Directions

A man on the street stopped me as I parked my bike one afternoon, and asked for directions the housing office. I used to cringe when people stopped me to ask directions. Partly it was because I usually didn't know where they wanted to go, but also because I was often unsure how to explain that to them without sound like a complete idiot. Now, after four years, my attitude has changed. I may still not know where my fellow pedestrians are heading and maybe I still can't articulate that perfectly. But if they don't like my answer then they should have just asked someone else.

This new-found confidence failed me the other night. When it was already pitch dark at 5:30, an old man asked me how to get to the tram stop. I pointed to it, told him where to go and watched him walk away. He hobbled right past the entrance to the station and kept going. I felt deeply, awfully guilty. Somebody's Opa was now wandering the streets of Hannover with his walker, and would probably get mugged and cause a car accident and have a heart attack from the shock. Then he and all his family would curse the foreigner who didn't walk him right to the tram. In all likelihood this did not happen, because nobody gets mugged in Hannover.

Back to my original story - the housing office (Wohnungsamt) is an easy one because it's just down the street from my building. I have a lot of confidence giving directions there. Every day of the week, a small crowd mills around the entrance. They are either waiting for the office to open, or staring at the door, puzzled why it's locked. If you want to visit the housing office, you have a window of just a few hours a day. If you show up during between the hours of 9 and 5, it's a long shot as to whether you can get in. If it's a Wednesday, forget it.

The fact that the housing office is there definitely increases the number of foreigners in my otherwise white, German, yuppie neighborhood. One day when I was in the grocery store, a couple (who had probably gone to visit the housing office and found it closed), stopped me near the bakery case. "Do you speak English?" They asked. Do I ever! They asked me to help them read the labels in front of the different croissants. She was wearing a head scarf and he looked vaguely Middle Eastern, and together we decided that the ham and cheese-filled croissant was not what they were looking for. There one next to it was labeled 'Nuss-nougat', which is the generic term for Nutella. I asked if they knew what Nutella is. She wrinkled her forehead for a moment in concentration, then said, "oh! chocolate." I nodded enthusiastically and they grabbed a few nutella croissants with the plastic tongs. I may have failed the old man looking for his tram, but I had helped this couple. I too had been baffled by items at the grocery store, and more than once took something home not sure of exactly what I'd find in the package, As women, as foreigners, she and I found common ground in love of chocolate.  Some things are universal.