Travel agents and mullets

I want to tell you about an institution in Germany that has held on since the early 90's.  It's not the fanny pack, and it's not in-line skates, though those are both good guesses. And no, it's not the mullet either.

Tangent: Mullets also not too hard to find here, especially as you head further to the east. In German it's called a Vokuhila, which is short for Vorne kurz Hinten lang (short front, long back). German language is nothing if not practical.

The business I'm talking about is the travel agency. Shortly after moving here, I discovered that just past every bakery and hair salon, there seems to be a travel agent's office. I can think of four within a 5 minute walk from my apartment. I figured that travel agents went out of business shortly after Al Gore invented the internet.

Then I learned about Germans' affection for the package holiday. Go to any all-inclusive resort in Spain or Italy or Egypt or the Turkish coast and you'll find towels covering all the beach chairs at impossible hours of the morning, but no people on the sand. Ambitious German guests have gotten up at 6, claimed a chair for the day, and then gone back to bed.

I've gathered that Germans often have an ongoing relationship with a  travel agent, like they have with a cleaning lady or a dentist or a hair stylist to trim that Vokuhila. Sink is clogged? Call your plumber. Dreaming of Mallorca? Call your travel agent. You won't have trouble finding one. There are about 10,000 travel agents in Germany, which is like one for every 8,500 people. The only country in Europe with more travel agents (and fewer people) is Italy.

In junior high, my class went on a field trip to some kind of job training center. One of the jobs that I chose to look at was travel agent. It actually was the early 90s, and there were lots of travel agencies in places other than Germany. I liked the idea of planning trips, and loved the glossy catalogs with pictures of palm tress.  I did not like the idea of staring at a small black monitor with orange letters all day, but did think it was cool to wear a headset and talk on the phone. Looking back, I probably would have made a good travel agent.  I probably would have made a good hotel concierge too, and a decent bike taxi driver. Maybe that whole liberal arts college degree thing wasn't so important.

But since my bike taxi career was over before it began, I guess I won't plunge into the travel agent market either. I'd get too jealous of my customers for taking cool trips that I'd planned for them, while I sat in the office with a headset, an Apple computer and some floppy disks.

Ghost of Jesse Owens (or maybe Tom Joad)

 There are moments that are timeless, and then there are people that are timeless. Last Sunday, Brian and I got to have a little bit of both.

We went to see Bruce Springsteen at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin. As I knew he would be, Bruce was awesome. He played for three hours and seemed to feed off the energy in the crowd. He played songs that made us sing and songs that sent us a message.

The other reason I was excited for this concert was the venue. This was the stadium built for the 1936 Olympics, with a special viewing box for Adolf Hitler. These were the games meant to show off the success of Nazi Germany and the prowess of the Aryan race. But in track & field, a Black American stole the show. Jesse Owens took four gold medals in a performance that no one could top for the next 48 years.

The legend is that Hitler, furious at Owens' victories, Hitler stormed out of the stadium. That may not actually be true.


It's possible that Owens actually did shake the Führer's hand, and apparently carried a photo of the moment in his wallet for years to come. He claimed that it was his own president, FDR, who snubbed Owens by not acknowledging his achievement.

The story, whether it's true or not, is timeless. Even to people who are not track nerds like me.

Several of the songs that Bruce chose to play were about immigration, about inclusion and hope and though he didn't say it outright, probably about accepting refugees. Timely and fitting to play at Berlin's Olympic Stadium. I think Jesse Owens would have approved.

Bruce may be timeless, but I certainly am not. I felt pretty old when we finally got home at 4am. As Brian reminded me a few times, Bruce was definitely in bed by then.

Foreigners' office, again

I just re-read a post I wrote in 2011 about going to the foreigners' office, the Auslanderamt. And though it has been nearly five years, not much has changed. Brian and I had to go again yesterday to get our visas renewed.

As the time for the appointment comes and goes, and the stuffy corridor smells increasingly like body odor, we knock on the office door. Then a grumpy bureaucrat in stretchy pants tells me to go back to the hallway and wait until I am called. I obey.

Eventually, a woman in leopard-print pants emerges to call us in. She wears a t-shirt with some metal studs on it. The dress code at the Auslanderamt is beyond business casual. It's more like roll-out-of-bed casual. As we sit down I notice she has a big tattoo of a bear face on her forearm.  I would love to know the story of that tattoo; maybe the bear is her spirit animal.

I hand over the paperwork, sign on the line and turn in my mug shot. It's called a biometric photo but it really just looks like a mug shot. This one especially does, since I had just gotten over pink eye and looked like I'd taken a punch or two. I am thinking this over as I get fingerprinted.
Welcome to Germany.

If I sound a little bitter, it's probably just because I am about due to get out of Germany for the summer. Even after living here for years, my tolerance for feeling foreign has its limits. When I get fed up with Germany, or with Germans, I rebel in public by crossing the street while the little red 'don't walk' man is still lit. Old women scold me under their breath, or sometimes out loud. Young men shake their heads. Everyone else pretends not to notice but I know they are astonished.
Take that, you law-abiding people.

My visits to the Auslanderamt are not over yet. I will have to go back in July to pick up the ID cards. Another appointment in another corridor, with different paperwork. And, if I'm lucky, maybe a different spirit animal tattoo.