It’s not over yet
March 6, 2026
Werner picked up Michael Junior (Michael Schmelzer) in Teningen around noon. Birgit and Michael also arrived at Werner’s at 2:00 p.m.
The hardware (8 motherboards) was distributed, and we then prepared for our trip to Frankfurt with coffee and butter pretzels. Before Karlsruhe, we were caught up in a German monster, a traffic jam, which added about an hour to our journey. The rest of the journey went smoothly.
Once we arrived in Frankfurt, we parked our car in the parking garage and checked in for our flight and dropped off our luggage at Terminal 1. We then took the S-Bahn to our hotel. We ended the evening with a cozy dinner.
The next morning (March 7, 2026), we handed in our room cards and took the S-Bahn back to the airport. Thanks to Michael Scholtz, who had booked a time slot for our security check, we didn’t have to wait in the long line and were able to get through security and passport control very quickly. Our flight took off at 11:45 a.m., and we spent the next 8.5 hours on the plane.
After landing, Werner was the last one through passport control. Then our luggage was X-rayed, and, as expected, our hardware attracted attention and we were pulled aside. Our usual battle with customs began again. Sr. Lucy had not received a customs exemption certificate, so our two Michaels had to argue with the customs officials. Our pro forma invoice was helpful in proving the value of the hardware. But they still wanted to charge us import duty. It was irrelevant that these were donations. Donations (hardware) are also subject to customs duty. After an hour, the customs officials gave up and handed us back our passports – without charging us any customs duty. Afterwards, Sr. Lucy, Sr. Hilda, and the driver welcomed us warmly and took us to the convent. After dinner together, we went to our rooms and went to bed.
We took it easy on Sunday. The notebooks for the Sisters were prepared, and in the afternoon we took a short trip to the Garden City (shopping center) and purchased a few urgently needed items.