Now for something completely different...

We had a very odd sort of day yesterday. After debating whether or not to write a post about it, I decided (with Michael's input) to go ahead and write it. I feel a little protective of Jena. I love this city, and apart from the distance between us and our families, I love our life here. So I want to share what happened yesterday, but I also want to make clear that it was an anomaly. Sometimes East Germany gets a bad rap, and I would hate to do anything to encourage people to think dismissively or derisively about a place that I love so much. So, with that little disclaimer in place, I'll just get to the point.

The weather has been absolutely perfect for over a week now. Sunny, warm, clear and just perfect. After a family trip to the park yesterday morning, we took another family outing to our favorite ice cream place in the evening. (I've said it before and I'll say it again, ice cream before dinner is one of my favorite perks of being an adult.) Anyone who has visited us--whether for a day or 2 weeks--has been to the Eis Cafe Riva. That's where the blog photos of the magnificent ice cream creations were taken, and it's the best ice cream I've ever had in my life. There are at least 3o tables outside (maybe way more, I'm terrible at guessing) and we grabbed the only empty one we saw. So that's the setting: a perfect sunny evening our favorite, jam-packed Italian ice cream shop.

We heard a loud bang, and I asked Michael what it was. (Why I always assume he has the answer to these questions I don't know.) He said it was probably a firework, and I said "Who lights fireworks in the middle of the afternoon?" Then we saw a large group of people marching up the street towards us. (We'd guess 30-40 or so, but again that's just a guess.) They were holding a banner, but we couldn't make out more than a word or two. ("Menschen" and "zuruck"; "people" and "back") The people in the front wore white masks that reminded me of the movie Scream. I looked at Michael and said "Should we be scared?"

Before he could answer, they descended on a group of about 6 young guys sitting nearby--not customers--and started pounding on at least one of them. At this point things moved pretty quickly, and I'm not sure that all of what I remember is accurate. I remember seeing them punch someone, and at that point Michael and I--and everyone else--were standing up. (Michael was holding David.) Then I remember seeing that the group didn't stop advancing, but kept coming, and that tables were being knocked over and glass was breaking. I pushed Michael and yelled for him to run. I think I had about a thousand thoughts in those few seconds. I worried that this was anti-foreigner sentiment (we were, after all, at a very successful Italian restaurant) and that, if so, the American couple with a baby would made a good target. I worried that hurting a baby, any baby, would be a good way of making a very dramatic statement. In retrospect, I can't imagine anyone actually targeting a baby, but as a mother I was really freaking out.

We were headed, with the crowd, towards a side street to get away when I noticed that they were now standing in that street as well. I felt totally trapped, and I've just never experienced anything like it before. There is a coffee shop between the Eis Cafe and the street, and they were rapidly closing up. The walls are all glass, giant sliding doors, and the coffee shop was almost full of people and they were closing them in. We stood there, and it turns out we were both thinking the same thing: if we go in, we might be safer, but we might also just be trapped. I mean, if you're looking for a target, then the 50 people crammed into a closed space are the obvious choice. Finally, the man closing up yelled at us to get in ("you have a baby, get in!") and we did. He closed up, and we watched for a minute or two before the group ran off.

After a few minutes, the police came and things looked alright again, so we went back to the Eis Cafe. We found our table, and our ice cream sundae was smashed on its side, a pile of broken glass and melted ice cream right next to David's pacifier. (Amazingly, our camera was still there untouched.) The waiter came by to see if David was Ok, and said he'd remake our sundae. I didn't really want ice cream anymore, but I also didn't feel right just leaving, so we sat (at a new table, of course), ate ice cream, and decompressed. Had the police not been right there, I never could have stayed there. Pretty soon, there were Police helicopters circling overhead, and vans all around the city. As of this morning's news, it doesn't seem that they caught anybody.

Looking back at what happened, it seems extremely unlikely that Michael, David and I were in any danger of being targeted. At the time, though, I had absolutely no frame of reference for what was going on. They were shooting fireworks out of a little hand-held cannon, and for all I knew, they were about to throw a bomb. It sounds so melodramatic, but in the moment it felt completely within the realm of possibility. It was so surreal, and happened so quickly, I just felt like anything could have followed from what we were witnessing.

It now seems likely that the group was targing the youth that were sitting near the cafe, and after the fight (or attack) we realized that the victims were skinheads, and that at least one of them was wearing a white-power T-shirt. There are almost always kids, or youth, hanging out where they were, so it seems likely that they were the planned target. Why they advanced into the ice cafe I don't know, and they were clearly looking to scare us all.

We checked an online Jena paper this morning, but the article had less information than we did. It did, however, have a picture of our table. That was a little weird. Here's the link if you'd like to see it.

http://www.otz.de/otz/otz.jena.volltext.php?kennung=on3otzLOKStaJena39914&zulieferer=otz&kategorie=LOK&rubrik=Stadt&region=Jena&auftritt=OTZ&dbserver=1

I took a picture or two as well--I couldn't resist--so I guess I'll post them too.

This was our table. (That's David's paci up top.)
Some more damage nearby.

To end on a nicer note, David was totally and completely unfazed by all of this. When it had all settled down and were standing in the coffe shop, I started to cry. I could not stop shaking. David, on the other hand, did not so much as bat an eye at the whole thing. As my mother suggested, I think Michael gets the credit for that. He stayed calm, and he was holding David. Had I been holding David, he would surely have cried if only to say "Stop squeezing me so hard, I can't breathe!!!"

so here's David, after the fiasco and after a little bit of ice cream: