HELLO LUXEMBOURG

The other day I discovered this blog site tracks where all the visitors to my blog come from. In the last week 74 views came from the US. What country was number 2? Luxembourg. I thought this was a fluke so I checked to see how many view there have been since the beginning. 979 from US, 77 from the Netherlands and 59 from Luxembourg. This doesn’t make any sense to me. What do I write that is of such great interest to people in the Netherlands and Luxembourg. I mean they are very nice countries and very nice people, but still. I’m not sure if it is a bunch of people from those countries who are reading my blog, or just one person in each country who reads a lot of my blogs.  

It’s even stranger when I notice that I had two page views each last week from Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Estonia, Slovenia, and Slovakia. These must be accidents, people looking for something and my blog just happens to appear on a Google search. For example, if you search for Wade Eichelberger, my blog comes up #2.

Back to Luxembourg. It sounds like a very nice place to live. I see from Wikipedia that Luxembourg has the highest gross domestic product per capita of any country in Eruope. I like that it is the only country with a Grand Duke as its head. I like its motto: "Mir wëlle bleiwe wat mir sinn." "We want to remain what we are," which I’d express: “Leave us alone.” Makes sense for a country that has constantly had to contend with the French, Germans, Belgians and Dutch. Yes, I could make that my motto: Bug Off!

From what I can tell, the national language, Luxembourgish, seems to be a lot like Dutch so I supposed an English-speaker could learn to read it or understand it.  Just looking at the Grand Ducal Anthem De Wilhelmus, I see a few lines that I can understand.

Zwee Kinnékskanner, déi trei sech léif,
koumen ausenaaner, wäit an déif.
Zwee Kinnékskanner, déi trei sech léif,
hu gebaangt, op d'Gléck nach bléie géif.
Haut weisen si der ganzer Welt
an engem Feld
d'Goldlilie mat dem roude Krouneléif.
Haut steet ëm si voll Freed, Hand an Hand,
d'Vollék vun dem Lëtzebuerger Land.

Hand in hand, the folk of the Luxembourger Land.

I’ve listened to a recording of the anthem, and it is very stirring. They also have a national anthem, Ons Heemecht. In investigating the anthem, I discovered that there was an earlier anthem sung to the tune of “To Anacreon in Heaven.”  Are you familiar with that? You should be. It’s the tune we use for “The Star-Spangled Banner.”  They were much wiser than we in replacing it. (I’ve never understood why the United States can’t have an American tune for it’s anthem. How about, “This land is your land, this land is my land?”)

Now a funny coincidence is that the area of Chicago where I grew up once had a large Luxembourger community. They were primarily truck framers. They must have disappeared or blended in with the Germans as the area became urbanized.

Another coincidence. I was just reading an article about some sister of the Mount Benedict Monastery in Ogden Utah moving to  Saint Benedict’s Monastery in St. Joseph, Minnesota.Intermountain Catholic It seems one of the sisters is now the director of faith formation at St. Wendelin’s Church, in Luxemburg. That caught my attention. I had no idea there was a town of Luxemburg in Minnesota. Turns out that there are also towns of that name in Wisconsin and Iowa. Shows you those industrious Luxembourgers got around in the Midwest.  The only puzzle I have is how they let their church be named for St. Wendelin. He seems to be an obscure Scottish saint who was once a shepherd and who later founded the Benedictine Abbey of Tholey.  Very mysterious.

Speaking of which, if you are one of the mysterious Luxembourgers who happened upon my site, add a comment so I know who you are and how you found me. I appreciate your patronage.

May the Lord bless you on your journey, wherever it takes you, and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne




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