Travelin' Trick

Brandenburger Tor

Last night we had a going-away party for Timo.  Naturally I made all kinds of food for the festivities and we all drank lots and lots like always.  Afterwards we even smoked some shisha.  All-in-all it was a good farewell for him. 

I wanted to make it good for him.  You see, Timo is the reason why I've found a place in Germany.  He's also been a very good friend throughout.  Even though all of this has been clear from the get-go, I only realized last night that I'm going to miss him a lot.  This place just won't feel the same anymore. 

Despite the somewhat sad farewell, I've begun to feel a reinvigorating sense about my stay here in Germany.  Somehow I feel somewhat better for the second half of my stay.  I'm drawing closer relationships with the people here and confidence in myself is getting gradually better.  Even if my time here doesn't prove to significantly better my German to my standards of what good German is (it's close), the soul searching I've accomplished has definitely been worth it.  I've learned so much about myself and am working on improving my life.  So priceless.

That being said, I think I'm ready to say that I'm 100% ready to stay here another year if that opportunity is given to me.  From the beginning I said I would go without a doubt, but in reality I was just saying that because I knew what would be best for me and my German.  Now, I no longer only know it's best for me, but I want to do it full-heartedly.  Sure I'll miss everyone at home, but I will always have the chance to visit when time and money permit.  The money issue should actually not give me any trouble.  I will earn three fold what I'm making now.  JOY!

So here I am, ich drück mir die Daumen!

I was just reminded I should write in my blog more.  Sorry!

Not much exciting going on at the moment, just a lot of slave work for the school.  It's not bad, I enjoy it a lot actually.  Growing up? Quite possible.

In other news, I got to spend time with the amazing Agi in Haiger and visit her family as well.  It snowed like a mad man, but I quite enjoyed it.  It was almost like revisiting Alaska, except it snows there a lot lot more.  I've just forgotten what it was like since I've been living in Kentucky. 

Agi's parents were super nice, though.  However, I was amazed to find out that her father actually liked George Bush.  That's not common in Germany, and we spent a good hour discussing that.  Somehow everyone always wants to speak politics with me here when they found out that I'm from the States......

In the school, the Dr. Phil show has caught fire.  Now every English teacher wants me to do it in all of their English classes as well.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy doing it because it's a lot of fun, but it does take a lot out of me.  I get so stressed out about perfecting it that I'm actually making a bigger deal out of it than it really is.  That's how teaching in general has felt thus far.  Anytime I have some kind of lesson to develop or activity to think of for the next class, I go home stressing the fuck out.  Then the activity/lesson takes place and I reflect, "Gee, that wasn't so stressful at all."  Maybe I'm just nervous? I guess I really do need a lot of practice.

My German... well, I'm never satisfied with its progress.  Every time I begin to think, "Ah! It's getting so much better!" I almost immediately experience something that tells me differently.  This past weekend I was at a going a way party for a friend who's going to Portugal for study abroad.  At first I was so hard on myself because I felt like I wasn't doing anything to mingle.  I could make the excuse that it's often really overwhelming jumping in a conversation with native speakers when I can't communicate like they can with each other.  Hence, I feel like I'm less worthy of conversation.  It takes more patience and concentration to talk with me.  I. hate. that.  And it just makes me feel like I can't speak the language at all. 

Sometimes I feel like I'd learn more if I were with other foreigners who were learning German. I'm only around native speakers except for Vincenzo, but I suppose we don't really talk much.  All the native speakers here take my pronunciation for granted, and I'm often too proud to ask what they meant if I didn't understand.  I don't want anyone knowing that I didn't understand what they said when they spoke like they normally would.  Perhaps if I were around other German learners I'd not feel so inadequate.  But I get the feeling NO ONE understands that here.  People don't understand how much patience I have when I talk to people in English.  But I guess we Americans are used to people learning our language, therefore accustomed to being patient with foreign speakers? Ok, not all Americans are patient when it comes to foreigners, but I definitely am.

[sigh].  This all comes about because of the stories I hear when others go abroad to learn English.  My friends from Vienna, for example, all came to Vienna to learn English.  First I thought that that was a dumb idea, but they really did learn a lot.  Now they can tout that their English has really improved.  But what if they had try learning it in a country where it's the official language like the U.S. and they were only around native speakers?  I think it would have been a lot harder.  Even still you see foreigners in the U.S. who only hang out with other foreigners because it's so much easier to speak English with them.

Whenever a foreigner visits me in the U.S., I'm very cautious and careful with the things I say and how I say them.  I'd even remind my friends to be careful, which brings me to another point.  I HATE HATE HATE it when someone says right in front of me, "Hey, you have to speak slower and clearer if you want him to understand you."  Somehow I translate that as, "His German is not that great to understand you."  I mean, thanks for showing that you want me to understand, but would I just feel so inadequate and unequal and foreign when someone says that in front of me.  It does a lot of harm to my learning.  Makes me feel like I want to give it all up.      

Of course, learning a language with others learning the same language has some negative affects.  That's why it'd be important to speak with natives, too.  But I just feel like throwing someone out in a pool of natives is like being thrown into the deep end of a pool of icy cold water.  I want to ask questions that are stupid without feeling stupid.  I have tried, and even though I understand how they could be funny for native speakers, laughing only makes me feel like I shouldn't have asked the question in the first place.  Then I only feel less motivated to learn the language.

Maybe I'm just weird.

Remember long time ago I said we'd be doing a Jerry Springer show in a couple of my English classes?  Well, we didn't get to do it, but just yesterday we wrapped our Dr. Phil shows!  I'll see about posting the videos to this blog if I'm allowed :D.

There's also some MORE good news.  Looks like it may be possible for me to teach in place for a teacher who has been calling off sick for quite some time now.  This means I'll have more responsibilities, but I will also get paid more if it all works out.  Looks like they just have to talk to the people in the Fulbright Kommision and the Education Department in Hessen to make sure it doesn't interfere with my grant or my residence permit.  Bureaucracy is the name of this game.

Aside from school, Ι believe I've finally got the rents' itinerary finished for their European trip.  They'll travel through France, Germany, and Switzerland in just 10 days.  I'm still not completely sure how I was able to fit so much into so little time. 

As for the free room situation in the WG, we've actually found someone who's looking to stay that month of a half between my contract ends and Timo leaves for Turkey!  This means none of us will have to pay anything extra for a room we wouldn't use AND we're going to get to know another "Ökotrophologin," which is something like a person who studies home economics, hence there will be no less time cooking in the apartment :D.  JOY!!!

That's all, folks!

It's been a while my friends.  I started writing a blog about everything that happened about my stay at Timo's in Rheinstetten, but I had to delete it. Only 3/4s of the way finished and six Microsoft Word pages long, I decided that it was just too darn long.  Not many have the time.  Heck, I probably wouldn't have even read it.  Therefore, I'm only going to write a quick summary of the things that took place.  Timo's mom took pictures, and I'll add those whenever she sends them to me.

23rd of December:
-met Timo's family.  Their house is huge and oddly reminded me of my Grandma.
-heard the badisch dialect for the first time. Puss uff!
-saw the Rhein and the French border
-jogged along the Rhein dam (the area looks a lot like Louisiana)

-played foosball and pool with Timo and a high school friend of his.  I lost every game.
-ate homemade Maultaschen pan-fried with cheese

24th of December:
-worked out in the cellar.
-bought Roquefort to make bleu cheese dressing.
-ate the meat fondue which was surprisingly delicious. The bleu cheese dressing went great with the meet.
-got a box of chocolates and a small case of homemade German cookies, aka Plätzchen
-played "Up the river, down the river," card game with the family 'til near 3:00 a.m. Timo's dad got tipsy.

25th of December:
-woke up late only to find that other family members were already there ready to eat Christmas lunch
-ate Marksklösschensuppe (vegetable soup with potato dumplings), sirloin steaks, steamed veggies (carrots, cauliflower, brussel sprouts), and Spätzle with different kinds of gravies and sauces to go with, and homemade walnut and red gooseberry ice cream.  Not what you'd expect a typical German family to eat, but everything tasted like HEAVEN.
-went to Karlsruhe of which Timo gave me a tour.  The city was the best urban planned city in Germany I have seen so far.
-met Timo's high school friend Janosch and played Halo 3 and some Western style game.  I didn't win any Halo matches, but I pwned the Western game!

26th of December:
-met Timo's favorite Uncle.  At the time he was very very sick.  Didn't seem to want to be living.  A few days later, Timo tells me he passed on. 
-ate rabbit for the first time. Seriously tastes just like chicken but better.
-got another thing of chocolate from one of Timo's aunts, and a bottle of a knock-off brand name cologne from another.  Who gives someone they don't know a bottle of cologne as a gift? Yeah I was appreciative that they got me something, but Timo and I both decided that you don't gift someone cologne unless you REALLY know them.  Thoughts?
-wrote silly emails in English to Vincenzo, en Français to Kathrin, and in ghetto English to Denise, Timo's girlfriend.
-got a nickname from Timo: Sir Richard Löwenherz (Lionheart).

28th of December:
-went to France for the first time.  Weather was ok, but totally didn't see it coming that everything is closed in France on Mondays.  They all wanted me to try escargot for the first time.  Guess I lucked out there!
-drove through the Rhineland-Palatinate (German state west of Hessen and on the French, Luxembourg, and Belgium borders.)
-had Saumangen for the first time.


The next few days nothing worthy of writing about happened, except we went to see Avatar in the movie theater the day we left to go back to Gießen on the 29th.  Needless to say, I had a wonderful time at the Wachter's.  Sometimes it was a bit draining having to concentrate so much on what everyone was saying with their badisch and all; nonetheless, it was great training. On New Years Eve, I went to Frankfurt, but had the worst time ever.  Don't really want to talk about it.

In the past week or so since Timo got back from spending time with Denise, we've just been hanging out cooking, watching movies, and working out a lot.  To my-- and perhaps your-- surprise, I may come back to the US all buffed up instead of fluffed up.  We eat and drink (notice I said, "drink," and not, "get drunk," there ;)) a lot, but we also work out like there's no tomorrow.  The other day I weighed myself and I was almost 60kg.  What's that mean you ask? That's 132lbs. I was 66kg (145lbs) before I left for Germany. WTF?!

As far as my German progress has been going, I'm starting to surprise even myself.  However, I do think I might have a slight problem that it's even evident when I speak English.  Please vouch if you know what I'm talking about.  Every time I start explaining something, I start to notice that people give me an odd look.  It's that look that could only mean, "huh?" or in German, "häääää?" I get sooooooooooo distracted when I see this look.  I think to myself, "Oh shit! They have no idea what I'm saying." Then I lose completely track of what I was originally wanting to say, and it becomes even more complicated.  There's no other choice but to just drop the subject.  Then when I'm listening to what someone else is saying, I completely lose focus and don't "hear" everything they've said.  There's always a word or two missing.  Sometimes I think I'm just deaf, but really, I feel like I might have some kind of attention deficit disorder, no joke.  This might be really affecting my language learning. But how would I even begin to fix this problem IN GERMANY?  How I would even explain the problem in German to the doctor completely escapes me.  And paying for the medication? Yikes. In the end I suppose I'm still learning German fine, just not fast enough.  Maybe I'll just have to wait 'til I get back to the U.S., but even then I won't have any health insurance to pay for it.  Curses!

School starts back up on the 11th.  Maybe I'll be tutoring, maybe not.  Won't be too upset if it doesn't work out.  I was just hoping that I'd be able to make a little extra money on the side so I could see and do more.  Definitely not traveling as much as I'd like.  There are so many places I want to go, but I never seem to be able to find the time or resources.  Plus the weather hasn't been the nicest here lately.  Sorry I have no other great exciting stories to tell!  Maybe it's just because it's winter break.  Now I know how the exchange students back at home feel when they're on break.  There should be a, "Hug an exchange student" day or something. 

School is out.  Snow has fallen.  Cookies are being baked. That can only mean one thing: Christmas time is here!

Of course, I'm no huge Christmas fan, but when you're in a foreign country, you try to understand and enjoy their customs and traditions.  Well, I've been enjoying them quite well, I might say.



A week ago (or longer?) I went to Frankfurt to the German stock exchange and the Christmas market.  A teacher had invited me to come with a class I had never visited, so I got to know some more cooler Germans.  Unfortunately, they're a banking class that has no English class, hence, the likely of seeing them again is slim. Aside from the stock exchange being a tad boring due to our not so enthusiastic tour guide, I enjoyed Frankfurt very very much.  Being there made me miss living in a big city, even though I'm quite comfortable in Giessen. 

The market in Frankfurt is bigger and more festive than the one in Giessen.  At this one booth in the Römer Platz I had Heidelbeerwein (Raspberry flavored Gluehwein) and Rahmbrot with Rakletkäse, which was a dark bread with melted swiss cheese on top.  I did a lot more adventuring through the markets and was truly astonished.  However, I decided in the end that you could find just about everything in the Giessen market that you could in the Frankfurt one.  There might be a few things you can't buy in Giessen, but I don't think it's anything worth noting.  Let's just say I won't be going to Frankfurt for the Christmas markets anytime soon because I'm missing out on something.


I also decided to do a little touring through the city on my own time.  It was my first time in Frankfurt, and even though I didn't get to spend any real time seeing the city, I enjoyed what I did see.  Enjoy some of the pics I took :).




<(Rahmbrot with different toppings)


Later that night I went home and helped Kathrin and Timo prepare for our next event on the following day, a Weisswurst Frühstück.  We invited several people over and cooked these special Bavarian white breakfast sausages with handmade Brezeln (pretzels), German potato salad, and an egg/cheese dip.  To top it all of we had Paulaner Weizenbier.  This was probably the first real authentic German food we made in the house together.  The sausages were sweeter than I had expected; nonetheless they were still very enjoyable.  My favorite part of the meal had to have been the Brezeln though.  There is NOTHING like a homemade, fresh-out-of-the-oven Brezeln.  A "Fressmaschine" (eating machine) is what I feel like after having eaten so many.  The dip was very much like deviled egg filling, and even though strange at first bite, I appreciated it all the same.  At last the Bier was obviously refreshing and complemented the food well.  No mystery there.


Here in Germany when it comes to Christmas, eating and eating and eating is the thing to do.  I don't think in the States we eat this much around this time of year, or maybe that's just my family.  We do often have one or two meals extra if we have to see different family, but it doesn't quite nearly rival up to the frequency of Christmas meals here in Germany.

Not long after the Weisswurst breakfast, Heike, a German teacher at the school, invited me over for a Christmas dinner.  We had some kind of Niedersachsen specialty which was like a cabbage stew with spicy sausage and tomatoes.  Doesn't sound too lovely at first, but it looks, smells, and tastes amazing.  I think Campbell's Soups needs to get on that recipe stat!

Anyway, shortly after that meal, I ate again at Conny's, my mentor teacher.  There we had a huge roasted goose with an amazing sauce, Böhmische Knödel, Rotkohl, and a goose giblet soup.  For dessert, Conny made all kinds of cookies, even some were a special recipe from her grandma.

And it doesn't end there.  Tomorrow I'm heading off to Timo's place in Karlsruhe where his mom has already prepared several things to cook.  On the menu already is the following:  homemade Maultaschen (German ravioli), meat fondue, smoked mackerel, and countless cakes and tortes and other desserts.  The only concern I originally had about was the meat fondue.  At first it sounded like processed meat that's been cooking in a fondue pot and one is supposed to dip vegetables or something of the sort into it.  However, I was gladly informed that it's actually pieces of meat on a stick that stick into a fondue pot of some kind of fat.  So it's frying your own meat.  I'm very intrigued.

Aside from gaining pounds in our waist area, Timo and I plan on doing some traveling/sight-seeing while we're there.  Supposedly there's a castle in Karlsruhe and several museums.  They may or may not be open, but we're going to try.  If time and money permit, we'll go off into German-Franco land a.k.a. Alsace.  Strasbourg is not far at all, and it will be my very first real time (airports don't count) in France.  I can smell the croissants already! That is, if I'm ready to take on a few more pounds :D.

At last, some German words:

der Spachtel - spatula
die Bohrinsel - oil rig/oil platform
abkacken - to screw up i.e. I screwed that test up/I screwed it up with her.
jemanden in den Wahnsinn treiben - to drive someone mad/insane
absetzen (Gewicht) - to relieve weight
ätzend - lousy/corrosive/pungent

There hasn't been much going on the past few days except for me working my butt off.  Well, the work really isn't any more than before, I'm just also dealing with issues going on at home.  While there's schoolwork and tutoring work to prepare, I'm calling over to Kentucky just about every day.  At least trying I'm trying to. 

There's also the roommates contingent.  We all love to cook, so just about every night we try to get together and make something.  What we make ranges from typical German to American, even experimenting with fusion foods.  That's like Mexican food with Chinese ingredients.  After we eat, we normally spend quite a bit of time quatschen about whatever we feel like.  It's easy to forget that I have to be in school 9 a.m. the next day.

The teachers at the school and I are also really starting to develop relationships.  Since the beginning of my time here in Germany, I've been spending time with my mentor teacher.  I'll never be able to stop repeating how amazing she is. I owe all of my positive experiences to her.  Now that quite a bit of time-- more than three months-- has passed, the teachers have started inviting me over for dinners (tonight I'm going over to a teachers for dinner and Glühwein) and I've even been returning the favor, even though our small Wohngemeinschaft doesn't compare to their large beautifully furnished apartments.  However, they seem to be even happier to have been invited and included in my life outside of school.  On the other hand, I feel like it's the least I can do.

It's nice to have three different kinds of age groups as friends.  The Lehrern satisfy my hunger for professionalism, the roommates and their friends for relaxation and student culture in Germany, and the students for new trends in the language.  You could say my bases are covered! 

But...

Even though one could argue that this is the best possible way to spend a time abroad, I'm getting oddly homesick.  In Vienna I didn't get nearly as homesick as I am now.  I just feel like I'm missing a lot going on at home, and it doesn't help the fact that my mom is having hardships AROUND CHRISTMAS.  I want to be there so much for them!  Everyone keeps reassuring me that this will past and eventually I will feel so at home that I won't want to come back.  That may come true, but I don't know if it's ever going to feel comfortable being out of reach with the persons I've loved for a long time now. 

I don't want anyone worrying about me, of course.  Everything will be fine.  I can't reiterate that enough.  Writing in this blog about it constantly just helps me put my thoughts into words which I can reflect upon.  Christmas is coming, and, even though I won't be spending it at home with family and friends, I will be in good company at my roommate's place outside of Karlsruhe, or K-town, as the Germans love to call it.  It's pretty exciting that I'll get to see how the people here spend Christmas while getting to know my roommates and their families better.  Oh! Forgot to tell you that Timo, the roomie from K-town, and I will be stopping by Kathrin's place in Mannheim, who also lives with us.  So there will be quite a bit of traveling this month, and I'm super stoked!  THEN! If that weren't enough, we're going skiing in the Alps sometime the beginning of January!  My Christmas break won't be bad at all :).

Alright, well I gotta head out!  I'll leave you with some new German words/phrases I've learned in the past few days or so.

fiese Socke - nasty sock! (used as a not-so-vulgar insult)
ätzend - god awful; corrosive; acidy;
Angeber! - Show off!
Ziegelstein - brick
einschätzen - to gauge; to assess; but also appreciate?
locker - lax; casual; "locker bleiben" - to stay cool
lahm Arsch - lame ass
scharfer Hund - like a teacher who's too hard/strict, some Amis may say "He's a Nazi!"