A Warm Welcome to Germany

I received a warm welcome to Germany at the Frankfurt airport where I was met by my fiancé J.P. and surprisingly his mom, who lives an hour away but insisted that she too wanted to greet me.   The warm welcome to Germany didn't stop there.  We drove back to her house where some good homemade potato soup was waiting for us.

My cats were supposed to accompany on my journey but due to an error by my vet back in Canada they were unable to, although they will hopefully join me in a few weeks.  J.P.'s mom knew I was upset about this so bought me a cat ornament as a "substitute" until my cats arrived - how thoughtful!   She also wrote a card in German that was incredibly sweet welcoming me to the family and saying that I was now part of her family too and how happy she was that I was finally here and welcome to Germany.  Fortunately J.P. was able to translate since my German is  very elementary. 

So much for German's reputation of being stoic and unfeeling, I couldn't have asked for a warmer welcome to Germany.  I have a feeling that this is only the first of many cultural misconceptions that I will discover living as an expat in Germany.