Egg-citing Finds!

This easter weekend, Erica and I ventured out in the cold and the rain to check out a floh-markt, or flea market. We didn't expect to find much because it is early in the year and the market was very small, but we found some treasures. We each got antique tea sets, I found an old pewter water pitcher, and Erica scored with her find of a wicker baby carriage and an antique map of the world. As if that wasn't enough, we stopped at a German Grocery store for some easter dinner fixings, and were each given a hard-boiled egg at the check-out. Another treasure, right? But I started thinking.

Every year millions of people in America boil and color eggs and carry out different traditions with them, whether that is having egg wars, rolling them, hunting them, etc. But everyone is always cautious about eating them if they have been out of the refrigerator for too long, and lots of people would never consider eating their dyed easter eggs, but throw them in the trash. After all, American Health officials caution that hard-boiled eggs that have gone unrefrigerated for over two hours, are cracked, or colored with harmful dyes, can pose serious health hazards to children — and parents — who eat them. So you can imagine my surprise when I saw that in the grocery stores here they have colored, hard-boiled easter eggs out for sale, unrefrigerated. Even passing them out to everyone as a good-will token. Erica informed me that all eggs sold in Germany are unrefrigerated! She showed me that they are in cartons with the dry-goods. Huh? Germany is not a 3rd world country where tourists are warned to not drink the water or eat fresh foods. So what's the deal? No one here is getting sick--we ate our eggs and we've been feeling fine. So although I'm still a bit confused, it just goes to show that one man's trash is another man's treasure!