School bags

Spring is the time to buy school supplies in Germany. That's why we had so much trouble finding supplies when we first moved here in August. Germans are efficient, logical people, but the timing on this issue has me stumped. Come August, when most German kids go back to school, you will have to hunt around for the items you need. Those big back-to-school displays will be long gone.

German backpacks for kids around Emilie's age look like this one. They have a rigid structure and are brightly colored. Emilie would love one, but they are very expensive (about $100-$150) and her 2-year old L.L.Bean backpack is still going strong.

The backpack usually come with a few extras, such as the matching pencil case, school calendar, sports bag and wallet. But something is missing.

Last summer, we bought James a cool lunchbox that matched his L.L.Bean backpack. We even had it embroidered with a soccer player and his initials so that the chances of it going missing would be minimized.

It went missing the second week of school. Hasn't been seen since.

So, James has been using his old lunchbox, but felt that it was too babyish for him and it was starting to fall apart. Today I went to the mall to get him something a little more "mature."

I checked around in two department stores and could find no lunchboxes among all the backpacks, sports bags and pencil cases. I finally asked a sales clerk where I could find lunchboxes and she asked, "For a child in Kindergarten (preschool)?" I answered that it was for an older child. She appeared puzzled and asked, "For lunch?" She just didn't seem to understand what I was looking for. She approached her two colleagues who proceeded to ask me the same set of questions: For a Kindergartener? For lunch? They seemed equally perplexed.

And then it hit me. The stores don't carry lunchboxes. They don't have lunchboxes because German kids go home for lunch. And then they stay home. No need for lunchboxes. Kindergarteners, whose school day is usually longer than older kids, will bring a morning snack and possibly a lunch with them, so there were lunchboxes for preschoolers. None for an older child.

All-day classes are starting to catch on in Germany, as are school lunches. As Germany's economy changes, the all-day school day allows more parents to work while the kids are in class, but it still is not the norm. The school day ends for most German kids around 1:00.