It is a lot colder in Hannover than in St Paul. The temperature is around -8 right now, which sounds really cold until I realize that's in Celsius. (Just like I think for a minute I've lost tons of weight, until I realize it's in kilograms). In Farenheit it's something like 16 or 17 degrees. At least the sun is shining.
The high today back home is 41. This is not what I signed up for! I was planning on very mild winters here and very cold and snowy winters back home so I could gloat a little.
Winter is different when you don't have a car. We have to be out in it whether we want to or not, because anywhere we go is on foot or by bike or at least walking to a train or a bus. There's no mad dash to the garage and flipping on the heated seats in the car (Ok, I miss those a little. My bike seat is definitely not heated).
Even though I do miss snow, getting around on the bike is significantly easier when the sidewalks are dry. So I don't really resent this cold snap. There's sunshine in the living room, and I even enjoyed pulling out my warmest hat and my ski gloves. I just resent that it's not cold everywhere else, so we could all be in it together, right? Somehow I think everyone in the Twin Cities disagrees with me right now.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Sunday, January 29, 2012
The Sporthalle, the Metronom, and Bison Grass
We had a great weekend.
On Friday, Brian and I headed up to Hamburg to see The Black Keys in concert. We went with Sonja and stayed with her, since Tom was in Sweden and missed out on the fun. Is this a concert I would have gone to in the Twin Cities? Probably I would have heard about it and said to myself, "that sounds like a great show, I should look into getting tickets," but would not have actually done it. Since they are in touring in Germany, though, I was somehow more motivated. The concert was at the Sporthalle, which is a sports arena but not a huge one. (Minnesotans, picture the Roy Wilkins auditorium. It's about that size). The show was loud, there was dancing, and all of Hamburg's aspiring hipsters were in attendance. It was a lot of fun.
When I say we headed to Hamburg, I mean that we took the train. I love travelling by train. To get to Hamburg, Bremen, Hannover, or anywhere else in the state of Niedersachsen, you can buy a Niedersachsen ticket. For two people, it's 25 euros and you can ride for the whole day on public transportation and the regional trains, which are called the Metronom. As it's name might suggest, the Metronom is not any sort of bullet train. It makes a lot of stops but gets you where you need to go. The other trains are the S bahn, which is the local commuter train, then there is the IC inter-city train, and the ICE inter-city express. I grew up taking commuter trains into Chicago from home, and in St Paul, we could hear the freight trains roll past and make our furniture vibrate a little every day. But the trains in Germany are a little different. There are tons of them, they go everywhere, and they are almost always on time. It's so civilized too - no taking your shoes off, no security lines, no arriving an hour early and getting bumped from your seat because Lufthansa says you didn't pay enough for your ticket (not that that has happened to me...). You just show up and hop on. You don't need to bring a map or worry about how to get there.
We came back from Hamburg on Saturday and got ready for Polish night at my friend Kaska's house. Kaska is actually from Poland and last week she actually spent 6 hours making something like120 pierogis. There was beet soup with dumplings, the pierogi, and of course the vodka. There were three flavors but the best one was called Bison Grass. It had a long blade of grass in it, sort of like the worm in tequila but not as gross. I didn't know that European buffalo existed, but Kaska and Wikipedia have taught me that they do. And apparently you can make vodka out of the grass they eat.
So it was a really fun weekend. Sometimes I am shocked that we have a social life here. I figured that would happen eventually but would take a lot longer. I was emotionally prepared for it to be just me and Brian hanging out on our own for a while. It's not that we know more people here than in St Paul, but the people we know are more available, they want to go out more, and they don't have as many other commitments. It's not that Germans are that way. The only actual Germans we are friends with are significant others of our expat friends. I think part of it is that no one we know here has their parents and cousins and siblings around, or their best friends from third grade, and they all want to put an effort into making it fun to live here.
Today it's Monday and I am back to general housewifery. I've already done as much substitute teaching as I'm allowed to for this month, and there is cleaning and studying German and grocery shopping to do. And I should probably follow up on that complaint letter I sent to Lufthansa.
On Friday, Brian and I headed up to Hamburg to see The Black Keys in concert. We went with Sonja and stayed with her, since Tom was in Sweden and missed out on the fun. Is this a concert I would have gone to in the Twin Cities? Probably I would have heard about it and said to myself, "that sounds like a great show, I should look into getting tickets," but would not have actually done it. Since they are in touring in Germany, though, I was somehow more motivated. The concert was at the Sporthalle, which is a sports arena but not a huge one. (Minnesotans, picture the Roy Wilkins auditorium. It's about that size). The show was loud, there was dancing, and all of Hamburg's aspiring hipsters were in attendance. It was a lot of fun.
When I say we headed to Hamburg, I mean that we took the train. I love travelling by train. To get to Hamburg, Bremen, Hannover, or anywhere else in the state of Niedersachsen, you can buy a Niedersachsen ticket. For two people, it's 25 euros and you can ride for the whole day on public transportation and the regional trains, which are called the Metronom. As it's name might suggest, the Metronom is not any sort of bullet train. It makes a lot of stops but gets you where you need to go. The other trains are the S bahn, which is the local commuter train, then there is the IC inter-city train, and the ICE inter-city express. I grew up taking commuter trains into Chicago from home, and in St Paul, we could hear the freight trains roll past and make our furniture vibrate a little every day. But the trains in Germany are a little different. There are tons of them, they go everywhere, and they are almost always on time. It's so civilized too - no taking your shoes off, no security lines, no arriving an hour early and getting bumped from your seat because Lufthansa says you didn't pay enough for your ticket (not that that has happened to me...). You just show up and hop on. You don't need to bring a map or worry about how to get there.
We came back from Hamburg on Saturday and got ready for Polish night at my friend Kaska's house. Kaska is actually from Poland and last week she actually spent 6 hours making something like120 pierogis. There was beet soup with dumplings, the pierogi, and of course the vodka. There were three flavors but the best one was called Bison Grass. It had a long blade of grass in it, sort of like the worm in tequila but not as gross. I didn't know that European buffalo existed, but Kaska and Wikipedia have taught me that they do. And apparently you can make vodka out of the grass they eat.
So it was a really fun weekend. Sometimes I am shocked that we have a social life here. I figured that would happen eventually but would take a lot longer. I was emotionally prepared for it to be just me and Brian hanging out on our own for a while. It's not that we know more people here than in St Paul, but the people we know are more available, they want to go out more, and they don't have as many other commitments. It's not that Germans are that way. The only actual Germans we are friends with are significant others of our expat friends. I think part of it is that no one we know here has their parents and cousins and siblings around, or their best friends from third grade, and they all want to put an effort into making it fun to live here.
Today it's Monday and I am back to general housewifery. I've already done as much substitute teaching as I'm allowed to for this month, and there is cleaning and studying German and grocery shopping to do. And I should probably follow up on that complaint letter I sent to Lufthansa.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
The dentist
I decided it was time to see a dentist here. There wasn't anything wrong, really, but I'm a regular twice a year visitor and I was a little overdue.
The word for dentist in German is Zahnarzt, which literally translated means "tooth doctor." One of the things I like about the German language is that it can be so very logical. An electric tea kettle is a Wasserkocher, a "water cooker." A refrigerator is a Kuhlschrank, or "cold cabinet". These things make a lot of sense. Then there's my personal favorite, the word for glove is Handschuh - you guessed it, "hand shoe".
So I asked a couple of people at the International School for a referral to an English-speaking Zahnarzt and I got a couple of names. I decided that I would go with the first one that had a receptionist who could talk to me on the phone in English. This was Tuesday at about 3pm. I called and all of a sudden had an appointment for Wednesday at 9am. The next day? What sort of an operation was this? I am used to waiting weeks if not months to see a tooth doctor.
When I went to the dental clinic in the morning I learned an important lesson. If you try and speak German with a German, they will likely continue talking to you in German. I guess this makes sense, but in my mind I wanted to show them I knew a little and then have them all switch to English after a few minutes. It didn't quite happen that way. The dental assistant and the dentist talked to me mostly in German and, to my surprise, I mostly understood them. It's not like we were conversing fluently - they were really patient and repeated themselves a lot and I listened more than I spoke - but I did ok. The dentist did switch to English when he was going over my X rays and when I looked extra confused.
As for the dental work itself, that went fine. All they really did was look at my teeth and X ray them. Then they told me I needed two more appointments - one to touch up some fillings, which was covered by insurance, and one for a cleaning, which was not covered and would cost 110 euros. What? not covered? 110 euros? What if I went to another dentist?, I asked the dental assistant (not that eloquently). That wouldn't matter, she told me, it's not covered. I was so overwhelmed trying to process the language and the insurance coverage and the fact that my mouth had just been inspected so I just did as I was told and signed up for the appointments.
I was still puzzled by the whole issue. It made no sense to me that they would pay for the restorative work but not the preventive work. I know a thing or two about health insurance in the US, and how coverage sometimes makes no sense. So it didn't seem impossible that German insurance would be the same way. But I also wasn't sure that I'd heard correctly. I did a little research online and it appeared that yes, German insurance does not cover dental cleanings. It doesn't matter which dentist you go to or which insurance provider you have.
I told Brian who asked a few of his coworkers about it. It turns out that everyone has a tooth doctor, and everyone has to pay for cleanings, which range in price and there's some sort of a card that you get punched every time like at the coffee shop or the car wash. Brian decided it was all a racket and I should have no part of it. Of course, he is the one who gets a checkup once every three years and the dentist tells him to drink all the soda he wants and come back in another three. I am not so lucky. I always have some area that's being "watched," like they are spying on my teeth.
I recognize that Americans are a little extreme about their dental hygeine compared to people from other parts of the world. Is every six months a little too often for a cleaning? I mean, maybe it's not the insurance policy that has the wrong standards, maybe it's me. I'm a good flosser, and I brush my teeth more than most people. Plus, 110 euros is a lot of money. So I decided that I will wait for a cleaning until the fall or winter. I called and cancelled that part of the appointment, but I'll still do the filling touch-up. That seems more important anyway, and is free.
So my first experience with the German health care system actually went pretty well, now that I think about it. I got there, I mostly got what I came for, and I mostly communicated. And the place was alright. They were nice and saw me on time. The clinic was clean and new-looking. The tooth doctor even wore hand shoes.
The word for dentist in German is Zahnarzt, which literally translated means "tooth doctor." One of the things I like about the German language is that it can be so very logical. An electric tea kettle is a Wasserkocher, a "water cooker." A refrigerator is a Kuhlschrank, or "cold cabinet". These things make a lot of sense. Then there's my personal favorite, the word for glove is Handschuh - you guessed it, "hand shoe".
So I asked a couple of people at the International School for a referral to an English-speaking Zahnarzt and I got a couple of names. I decided that I would go with the first one that had a receptionist who could talk to me on the phone in English. This was Tuesday at about 3pm. I called and all of a sudden had an appointment for Wednesday at 9am. The next day? What sort of an operation was this? I am used to waiting weeks if not months to see a tooth doctor.
When I went to the dental clinic in the morning I learned an important lesson. If you try and speak German with a German, they will likely continue talking to you in German. I guess this makes sense, but in my mind I wanted to show them I knew a little and then have them all switch to English after a few minutes. It didn't quite happen that way. The dental assistant and the dentist talked to me mostly in German and, to my surprise, I mostly understood them. It's not like we were conversing fluently - they were really patient and repeated themselves a lot and I listened more than I spoke - but I did ok. The dentist did switch to English when he was going over my X rays and when I looked extra confused.
As for the dental work itself, that went fine. All they really did was look at my teeth and X ray them. Then they told me I needed two more appointments - one to touch up some fillings, which was covered by insurance, and one for a cleaning, which was not covered and would cost 110 euros. What? not covered? 110 euros? What if I went to another dentist?, I asked the dental assistant (not that eloquently). That wouldn't matter, she told me, it's not covered. I was so overwhelmed trying to process the language and the insurance coverage and the fact that my mouth had just been inspected so I just did as I was told and signed up for the appointments.
I was still puzzled by the whole issue. It made no sense to me that they would pay for the restorative work but not the preventive work. I know a thing or two about health insurance in the US, and how coverage sometimes makes no sense. So it didn't seem impossible that German insurance would be the same way. But I also wasn't sure that I'd heard correctly. I did a little research online and it appeared that yes, German insurance does not cover dental cleanings. It doesn't matter which dentist you go to or which insurance provider you have.
I told Brian who asked a few of his coworkers about it. It turns out that everyone has a tooth doctor, and everyone has to pay for cleanings, which range in price and there's some sort of a card that you get punched every time like at the coffee shop or the car wash. Brian decided it was all a racket and I should have no part of it. Of course, he is the one who gets a checkup once every three years and the dentist tells him to drink all the soda he wants and come back in another three. I am not so lucky. I always have some area that's being "watched," like they are spying on my teeth.
I recognize that Americans are a little extreme about their dental hygeine compared to people from other parts of the world. Is every six months a little too often for a cleaning? I mean, maybe it's not the insurance policy that has the wrong standards, maybe it's me. I'm a good flosser, and I brush my teeth more than most people. Plus, 110 euros is a lot of money. So I decided that I will wait for a cleaning until the fall or winter. I called and cancelled that part of the appointment, but I'll still do the filling touch-up. That seems more important anyway, and is free.
So my first experience with the German health care system actually went pretty well, now that I think about it. I got there, I mostly got what I came for, and I mostly communicated. And the place was alright. They were nice and saw me on time. The clinic was clean and new-looking. The tooth doctor even wore hand shoes.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
The pool (das Schwimmbad)
There are only a few things that I feel pretty familiar with in Hannover, and one of them is the pool. (What are the others? I ask myself. I feel good about the grocery store, the ATM, and the tram. Everything else is still kind of iffy). I put my swimming stuff in the saddle bag on my bike and ride over to the pool, take out my 10 visit punch card, and make sure I have the 1 euro coin I need as a deposit for the locker. I know where the showers and the hair dryers are, and I have a pair of flip flops that I use only at the pool. It feels good to know what I'm doing.
I swim at the Stadionbad, which is the stadium pool, about two times a week. It's called that because it is right next to the stadium where Hannover 96, the professional soccer team, plays. The swimming pool is huge, Olympic size, has a lot of windows and two diving boards, and is the most chaotic place I've been in all of Germany.
Normally Germans have a lot of rules and go places in a very orderly way. They diligently wait for a green light when crossing the street. Their trains run on time. Bikes go on a designated part of the sidewalk. They have a lot of rules about a lot of things. But at the pool it's a free for all. I am used to nearly empty swimming pools with ropes between the lanes, and if more than one person swims in a lane, everyone stays to the right so they don't collide. At the Stadionbad there are tons of people and everyone swims where they feel like it. There are lanes painted on the floor of the pool, but they remind me a little of the lanes painted on the street in Cairo - purely decorative. Usually an old man is swimming a backstroke diagonally across the water and three women paddling along side by side and chatting. I have discovered that the late morning is the worst time to go. The average age of swimmers at that time is about 75 and if they see me coming toward them in the pool, they like to play chicken and keep coming straight (or diagonally) toward me. They have no fear, or are just oblivious. And because there are no lifeguards and Germans tend to just mind their own business, if someone wandering swimmer slammed into me and I started to drown, I'd be out of luck. It's a lot less crowded early in the morning, or early in the afternoon. That means less frustration for me and less risk of getting kicked in the head, or at least getting water up my nose.
The pool is also a good place to observe bathing suit fashion. You may think that German men wear speedos. Well, you're right. Not all German men wear them, but generally the older they are, the shorter and tighter the swimsuit becomes.
Is it odd that the least orderly place in all of Hannover is one of the places I feel most comfortable? Maybe not. Maybe the lack of rules makes it easier to for me to understand because there's less to learn. I may not know how to speak the language well, but I can dodge an old guy in a speedo.
I swim at the Stadionbad, which is the stadium pool, about two times a week. It's called that because it is right next to the stadium where Hannover 96, the professional soccer team, plays. The swimming pool is huge, Olympic size, has a lot of windows and two diving boards, and is the most chaotic place I've been in all of Germany.
Normally Germans have a lot of rules and go places in a very orderly way. They diligently wait for a green light when crossing the street. Their trains run on time. Bikes go on a designated part of the sidewalk. They have a lot of rules about a lot of things. But at the pool it's a free for all. I am used to nearly empty swimming pools with ropes between the lanes, and if more than one person swims in a lane, everyone stays to the right so they don't collide. At the Stadionbad there are tons of people and everyone swims where they feel like it. There are lanes painted on the floor of the pool, but they remind me a little of the lanes painted on the street in Cairo - purely decorative. Usually an old man is swimming a backstroke diagonally across the water and three women paddling along side by side and chatting. I have discovered that the late morning is the worst time to go. The average age of swimmers at that time is about 75 and if they see me coming toward them in the pool, they like to play chicken and keep coming straight (or diagonally) toward me. They have no fear, or are just oblivious. And because there are no lifeguards and Germans tend to just mind their own business, if someone wandering swimmer slammed into me and I started to drown, I'd be out of luck. It's a lot less crowded early in the morning, or early in the afternoon. That means less frustration for me and less risk of getting kicked in the head, or at least getting water up my nose.
The pool is also a good place to observe bathing suit fashion. You may think that German men wear speedos. Well, you're right. Not all German men wear them, but generally the older they are, the shorter and tighter the swimsuit becomes.
Is it odd that the least orderly place in all of Hannover is one of the places I feel most comfortable? Maybe not. Maybe the lack of rules makes it easier to for me to understand because there's less to learn. I may not know how to speak the language well, but I can dodge an old guy in a speedo.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Joey's Pizza
Last night we had Joey's Pizza. If you want a pizza delivered somewhere in Germany, you call Joey's. It's like the Papa John's of Germany. Well, actually it's not like Papa John's at all (read on to find out why) but they do deliver pizzas.
Joey's has a lot of unusual kinds of pizzas. Maybe they are normal for Germany but they seem unusual to us.
The Pizza Tigris is on special right now. It involves Asian style chicken, cucumbers, parsley, onions, tomatoes, and yogurt dressing.
You can also order the Pizza Crazy Dog, which features hot dog slices, pickles, ketchup, and onions.
Some ingredients that show up on a lot of Joey's pizzas are arugula, hollandaise sauce, and tuna.
If you are not in the mood for pickle pizza you can even choose your own toppings, but be careful.
If you want something with pepperoni, make sure to order pepperoni-salami, and if you want green peppers look for pepperoni. Asparagus and corn are available, but if you are feeling like Italian sausage, you're out of luck. The Germans have probably hundreds of kinds of wurst but you can't find a spicy Italian sausage anywhere. What you can do is order all sorts of different pork products like ham, bacon, salami, another kind of ham, etc. Germans are good at pork.
Lucky for me, you can order Joey's online and don't need to call. I figure in the next couple of months I will get up the nerve to call for a pizza or a taxi or something like that, but for now I prefer communicating online or in person. When you're on the phone there is no opportunity to point, gesture, or smile so that they don't get too annoyed with you. Plus, ordering online gives me a chance to translate words like Rindersteak-Streifen (beef strips).
When the pizza arrives - Joey's delivers on bikes and mopeds only - we put it in the oven for another 10 minutes. The crust will never be self-supporting, but at least we can make it a little crispier. And I need to get the pizza cutter out too because they don't cut the pizza for you.
There is actually a Pizza Hut in Hannover. We had their buffet once for dinner and neither of us could sleep all night. Our bodies are no longer used to that amount of grease and cheese and Pepsi and decided to protest with major belly aches. I guess if we stick with Joey's we'll feel healthier, especially if we order extra arugula and cucumber on the pizza.
If you want to check out Joey's yourself, here's the website: www.joeys.de
Joey's has a lot of unusual kinds of pizzas. Maybe they are normal for Germany but they seem unusual to us.
The Pizza Tigris is on special right now. It involves Asian style chicken, cucumbers, parsley, onions, tomatoes, and yogurt dressing.
You can also order the Pizza Crazy Dog, which features hot dog slices, pickles, ketchup, and onions.
Some ingredients that show up on a lot of Joey's pizzas are arugula, hollandaise sauce, and tuna.
If you are not in the mood for pickle pizza you can even choose your own toppings, but be careful.
If you want something with pepperoni, make sure to order pepperoni-salami, and if you want green peppers look for pepperoni. Asparagus and corn are available, but if you are feeling like Italian sausage, you're out of luck. The Germans have probably hundreds of kinds of wurst but you can't find a spicy Italian sausage anywhere. What you can do is order all sorts of different pork products like ham, bacon, salami, another kind of ham, etc. Germans are good at pork.
Lucky for me, you can order Joey's online and don't need to call. I figure in the next couple of months I will get up the nerve to call for a pizza or a taxi or something like that, but for now I prefer communicating online or in person. When you're on the phone there is no opportunity to point, gesture, or smile so that they don't get too annoyed with you. Plus, ordering online gives me a chance to translate words like Rindersteak-Streifen (beef strips).
When the pizza arrives - Joey's delivers on bikes and mopeds only - we put it in the oven for another 10 minutes. The crust will never be self-supporting, but at least we can make it a little crispier. And I need to get the pizza cutter out too because they don't cut the pizza for you.
There is actually a Pizza Hut in Hannover. We had their buffet once for dinner and neither of us could sleep all night. Our bodies are no longer used to that amount of grease and cheese and Pepsi and decided to protest with major belly aches. I guess if we stick with Joey's we'll feel healthier, especially if we order extra arugula and cucumber on the pizza.
If you want to check out Joey's yourself, here's the website: www.joeys.de
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Self-improvement
It has occured to me that being an expat in a small German city requires some new and improved skills. For a while I thought moving here would eventually make me smarter. Now I'm not so sure. But at least it might make me more well-rounded.
There are things I have gotten better at since we moved here, such as:
There are things I have gotten better at since we moved here, such as:
- Being humble. It takes you down a few notches when you realize you don't speak the language and don't really understand how things work. Like the time I wanted to order a beer and ended up with tonic water. Or the time Brian and I got on a train that was headed to Frankfurt instead of Hannover. Or when we speak with Germans who apologize that their English, one of the three or four languages they speak, is not impeccable. When you understand about 20% of what's going on, it's hard to have a big ego.
- Sense of direction. Since the streets change names every few blocks, and I can't pronounce them all anyway, I have stopped relying on street names and gotten better at knowing where I am. I just couldn't tell you how to get there.
- Cooking. I now have time to try more new recipes and to make dinners that take two hours to cook. I've also made more things from scratch just because the German stores don't sell them. I now make my own lemonade, salsa, and coffee cake. Since there's no cream of mushroom soup to cheat with, I've learned to make a roux. (I never knew what a roux was before. If you don't either, you don't need to admit it. Just Google it). My next endeavor will be making my own tortillas - I'll keep you posted on that one.
- Stair climbing. We live on the 5th floor. No elevator.
- Pack mule-ing. For example, yesterday I went to the grocery store and carried two full bags of groceries up the stairs. Then I went to the liquor store and carried home 18 beers and 2 bottles of wine in my backpack. I am not sure that pack mule-ing is a real word but I've gotten better at hauling around things I used to throw in the trunk of my car.
- Speaking German. It's coming slowly, but it's coming.
- Blogging? I'll leave that up to you.
And there are other skills that have gotten a little rusty for lack of use, like:
- Friendliness to strangers. It's true. In an effort to blend in with the Germans who don't make eye contact or speak to people they don't know, I've started to behave that way too. Today an elderly woman asked me to reach something on a high shelf in the grocery store and I wanted to hug her. I could go on a friendliness spree and smile and say 'guten tag' to everyone I see, but they would think I was crazy. It's possible that some of them might appreciate it and start speaking back to me. Then I'd really be in trouble.
- Driving. I haven't done it in five months. I'm sure I haven't totally forgotten but it'll be a little scary next time I'm behind the wheel.
- Being a boss. I used to be responsible for a lot of people. Now I'm just responsible for me and Brian, and a couple days a week I am also in charge of a room full of sixth graders. Since I am usually trying to be inconspicuous or really polite in public so that people forgive me for being foreign and clueless, I am very out of practice at telling adults what to do.
- Barbecuing. I've always used a gas grill, and used it pretty well. So when we bought our charcoal grill here I was a little over confident and I rushed it. In one of my first attempts I was responsible for some lighter fluid flavored chicken.
- Speaking Spanish. I am keeping up a little but not speaking as much as I used to. It's still there in my brain. It's just a little dusty and buried under the German somewhere.
So will living abroad make me a better, smarter, more cultured person? I am not sure. But if I need to figure out where I'm going, carry a bunch of stuff upstairs, and cook dinner when I get there I'll be set. Just as long as dinner is not on a charcoal grill.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Giulia comes to visit
I had a visitor this weekend!
For those of you who haven't met Giulia, she is a good friend I've known since our family lived in Belgium in 1996-1997. She lives in L.A. now but was home to Belgium for the holidays to see her family, and came over for a few days.
Brian was in Oslo all weekend for a baseball clinic. Oslo sounds like a magical city where everyone skis, people are beautiful, and you get free ice water at restaurants. Even though Hannover may be, as Brian said last night, "the most boring place in Europe," we managed to have a really good time. I used Giulia as an excuse to do the touristy things I hadn't yet done in Hannover, and to practice being a tour guide for future visitors. The sun was shining all weekend, which hasn't happened since probably October. We did the 'red thread' walking tour of the city. If you follow the red line painted on the sidewalk around town, it leads you to all the historical/cultural/notable places. I figured out that part of the wall in the school where my German classes are held is a tower from the 1400s that was part of the old city wall. We checked out the Opera House and the Rathaus and the oldest house in Hannover. We saw a lot of bad post-war architecture. Giulia almost got hit by a bus but learned that when the light says 'don't walk' here, they really mean it.
On Sunday we hosted a birthday brunch for my friend Kaska, and Giulia got to meet the Hausfrauen Klub. As you may recall, this is the group of friends that I hang out with here who are are recent arrivals. True to German tradition, we had a Sekt Frustuck, which is a brunch with a lot of prosecco. We concocted plans for the TV series about our lives in Germany, which Giulia has volunteered to produce. I told her there's plenty of material in this blog, as long as we make the plot a little more dramatic and make the actors a little more glamorous, it will be a hit! (I don't think the molasses episode will make the cut).
Then Giulia and I went to the Sprengel Museum to see some modern art.. I have not been a good museum-goer since we got here so at least I can check that one off my list.
There is something validating about an old friend visiting me here. It seems less like I am living in a parallel universe and more like this is a real place and a real lifestyle that someone from my previous world has witnessed. We also did enough chatting to get me through at least a week. So now she will return to Belgium and a few days later to California where it is much warmer and the people look more like the actors in our TV series should. Thankfully, Giulia did not get hit by a bus and will be leaving Germany in one piece.
For those of you who haven't met Giulia, she is a good friend I've known since our family lived in Belgium in 1996-1997. She lives in L.A. now but was home to Belgium for the holidays to see her family, and came over for a few days.
Brian was in Oslo all weekend for a baseball clinic. Oslo sounds like a magical city where everyone skis, people are beautiful, and you get free ice water at restaurants. Even though Hannover may be, as Brian said last night, "the most boring place in Europe," we managed to have a really good time. I used Giulia as an excuse to do the touristy things I hadn't yet done in Hannover, and to practice being a tour guide for future visitors. The sun was shining all weekend, which hasn't happened since probably October. We did the 'red thread' walking tour of the city. If you follow the red line painted on the sidewalk around town, it leads you to all the historical/cultural/notable places. I figured out that part of the wall in the school where my German classes are held is a tower from the 1400s that was part of the old city wall. We checked out the Opera House and the Rathaus and the oldest house in Hannover. We saw a lot of bad post-war architecture. Giulia almost got hit by a bus but learned that when the light says 'don't walk' here, they really mean it.
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| At the Opera House |
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| Aegidienkirch |
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| The river Leine |
On Sunday we hosted a birthday brunch for my friend Kaska, and Giulia got to meet the Hausfrauen Klub. As you may recall, this is the group of friends that I hang out with here who are are recent arrivals. True to German tradition, we had a Sekt Frustuck, which is a brunch with a lot of prosecco. We concocted plans for the TV series about our lives in Germany, which Giulia has volunteered to produce. I told her there's plenty of material in this blog, as long as we make the plot a little more dramatic and make the actors a little more glamorous, it will be a hit! (I don't think the molasses episode will make the cut).
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| Kaska, me, Renee, and Serena |
There is something validating about an old friend visiting me here. It seems less like I am living in a parallel universe and more like this is a real place and a real lifestyle that someone from my previous world has witnessed. We also did enough chatting to get me through at least a week. So now she will return to Belgium and a few days later to California where it is much warmer and the people look more like the actors in our TV series should. Thankfully, Giulia did not get hit by a bus and will be leaving Germany in one piece.
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About Me
- Julia
- Thanks for coming to my blog. It started as a way to keep in touch with family and friends, and now has become an ongoing project. I'm an American living in Germany and trying to travel whenever I can. I write about my experiences as an expatriate (the interesting ones and the embarrassing ones), and about my travels. There are some recurring characters in this blog, particularly my husband Brian and several of our friends. The title comes from the idea that living in a foreign country means making a lot of mistakes. So the things you used to do easily you now have to try over and over again. Hopefully, like me, you can laugh at how idiotic it feels. If you have happened upon my blog, then welcome. Knowing that people are reading what I write makes me keep going. Feel free to write comments or suggestions for future posts.