Before I forget again, here is what Peter and I talked about this morning. Somewhere Peter had read that these days authorities may get suspicious if you leave the house without your mobile. It happened to a journalist in Germany who went out without his ‘handy’. He straight away became a suspect. What did he plan? Without carrying his phone, nobody could trace where he was going! So why did he leave his phone behind? What did he want to cover up?

My response was, what happens to people who do not own a phone? I for  instance have no mobile, never had one. When I go out, who can trace my steps? Peter said, this was all right for I  am a non-person, I do not count. Ah well, so this means, that nobody really knows whether I am alive or dead. The German government generously pays me a monthly pension. It is a very nice little addition to my Australian pension. How do they know, I am still alive? They do not know, do they? The same applies to Peter. This is why we are required to let them know once a year that we have not died yet. That means every year at the beginning of July Peter and I make an appearance  at our Australian Centre Link Office. When they see us they believe that we are alive and certify our existence, The signed and stamped papers about our existence we then send off to the German Centre  for pensions in  Germany, and this safeguards the payment of our small German pension  for another year. We do get this pension since we turned 65. My goodness, that is nearly 18 years for me, and over 17 years for Peter. It adds up. Quite a bit of money really. No wonder that every so often we can afford a trip to Germany. At the moment we are in a bit of a rut. So I suggested to Peter today, that we should look into it whether we could book another trip to Germany for sometime this year just before another cancer treatment is due for Peter. Meaning that maybe we should not  wait until someone in our family wants to travel with us again. Maybe we should just take off on our  own as soon as possible. How about   it?