wolf and Family __________________ Wolf Seelentag, Ph.D. Reherstr. 19 CH - 9016 St.Gallen +41 (0) 71 - 288 51 21 [email protected] (note this new address - I now have internet at home as well)