Germany

Went out to dinner on Friday night with some friends of the family, then met up with James at the Irish pub, and met some Welsh guys who want to move to NZ and had heard the Waikato was the place to go!! They invited me to come back the next night to watch the Rugby with them, Wales vs. NZ and so I dragged myself along in the vain hope of other NZers magically appearing. I only stayed for the last half, and was the only female and the only one under 30. But the old boys treated me ok, they all stopped and stared when I went in, and one even said "A WOMAN!" but not in a "This is man territory, get out", just shock that I would show up by myself to watch the rugby and have a beer. I was a little surprised at myself as well.

Me and the boys, Max is 7 and Mike 5.

Then headed over to a mates place and mucked around for a few hours just chatting. When I left her place, I noticed a note had been left on my windscreen. It was all in German so it was straight to the dictionary when I got home. The writing was barely legible as it was, and so the only words I could translate were "Unfortunately" and "Pressing Charges". The whole family had gone to Düsseldorf, and so I had to wait till morning to track someone down to explain it to me. Apparently I had blocked someone’s driveway and instead of getting my car towed, they had made a complaint with the police against me. Of course I freaked out, as images came to mind of me standing in a court room having some angry German judge screaming and spit flying! But after calling Sandra and Luis (friends of the family’s who I get on really well with, i.e. the ones I went to dinner with on Friday) they told me that as they hadn’t got my car towed, there’s really not a lot they can do now, the police won’t be bothered with it. But we will wait and see what happens. I didn’t know if I should go apologize, or what. But everyone I've talked to, said not to worry about it, this guy sounds crazy, and they had never heard of someone going to the police over it before. Just my luck huh? Just to clarify, I did not for a second think I had ever parked in someone’s driveway, it was dark and raining heavily, and looked just like a normal parking space. To put it in a better perspective, in most suburban streets, the roads are very narrow and are often one-way, so to combat the parking problems you are allowed to park on the pavement. Of course seeing it in broad daylight the next day, I can’t believe how stupid I was, but at least lesson now learned.

Anyway, on to other things, here is a bit of a list I’ve complied to give you an idea of the differences of living in Germany to life back home in New Zealand:

At restaurants you always just go straight to a table, never wait to be seated.

Mandatory military service for all males over 18, for at least 10 months.

Germany has over 300 universities, of which students don’t have to pay any fees.

There are around 1,500 kinds of sausage.

They drink sparklingly mineral water like nobodies business, and tap water is considered fine for bathing in, but ‘only a barbarian would drink it’. But at around 30c a bottle, it’s not so bad.

Random photo from a Black and White party I went to a few months back, just thought it looked cool

Germans tend to leave work right on finishing time. To stay any later, would show you’re inefficient with your time.

Most German washing machines are front loaders, and can take up to 2 hours to do a load, but surprisingly using less water in the process. I haven’t seen one clothesline the entire time I have been here.

Religious studies are compulsory in all schools.

In-sink garbage disposables are banned, as is importing Garden gnomes from Poland.

There are usually locks on every internal door in the house.

Most of the transport network, works on an honour system – meaning that there are no barriers to go through and conductors are rare.

It costs €2000 to get a drivers license and requires between 25 to 40 hours of professional instruction, plus 12 hours of theory.

Germans aren’t prudes and have a very casual attitude about nudity. They happily walk around the changing room in the gym without a care in the world, completely in the buff.

They have to pay for local calls, and pricing is quite expensive, comparative to NZ.

When Germans rent an apartment, they need to bring everything with them (sometimes including even the kitchen sink). The rooms are completely bare, no light fittings and no curtains! When they leave, they usually have to paint all the walls white. So this means that most get quite creative with decorating their flats, as they have to paint over it at the end regardless. Unlike our stiff rules for renting in NZ, I have seen people put whole new kitchens and bathrooms into their apartments at their own expense, not the landlords. As renting is more common than owning in Germany, I guess the philosophy is that they have to live their and so they want to make it as much their own and as comfortable as possible.

The biggest thing I hate about Germany is that it feels like everyone here smokes! It’s probably just because there are few smoking restrictions in public places, the workplace, and even restaurants. It really is a non-smokers hell. Non-smokers are completely at the mercy of smokers, as the attitude seems to be if you don’t like it – you move! Not the other way round, it’s their god given right to smoke where ever they want. I had forgotten just has awful it is to smell yourself when you come back from a night in a pub. Yuck!

At intersections, the traffic lights are only on the side of the road that you are stopped at, not across the road as well. This means if you are at the front of the queue, you are inline with the traffic lights, meaning it is often very difficult to see when the lights change.

Biking everywhere is quite common, and wearing a helmet is not compulsory. There are bike paths and lanes everywhere.

An urban treehouse in Berlin. Not sure if this is art or children actually made it.

They are fanatics about recycling, and have four different bins. Plus most bottles have a ‘pfand’ meaning you get money back when you take them back to the place you brought them from. To give you an idea, of the extent you have to go to discard ones rubbish, to ‘chuck’ away one teabag, you actually have to use all four bins! Their plastic bottles for sodas etc are much thicker than ours, as they are used repetitively instead of being melted down first.

Companies are very efficient in finding ways to save money, by replacing workers with machines or making the customer do the work. At the supermarket, no one packs your bag, or even puts the food in the trolley for you. They just push it to the end of the checkout and you have to load it in yourself. To get you to return your trolley to the terminal, you have to put a €1 coin into a slot on the handle to begin with, as it releases it from the rest of the line. To get your money back you have to connect it with the remaining trolleys. In a parking garage, you have to take your ticket with you and pay before getting back into your car, so no grumpy attendant in a booth waiting for you like back at home.

Well autumn is all but nearly over, trees have just about shed all their leaves and winter is at our heels, and I am still as happy as ever. I’ve heard on the radio it might snow any day. I think it’s been good weaning my self into the cold, than say if I had landed in the middle of it. I remember back to when I visited friends in their flats in Dunedin (South Island of New Zealand), and I thought I was going to die of the cold, but at least here I’m not the one paying for heating, I have a car to get around in and I actually have some warm clothes so I think I should be alright. I’m told November is the biggest month for suicides in Germany, but I’m in surprisingly high sprits. I’m due for a winter anyway as I haven’t had one in well over a year and a half.

The Halloween festivities have finished, and the family I live with had a giant party, they even brought in professional decorators to style the house for two parties (one for the kiddies and their friends families, the second for Franks work colleagues). They took everything down, and are coming back to put up all the Christmas decorations, I even heard murmurings of a 4 metre high Christmas tree - absolute madness. The house gets lit up as well, just like in the American movies. I can’t wait, as Christmas is huge here! Massive Christmas markets and its most likely going to snow! My sister is moving to Belgium in a couple of weeks, so I’m actually going to have family at Christmas dinner!

I’ve been quite a social wee bunny lately. I’ve been going out to dinners, the Irish pub, cocktail bars, the International Youth Circus, and even went to a very weird German version of the Rocky horror picture show. We arrived just as the ‘Sweet transvestite’ song started, it was more than a little disturbing - think Meatloaf changed into German then sang in drag!

I met up with a girl my age, last week who’s mother goes to the English speaking group I’ve been to a couple of times. Nadia’s just got back from a few months working in Nambia. She lives about an hour away from me, and is going to Uni. So I might go for a drive one day and check out what a German university is like. She showed me around her city for a bit and we had lunch in a Castle. It was so good to have someone my own age to talk to and be silly with. She’s coming to stay with me this weekend, so I’ll show her around Wiesbaden.

My very first attempt ever, at carving a Pumpkin

I was just thinking it was about time for a little recap, to fill you in a little on the daily goings on of my life as an Au Pair in Germany. Well where to start, I guess at the very beginning: I get up every morning around 6.30 am and head down stairs to make the boys a snack for school and get breakfast ready. Usually a soft-boiled egg, or either jam, cream cheese, ham, salami, wurst or cheese on bread, then at 7.30 it’s a mad dash out the door, through the busy city traffic to the boy’s private bi-lingual school across the other side of town. The school is several large old buildings, divided by a busy road and has absolutely no grass – anywhere! To be able to drop the boys off, I have to go down a very narrow one way street, which is often blocked by people parking on the sides and not leaving enough space to pass, or people block the exit to the schools tiny car park, utter chaos at 7.45am every day. The boys get a cooked lunch everyday at school, as ‘lunch’ is the main meal in Germany. Surprisingly most schools in Germany are finished by lunchtime, and the kids come home for lunch, and don’t need to go back in the afternoons. That doesn’t really leave a lot of time for learning. The boys however usually stay at their school until 4 pm, as they have an after school program. All the teachers at the school speak reasonably good English, and thankfully so do a lot of the other children’s parents. All the mummies and daddies are all immaculately dressed, and have flash cars and I always get funny looks when I walk around in my t-shirt and boardies but I think they know I’m an Au Pair so I don’t really get too many ‘snotty’ looks. Another thing I hadn’t counted on, was the fact that there aren’t actually that many Au Pairs here, in fact I’ve only met one and I was in such a hurry when she introduced herself I never got her name. I’ve asked around, but they’re really not as common here as I thought.

Frank as a Pirate

While the boys are at school, I am a lady of leisure. I watch a little German TV, as I eat my breakfast – all in the name of research of course! So far I have endured Dr. Quinn Medicine woman, the Simpsons, the Cosby show, Step by Step, Seventh Heaven, the Nanny and Monster Garage in bad German voiceovers. I have managed to find three channels with some English. The first of course is MTV, but for the last few weeks it has mysteriously disappeared. There is an engineering type channel which has been voiced over but they still have the original English underneath, so if I’m lucky and listen really hard I can pick up random words about how to build bridges, and apartment buildings! The third is a journal type program with news bulletins and is half in German, half English. So every two hours I can understand something, but I’m not complaining, I didn’t expect there to be anything in English anyway. Besides I have found that as I know quite a few random German words, and with the help of the images, I can kind of piece together what people are talking about. The Germans love their reality TV and have adapted a lot of American shows, i.e. they have the German equivalent of ‘Judge Judy’, ‘Popstars’, ‘Super nanny’ ‘DIY rescue’ and ‘Wife swap’. They have a lot of talk shows, and game shows.

I still only know pathetically little of the language, which is not all that surprising considering I haven’t taken any classes, and I have to speak English all day. I still know enough to get by, and haven’t gotten into any major problems, its mostly just an issue when the Albanian house cleaner wants to talk to me and she knows little German herself as it is - gets very frustrating, and often hilarious, ahh well. I have looked in to classes, and unfortunately the classes offered are either not for absolute beginners or at tricky times. I have been told by so many not to even bother trying to learn the language as it’s a complex and tricky language that it will take years to get familiar with it, and I leave in six months.

Nicole and Sandra in the kitchen

Anyway, I usually go to the gym which is going well, but I need to figure out a better eating plan. Since the boys are at school I tend not to make a big meal at lunch, and then since I have to make them a small dinner, I’m not getting enough meat, veggies and fruit. I’ll talk to the nutritionist at the gym this week. I also have to run several errands usually, like the dry-cleaning and getting fresh things from the supermarket. Germans tend to go shopping more regularly, and buy in smaller loads to assure everything is as fresh as possible, so daily trips to the bakery are common for many. But for the most part I can do what ever I like. As I save most of my money for travel I don’t really go shopping, (besides Wiesbaden is pretty ‘high end’ anyway) I tend to look around town, people watch and window shop instead.

There are lots of differences everywhere you look, I find myself saying “well back in New Zealand we…..” a lot. But there’s nothing that I find really really strange or infuriating. I will try and write things down when they happen to explain to you better. I am thinking already about where to head after my time in Germany is over. I definitely know I will not be returning to New Zealand in the near future. I am tossing around the idea of working at a Summer camp in the US, before heading to the UK but I am open to suggestions and advice if anyone has any ideas out there. In the next wee while I will be doing a couple of weekend trips, mostly to places with famous Christmas markets, and hopefully will get to Belgium in January while my sister is there. Also got to work out when I can go to Norway to visit my friend there. Well keep in touch, and don’t forget that I still want to hear about what you’re up to as well!

WARNING: This one is a whopper, perhaps best taken in small doses. I know reading about other peoples holidays is never really that exciting since you weren’t there yourself, so I won’t be offended if you can’t be bothered reading the whole thing. I’m not exactly going to quiz you on it later :o) Although I’ve tried to make it as interesting and easy to read as possible for you – feel free to just have a browse through the photos if you’re just not in the mood right now. Otherwise, enjoy!

The family spent there autumn vacation in Gran Canaria in Spain, so I took the chance to jump in the car for a week and head north in search of the real, quintessential German experience. Now most “normal” people who travel around Germany head to Bavaria, and usually follow the “Romantic Road” full of wurst, castles, lederhosen and cuckoo clocks. I have nothing against the state, but as I am somewhat of an anti-tourist I chose the less well known 600 km long “Fairytale Road” as a rough guide to my route north.

Doing things properly I started off in Hanau which is the birthplace of the brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm who you may or may not know gathered and recorded most of the fairytales we grew up with. There was nothing to see or do there, except look at the statue of the two brothers which as you can imagine, doesn’t really take all that long. I then headed off to Marburg, a pretty cool, relaxed University town where I spent the afternoon with Julian; a guy I’d met the weekend before at a brunch for ‘Couchsurfers’ in Frankfurt. He showed me around the old part of the town, and gave me a glimpse into life as a student in Germany. They don’t have to pay fees, and all pretty much live in apartments. The guys still have to do military service for a year, but a lot seem to get out of it by doing some sort of community service instead. So the result is they finish their degrees a lot later than we do, considering they also finish high school later than us to boot. Of course as luck would have it, on the very first day of my little road trip I encountered car troubles, thankfully not of the serious kind. As I pulled into Julian’s place, he noticed the front passenger-side tyre was making a funny noise. Somehow, a guard above the tyre had slipped down, had ripped partly off and was grating against it. He managed to get the whole thing off with out problem, but who knows what would have happened if it had come off completely while I was driving.

Julian

I ended my first day, by arriving reasonably late into Kassel and having my very first couchsurfing experience. I signed up to Couchsurfing early last year, but my flatmates back home were never really that keen about the idea of letting strangers come stay. I couldn’t really complain as I had an outside room and they’d be the ones stuck inside with them. I stayed with a speech therapist called Salesia who was a newbie to the whole Couchsurfing phenomena as well. Even though we were both exhausted, we stayed up chatting over all the misconceptions we had about Germany and New Zealand etc. She was very warm and welcoming and I hope I left a good impression as well.

Salesia

I was a little disappointed by the city of Kassel, perhaps it was the crappy weather but I just didn’t feel anything for the city – surprising considering it was supposed to be the capital of the Fairytale road. The main attraction of the town is a huge Hercules statue on a hill over looking the city, but of course when I was there his head had been taken off to get restored and all I could really see was scaffolding.

Rheinhardswald

I carried on the next day and stopped in a small village called Hofgeismar, which doesn’t really have any claim to fame but was a good stop for lunch. As I sat in the market place, a woman came to sit by me and we started to chat. Jana had moved from the Czech Republic seven years ago and now lived in the village with her German husband and two small children. After a while she invited me back to her house for Coffee, as she had to put her son down for a nap. I had no plans so I decided it couldn’t hurt to pop in for a while. We ended up talking for a few hours, and although I hadn’t implied it or even thought of it she invited me to stay at her place for the night. I couldn’t think of a reason not to, so I stayed. I left for a few hours and went to Sababurg, the castle of Sleeping Beauty and was stunned by the gorgeous countryside surrounding the Rheinhardswald, a primeval forest reserve.

Jana and her little one

Autumn turned out to be a fantastic time to see this part of the country as all the trees had turned deep reds, burnt oranges and striking yellows. Because of the rain the grass was lush and green, and the sun was low and golden. When I got back, Jana and I sat drinking Czech beer, and ate fresh Italian food, her husband was on a business trip and would probably have been more than a little surprised by both of our spontaneity. She invited me to go with her back to the Czech Republic, as she was going to visit her family, but she wasn’t going to be back before I had to be in Wiesbaden to look after the boys and I had already made plans to meet up with Hauke in Hanover. However when she goes back again I would be more than keen to join her.

Trendelburg

Sad to leave my new friend, I ventured on regardless to Trendelburg, home of the tower of Rapunzel. I just missed a large tour bus leaving and so fortunately had the whole place to myself to snoop around. Then on to Bad Karlshafen, which was disappointing considering my Lonely Planet guide had made it out to be a little slice of heaven. Hoxter came next, of Hansel and Gretel fame. I decided spontaneously to get a haircut and get a bit of colour put in, which is not as easy as it sounds when you don’t speak the same language as the person with the scissors. Blink and you miss it, ‘Polle’ is supposed to be the home of Cinderella, but when doing a bit of further research it’s never mentioned – hmmm sounds a bit fishy. Again I was the only one at the castle ruins, so I’m not complaining. I got to try out the self-timer function on my digi, and looked like an idiot running around and jumping on to ledges to be in time for it.

Me in Polle, Cinderella’s castle

Got to Hameln reasonably late in the afternoon, after stopping at a country pub (extremely similar to the one at Matawai actually) for a lunch of Schnitzel, and having to push my way past all the old boys watching the soccer. I got a few raised eyebrows, as they quietly pondered ‘who the hell is that’ and ‘how the hell did she end up here’? The town of the ‘Pied piper’ is crawling with rats, as the towns gone more than a little crazy with its namesake. I tried in vain to find the Rattenfängerhaus (the rat catcher’s house) one of the oldest buildings in the town, which is now a restaurant, and so settled for a kebab. Of course on the way back to the car, just mere metres away but what should I find? I think you can guess.

Bergen-Belsen, memorial and mass grave to the right

After staying the night in the quiet Hameln hostel I left the fairytale route and came upon a pretty town full of half-timbered houses called Celle. As it was a Sunday nothing was open, and so I had no way of finding out if there was anything to see or do there, but it was a nice stop anyway. After reading about it in my guidebook, I did a detour to Bergen-Belsen, which was a Nazi ‘Prisoner of War’ and ‘Concentration’ camp in WWII. Although unlike Auschwitz in Poland, absolutely none of the camp remains and all that is left are mass graves of the 70,000 people that died there, including Anne Frank. The large plant covered mounds of the mass graves, almost blend in naturally to the landscape, it’s not until you read the signs that the realization of just how many people died there hits you. ‘Here lies 5000 dead’ etc. The museum there was full of appalling pictures and although the descriptions were all in German, it didn’t really matter - the impact of the images was enough. I watched a video in English and the inhumanness of it all was so overwhelming. There were awful, uncensored scenes of the several thousand unburied bodies and emaciated survivors that greeted the British forces who liberated the camp in April 1945. So feeling a little deflated and sad I moved on to Lüneburg. I had hoped to find a barn to sleep in for the night, as the area is well known for its ‘getting back to the country’ lifestyle, but sadly the girls at the Information centre were more than a little unhelpful. Although I was getting sick of driving I carried on to Hamburg.

Hamburg Rathaus

I hadn’t heard a bad word said about Hamburg since arriving in Germany, so I had high expectations. Basically as soon as I arrived I met a friendly Norwegian called Margrethe who was staying in the same dorm as I was. We ventured off to the famous ‘Repperbahn’ aka the red-light district of Hamburg for dinner. I practically talked the poor girl’s ear off as I hadn’t spoken to anyone in nearly two days. She asked me if all New Zealanders were like me? - not sure if it was a compliment :o) But she told me the next day to keep in touch, so I couldn’t have been too awful. I gave in to the evil tourist pull, and did a tour of the city in one of those awful double-decker buses with headphones, simply to get my head around the huge city and also because I didn’t know a thing about the place. I got off and had a look around the centre and did a tour of the Rathaus, which was pretty impressive. As the weather was crap and I was feeling hideous after taking sleeping pills the night before (the curse of being a light sleeper in a hostel) I really didn’t give Hamburg as much energy as it probably deserved. I wasn’t up to roaming around looking at everything, so I convinced myself the tour in the bus and walk around the centre was sufficient. Back in the car and on to Bremen.

Bremen

Even though Bremen was also the end of the fairytale road, I have always known I would get to Bremen eventually. When I was fourteen, Hauke came to live for a year with a family friend who lived in the Waioeke Gorge just south of Opotiki. I had naturally seen photos of his home town from him, but I had also grown up with a book of the ‘Bremen town musicians’. I really liked Bremen, although its old buildings were a little dark and grimy it had a nice feel about it. I wasn’t even put off by the foul stench of Hops coming from the Becks brewery across the river. I met a couple of eccentric Organ players from Sweden at the hostel that night, whom had mistakenly been put in a girls-only dorm. When someone complained (no idea who) they were moved and replaced with a very chatty and friendly Russian girl. As the boys had to go to a recital I dragged myself off to a restaurant for dinner, and contemplated having a few drinks, but the thought of drinking by myself was a little depressing to say the least. I’m sorry if this gets the feminists out there a little angry, but I really don’t think its normal for a girl to sit at a bar and drink by herself – sends the wrong messages if you know what I mean.

Bremen Town Musicians

I had an interesting start to the day, by going down into a lead cellar below the large Dom St Petri Cathedral, where eight mummified corpses lay in open coffins. The figures included a Swedish countess, a soldier with his mouth opened in a silent scream and a student who died in a dual in the early 1700s - really not somewhere I would recommend for the squeamish. Luckily I had arrived in Bremen when a Carnival had come to town, so after leaving the sombre cellar I was instantly surrounded by Ferris wheels, flower stalls, crafts, wurst and apfelweine stands. To be able to end my fairytale road experience in the proper fashion, I roamed the streets and hunted around for the statue of the ‘Bremen town musicians’ and was just about to give up, when I realised the small insignificant statue stashed in a corner, which I had dismissed earlier was actually the towns iconic quartet. With my search over (a little disappointed) I travelled south to Hanover, and finally got to catch up with Hauke – the German exchange student I met in 1999.

Hauke and Ines

Hauke, has spent the last five years learning to be a Doctor, and actually plans on moving back to New Zealand briefly (most likely to Tauranga) to do his practical training with a friend. He hasn’t changed all that much, just back from a holiday in Tunisia learning to kite surf, he’s still into his triathlons, and lives with his girlfriend of five years, Ines. It was nice to go over some old stories and talk to someone about New Zealand who actually knew people and places I knew. He showed me around parts of Hanover, and as we got caught in a rain shower we sat down below some trees in front of a lake that was made by Hitler (not personally of course). As he had to go to work first thing in the morning, I decided not to stick around Hanover, and instead followed a recommendation to head east to the Harz Mountains region.

As time was beginning to run out I could only make a quick stop for lunch and tour around the cute town of Goslar, and then headed right through the middle of the scenic region which brought me to an area called ‘Bovenden’, naturally I couldn’t resist taking a picture of me in front of a sign. So now back on the Fairytale road, perhaps not in the order it was designed, but who’s checking? After literally finding no room at the ‘Inn’ in Gottingen, I randomly headed south to Hann Munden. Absolutely exhausted I made myself walk around the middle of the town, looking for somewhere to eat, and had to pathetically resort to McDonalds in the end – as nothing was open. The following day, I needed to head home but as I was in the area, I checked out a few little villages on my way back including Oberweser, the home of ‘Snow White’ and ‘Puss in Boots’ and also Schwalmstadt the centre of the ‘Little Red riding hood’ region. Let’s just say I was more than a little surprised at the lax attitude these villages had about their so called ‘claim to fame’. Trying to find information, let alone a blimmen shop that was open was a joke. Admittedly these places are just small dots on the map, I am sure with a little ingenuity they could really make a little business for themselves – but perhaps they like things just the way they are. And as I mentioned earlier (if you can remember back that far) I was after the quintessential German experience, so did I find it?

Bovenden

I had a fantastic time away; I met some rather entertaining and warm people and learnt a thing or two. It was good to do things a little untouristy, even if sometimes all you wanted was a little tourist information, like why the hell are you here? But you can’t want one thing and curse the absence of the exact opposite can you? Autumn was a fantastic time to tour around the north of Germany. There were stunning sights around every turn, and crowds were scarce, of course this also meant that things were closed for the season. I travelled nearly 1500kms in the end, virtually all off the autobahn – so I could see things up close, and which also meant places took longer to get to. So I was glad to be able to finally stop the car and be at home. Straight back into things when I got home, Friday night I went to a Coffee house concert at the English Church here in Wiesbaden with friends and then onto a few drinks at some bars in town with my drinking buddy, James. Saturday night I went to a Halloween party with some people I met at the Black and White party I went to a fortnight ago - got see a rather entertaining version of the ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ and a bit of Meatloaf in German.

This coming weekend, we’re having a huge Halloween party in the house, and the decorations have already been professionally put up around the house, it looks like something straight out of a movie. The following weekend I am back on the road, this time with an American woman I’ve met here and we’re heading to Northern Bavaria for a bit of Girls Weekend getaway. I’ll keep you posted, naturally.

This weekend I jumped at the chance to go on a mini road trip with Stefan to his hometown, Berlin. On the way, we stopped off at a medieval castle perched on a high hill above the town of Eisenach. Wartburg Castle is somewhat strangely, the only castle in all of Germany to be named a ‘world heritage sight’. I will not bore you with too many details, of which I only know little myself as I had to take the German tour as the English tour was booked out, and was the only way of seeing the interior. Its biggest claim to fame is that it is where Martin Luther translated the bible. The castle had quite a nice feel about it, it had a very impressive gold room covered in glass mosaics but unfortunately for me the courtyard was being restored much like the rest of the country and dare I say – the rest of Europe (the price of having so many old buildings I guess). Having to do the tour in German, provided me with an unusual insight into just how different we English speakers behave. On the several tours I have been on, the atmosphere is very relaxed, and very informal. Although people listen to what the guide is saying, people casually talk amongst themselves pointing out things and above all – they ask questions, lots of them, and usually very annoyingly so. But the Germans were absolutely quiet the entire time. Not one question was asked, and no pleasantries exchanged, it was all very sterile really. Still it was a nice break in the journey and was worth the visit.

Inside Wartburg Castle

We stopped off in Leipzig in East Germany to visit Stefan’s sister and her new husband. She is 21, works in the German Navy, and apparently is an excellent shooter (trust me; you would never have guessed it.) They had recently brought all the set up for Singstar so I got to see the boys battle it out, and got to see some very tragic German 80’s hits. They had most of the songs we have, but a few random localised hits as well. After being on the autobahn all day, and not being able to go too fast (only a crawling 160 km/h) because of the long weekend traffic, I was exhausted by the time we finally arrived in Berlin, which supposedly has roughly the same population as all of New Zealand, go figure.

We literally spent all of the next day on the go. As Stefan is a born and bred East Berliner (who still clearly remembers what it was like to live behind the Berlin Wall) I got see most of the main sights and sounds without any problems, apart from getting disorientated from getting on and off the S bahn, the U bahn and bus. Mitte, formerly East Berlin, is the city’s historic core and packs in most of the landmark sights, with a few exceptions of course. Here is a rough guide of what I got to see, mostly for my future reference:

Berliner Dom

Brandenburger Tor - Berlin’s famous gate, still standing after virtually everything else around it was destroyed in the war.
Reichstag – imposing Government building with long queues out the door, down the steps and around the side of the building
Unter den Linden – tree lined boulevard full of embassies and historic buildings, including the Humboldt University and the infamous Bebelplatz, which was the sight of the first official Nazi book-burning.
Gendarmemarkt – large square, flanked by two large domes and a concert hall
Berliner Dom – huge cathedral, with some very impressive, yet slightly eerie crypts of former royals, which a large number where actually children’s
Museum Insel – literally ‘Museum Island’, need I say more
Neue Synagoge – the original bombed by Nazis towards the end of the war and is still guarded by police
Kufürstendamm/Wittenburg platz - shopping district, with KaDeWe the seven story designer apartment store, for the rich. A fashion photo shoot was going on in the foyer while we popped in
Potsdamn Platz – the ‘new’ Berlin, epitomised in the Sony Centre, an architects dream (or nightmare I’m not quite sure) the surrounding buildings I was told, literally hang from a large tent like glass roof, with an artificial pond in the middle – very impressive. The base for the Soccer world cup media reports a few months back, and also the World premiere for LOTRIII.

Marge Simpson is dead - well her German voiceover is anyway. Apparently she was in her 60’s and died shortly after her husband had passed away after a long illness, sad story really. Just thought I might throw that in there, to wake you up after all my boring holiday details. Ok, now where was I?

Oranienburger Straße

Although I got to see a lot, we didn’t have time to see each thing in very much detail, and there is still so much I didn’t see at all, like ‘Checkpoint Charlie’ and the ‘Holocaust memorial’ - which means another visit, is more than a likelihood. As I was lucky enough to stay with someone who actually grew up in Berlin, I got to see just how different the two sides of Berlin still are. Although virtually none of the Berlin wall remains, most of it taken in small pieces for mementos, and larger chunks in museums throughout the world, the rest simply recycled and used for roads - there is an invisible line you cross where the change is instantly visible. Where the west is packed with ugly cell like apartment blocks, literally blocking out the sun, the east felt more like a country village with haphazard cobbled streets and a random mix of decent residential and desolate housing.

The next day, feeling a little worse for wear, we started to make our way back home, but not before stopping off to get me some Turkish Apple tea from one of the Turkish supermarkets (mmm heaven) and just out of Berlin we stopped off for a few hours at Potsdam at the Sanssouci Park. The sprawling beast of a park was basically the playground of the royals and all the main buildings (much to my joy) are very spread out. The Neues Palais, the most impressive of the palaces was a nice leisurely stroll 2 kilometres away from the infamous Schloss Sanssouci, although you could pay to go in, I was suffering a bit of information overload as it was.

Neues Palais

Out of all the places in the world I expected to see some good old NZ toetoe; in front of a very large Old Dutch Windmill, in a small garden in a large German park was not it. But better yet when we had sat down to lunch at the parks restaurant - for Schnitzel of course, who should I see out the window than Nancy, one of Marisa’s (my old flatmate) friend who had lived in NZ a while ago for a year, in Waihi and whom had actually come back to NZ just last year for a visit and had stayed at our flat for a few weeks in Hamilton. To add to the coincidence she was at the park to show her host parents from NZ around. I had completely forgotten she was from Berlin, but the chance of seeing her then and there in the huge park was just uncanny.

So now 9 of the 16 states of Germany down, and of course I only got to see a very small slice of Berlin, so I can not fairly give an informed opinion yet. I would like to go back to Berlin simply because I do not think I have heard a bad word about it, from anyone actually, so I definitely want to explore a bit more. In two weeks time, I am back off to Bavaria for a quick visit, and then I am off on a road trip to explore the north of Germany for a week and will probably follow the ‘Fairytale Road’. Oh and just something a little random to end on, petrol stations all over Germany sell alcohol, and usually on big stands by the counter. I’m told it’s more to do with the service stations opening hours (compared with supermarkets) than promoting drink driving, but still!

Well life is still ticking along just nicely over here, on the other side of the world. Thankfully the sun came back, and winter has held off for a wee bit longer. I get strange looks when I drop the boys off at school, when I casually stroll around in my shorts and t-shirt while the flash mummies are all wrapped up as if it’s the middle of a NZ winter. Although it’s not exactly tropical, I’d describe the temperature more as ‘fresh’. I hadn’t really thought about it but I have had a year long summer, so winter is going to be a bit of a shock to the system when it does arrive in full swing.

After Mum left, and carried on her way to Croatia and Bosnia on her religious pilgrimage – I got straight back into things and I joined the library and the gym. The library has reasonable size English section, €10 for a year’s membership so I am in heaven. The gym thankfully has quite a high number of staff who can speak English or at least a bit of Germish. I spent last week getting weighed, measured and condition tested, of which I was absolutely horrified at my initial analysis. But that’s why I signed up in the first place huh!? The gym works a little differently to home – hell what do I know I only went about 5 times to the one at the University in Hamilton. But basically I pay my monthly membership which is €39, and then I have access to everything, even free massages!! I have a personal trainer whenever I need one, literally, and they’re making up a nutritional plan for me for teaching me how to eat whilst in Germany. They have lots of classes running which will be perfect for me, and might be a chance to socialise a bit. Strangely enough I had already managed to loose 10 kilos since arriving, with out even really trying. I think all the walking in Italy, the decrease in consumption of takeaways and the reversal of eating patterns has helped considerably. Germans have their main meal at lunch, eat a very light dinner and seldom have junk food. But the weight loss still surprises me because all they ever seem to eat here is bread, cheese and meat. Hmmm.

I went to another BBQ with a different English speaking group, I was feeling absolutely awful but dragged myself along anyway for a nice sunny Sunday afternoon BBQ. I couldn’t eat a bite all day, but managed to plonk myself at one of the tables and didn’t move for nearly five hours. The group was mainly made up of British, but there were a few Americans, one Australian, and a few Germans. I was of course the youngest there, but it wasn’t a problem. I met a nice Scottish woman who is more than willing to off load all her old books to me.

As there’s never a dull minute when I’m around, I received a phone call from a young girl nearly two weeks ago claiming I had hit her car, a brand new ‘Smart car’. Yes another traffic incident! You would think the car crash before, and speeding tickets were enough wouldn’t you! One morning on my way to taking the boys to school, I had moved behind a car blocking a side street, to let another car coming up the main (yet narrow) street to pass. The car in front of me suddenly started to reverse and so I honked the horn to warn her not to hit me, as it then became obvious she hadn’t pulled over to let the car pass but was instead trying to get into a car park which I was now in. The other car coming up the street passed, and I went on my way. Apparently she is now claiming I hit her car, and scratched and dented it, then I left the scene of an accident and she has an eye witnesses. As it happened virtually right outside the house, and our names are on the front gate I imagine that’s how she got our phone number; otherwise they must give out personal information to people who have your license plate number. I am really peeved because I never felt any impact what so ever, neither did the boys, and if there was an impact surely it must be her fault for not checking her rear-view mirror?!? She told Frank I must have been in a hurry, that’s why I honked the horn and then drove off. I never thought there was an accident, so of course I didn’t stay. But it may get tricky because she claims she has eye witnesses, who could be bloody anyone (probably just one of her mates) and the whole thing could end up in court and get messy. The alternative is I pay for it to get fixed and it gets forgotten about. But as I have very limited income as it is, it would be a devastating blow and I really don’t feel I have done anything wrong. A whole big case of misunderstanding!! I have since seen the car parked outside the house, as she goes to the high school a few doors down, and I can’t see a mark on the car at all, but it could have already been fixed by now.

To add to the chaos, I came out of the supermarket the other day and low and behold, someone has driven into the side of my car, and dented it with out leaving any details! No one was around either so I couldn’t ask anyone what had happened. It is really frustrating because I know how careful I am whilst driving here, and it just feels like one thing after the other – and Frank and Nicole have enough things to think about without me adding to it.

The last few days have also been rather eventful, as Max got sick at school and so he got taken to the doctors and then admitted to hospital where he spent two nights. The health system works very differently to home, and instead of kicking them out of the beds ASAP they try to keep them in there as long as possible because the Insurance companies shell out hundreds of euro a day to the hospital. Max had a bit of a fever, stomach cramps and funny red spots all over his head, they kept talking about it being ‘Scarlet Fever’ but nothing is still clear yet as to what was wrong with him. He is now home, as Nicole refused to play the hospitals game, and it was obvious he really didn’t need to be there any longer. Frank is in China for work, and Oma and Opa are staying for a few days. I have been looking after Mike and keeping him entertained, which usually means playing soccer in the drive way, and making sure Max is ok.

But it’s not all work, yesterday I spent the afternoon sitting on a rug in the sun by an old castle and big lake in the park, and read my book, ahh bliss. Then for dinner we went to a nice wine garden along the Rhine River. I have been going to the gym nearly every day, I go for walks through Wiesbaden city centre and I’ve also driven into Frankfurt and gone to the English Cinema and saw ‘Das Parfum’ (sorry no idea what the English title is) and also ‘The Break Up’. I like to sit out in the garden and attempt reading a German magazine, and watch all the squirrels in the trees collecting food for the winter. The first signs of autumn are here, the tree lined streets are turning red and there are carts with big orange pumpkins on the sides of the country roads. Nicole has brought a few home, and the boys are well practised at craving them. I have been told I need to master the art before Halloween arrives, as each year they have a big party and go crazy with decorating the house. I also have five days off in a row at the end of next week so I am off to Berlin with Stefan, and he’s going to show me some of the sights and sounds. So one could say, life’s not to bad for me at the moment.

Well that’s all for now, can you believe I have been here almost four months? You better start thinking about Christmas and birthday presents for me, because it’s going to take a while for any packages to get here, with the way the German postal system operates. Hint hint!