And Now, a Series of Short Stories

Who am I kidding? Reflection on my life-enriching experience these past two months is clichéd and dull. Let's write about extremely trivial things instead. And let's do it in an extremely ugly, numbered format.

1.Whaddup Dresden

I spent a couple of days in Dresden. It's very pretty, and nice to walk around in, but the biggest problem  is the plethora of beautiful artistic fountains with ZERO drinking fountains. None. It's like, a cool German thing to always be a little dehydrated. It's been really warm these past few days, and nothing makes a dehydrated Katie (who has been walking around Dresden for hours) more inclined to break rules than reading “Kein Trinkwasser!” Is it? Is it really kein Trinkwasser? I could probably drink it, really. No one's around.

Yeah, alright, so I didn't drink fountain water... but seriously, I’m going to guess that Germans are  a pretty dehydrated people. And they like it that way.

  

Tried a pretty fantastic pilsner for free. Shout out to Brautzner Tor, where a liter costs only €4.60! (I didn’t order a liter, but I should have. Go ahead and judge me, Dresden. I dare you.)

2. I Found Love

I used to be a pessimist in regards to love, but my time here in Germany has changed my mindset. I am in love, friends. I am in love with this pair of Birkenstocks, and I feel no shame.

...well, alright, I feel a little shame. I mean, not only are they an inanimate object, but they’re Birkenstocks for goodness' sake. What am I, some kind of middle-aged “practical” shoe-buyer who power walks on weekends and buys low-fat granola in bulk?  (Yes.) But these sandals are love. I have walked the crap out of them since I bought them a week or so ago. They’ve accumulated miles over the course of Dresden and Berlin, and they are holding it together like champs! 

I’m already planning to obnoxiously wear them around Michigan and look like some horrifying European-wannabe-(who-doesn’t-actually-know-what-Europeans-wear.) 

(What do they wear? Not Birkenstocks.)

Seriously, my relationship with these sandals is a deep, unyielding bond. I've never felt this way about shoes before. They’re like my children, if you strapped children to your feet and walked around for hours. When I step in mud, I cry.

3. Train Problemz

New Feature Film: "Stoppable!" The long-awaited sequel to “Unstoppable,” that will thrill you with a strange balance of being bored out of your mind and simultaneously very stressed because you're never sure what is going on.

Starring me, a regional train, and some cows.

Filming Location: Wish I could tell you.

Welp, I finally got lost on the trains. It was two glorious months of pretending I knew exactly how to navigate the rail system, two months of sheer, unadulterated logistical bliss, and it came to a screeching halt yesterday. I had to catch a transfer in the Leipzig station, so I went to Platform 10 (like I was supposed to), and there was some gurgled announcement about 12 and something… but my train number didn’t have a 12 in it, so… I mean, it was fine, right?

I should’ve suspected the worst when someone on the platform asked me, in English, “Is this train going to Berlin?”
“Why, yes, I think so.” Then, some garbled form of Denglisch fell from my mouth and a few sentences later, they were gone.

So, of course, I had to follow my own advice. I got on the train. It didn’t LOOK like the right train, it didn’t FEEL like the right train, but hey… there were open seats and it was Platform 10. It’s probably right, right?

It was definitely not right. Definitely, definitely not right. I wish I could tell you what godforsaken city I ended up in, but I can’t even remember the name. Something beginning with “H.” There were fields, and cows, and trees… by about the 5^th or 6^th cow herd sighting, I began to doubt that this train would take me to Berlin.

So after riding through the foothills of Nowheresberg for two hours, I finally ventured off the regional train onto a platform. The only recognizable destination for the other trains was “Leipzig,” so on I went. Back, two hours from whence I came. I got there, rechecked a departure time to Berlin, and finally made it there 5 hours later than expected (my friend was not happy about waiting.) But as far as mistakes go, this one was at least scenic.

4. My thoughts on Berlin: Meh.

Berlin is overwhelming. And not in the good way, more in the “I seriously have no idea what I’m doing, where I am, or where I should be going.” I have a pretty poor sense of direction, and Berlin’s area is about 10x too big for my tiny, directionally-challenged brain to handle, let alone trying to use the U-Bahn/S-Bahn system. There’s just so much here, it’s impossible. IMPOSSIBLE, I TELL YOU. 

And also, the hostel we’re staying in is really “hip” and all these young, attractive people speaking languages I can’t understand are always dressed for clubbing and hanging out by the reception. It's intimidating. Overall, this has solidified the hunch that I'm not a big city person.

Incoherent Stream of Consciousness

Oops, it's been two weeks since I last posted. Funny how that happens.

If you read the last post and wanted to scratch your eyes out at the sight of my ignorant Amurrican complaints about soccer football, you'll be pleased to know I've learned a lot more since then. For example, ties bother me a lot less now that I understand the whole round-robin elimination thing. At this point, I predict Germany will beat Italy on Thursday, and probably face Spain in the final on July 1st. It's so fun to watch a sport where there are no idiotic ESPN commentators to deal with and no commercial interruptions for Cool Ranch Doritos. (WE GET IT, YOU'RE DELICIOUS. NOW GO AWAY.)

As for my plans, my last day of class is on Thursday. After that, I'm hoping to visit a friend in Tübingen (south Germany) and then head to Berlin for my flight to South Africa on the 5th. I'm a little anxious about the whole "lugging my 50lb suitcase on to trains" thing, but we'll make it work (no promises, though. I might knock a few bystanders unconscious in the process.)

In other news, what is food in America? I think I've forgotten. Hamburgers? (They're actually pretty terrible here, so... congratulations, America! +1 Arbitrary Culinary Point for you.) Bacon? But there's not schnitzel, or wurst... but I mean, I don't... pasta, maybe? Seriously, what did I even eat last year? Soup? Raisins? I'm pretty sure that was about it...
Yeah, I'm going to miss German food a lot.
And their beer.
And their ice cream.

This is a transitional sentence. Over the course of the past two months, I've been collecting postcards, coasters and miscellaneous things and sticking them to the board over my bed. Here's a picture of it:

As you can see,  I started on the right and it gradually descends into chaos on the left. There's a little story that goes with most of them, which is nice; some I still don't understand. However, my favorite has to be the very first that I found in Frankfurt:

It was a promo postcard for some comic convention day in May, but let's be real, that doesn't adequately justify why this picture exists. There are just so many great things about this I can't even stand it.

Anyway, I'll be bringing all of these little memory nuggets with me back to the U.S. Taking them down in a few days will be a bummer.

I'm hoping to write at least one more post before I leave Göttingen, but I feel I should warn you in advance, it'll probably be tacky and laden with gross summaries of what I've learned about myself, blah blah blah, how my world perspective has been altered by this experience, yada yada... boring, preachy stuff like that. Something from the classic "20-something goes somewhere and thinks she knows everything now" genre. Don't miss it!

Winners and Losers and Ties, Oh My

I've begun watching the football matches in the Eurocup with other Goethe Institute people. Not being from Europe, my knowledge of "football" is little to none, but I reckon all that really matters is that Europe is playing each other and it's a big deal. Germany beat Portugal over the weekend, so that was good. But the next day, I was watching the Spain vs. Italy game, and it was really exciting, and the score was 1:1, and then... it was over. Everyone just stopped playing. 

The players walked off the field. The crowd stood up and filed out.

"Oh, but Katie, it wasn't an elimination roun--" 

Silence! I don't care, I'm so not okay with this. And if I'm not okay, how can the crazy Europeans be okay? Everyone in Amurrica knows there are only two categories, winners and losers, and someone has to lose. Or win. Something has to happen.

"Oh, but Katie, there are ties in some American sports, like hockey--"

Yeah, yeah, well, tied hockey games haven't really pervaded the American psyche enough for me to sit idly by and accept a 1:1 final score. It's frustrating, I tell you. I want some answers. And then it happened again today, with England versus France. COME ON, MAN. 

Also, they count time up instead of down. This is by far the most disorienting thing when watching this sport. They reach the end of play time (90 minutes) and then just... add a couple of minutes or so, depending on what they feel like. Maybe there's a more accurate system that I just can't decipher, but it appears to be really jank, especially to someone who watches a football where every second, nay, half-second is fought for and debated over with tooth and nail.

And have you ever actually watched soccer players? Because, well, obviously I hadn't before this. Every single time two (or more) players collide with each other, they replay it in super-slow-motion, and it reminds me of those National Geographic shows where the lion takes down the antelope really, really slowly (see below.) So much pain.

(spoiler alert: the antelope dies.)

Although I'm learning (sort of) as I watch, it still makes me miss sports I understand. Sports with countdown timers and padding and helmets to cover the agonized faces of injured players. Michigan football, anyone?

Save Point (Half Done!)

Three-part mega-blog! Half-way point! Nostalgia! Too many parenthetic statements, exclamation points and incomplete sentences!

Munchin’ in München! 

The ties that bind...

OK, we didn’t munch that much. We mostly drank. But there were some pretty impressive pretzels in between the liters of beer. 

München (Munich) was just as wonderful and expensive as I had been told! Since no building can be higher than the St. ...Something church, it doesn’t feel as “big city” as most towns with over a million people do. Positively charming in stature (Fun fact: I... don't know any of those words in German.)

München, and Bavaria as a whole, is home to those most ready to embrace German stereotypes (and now I'm generalizing. Whee!) Lederhosen, beer-quaffing, pretzel-nomming—all very, very easy to find; especially beer quaffing. There are six brews specific to this city, not to mention their airport brew (brewed in and for exclusive consumption in the Munich airport. Yeah, that's right.)

Overall, my weekend there was lovely. Learned a little, walked a lot, and met some interesting people. On a beer tour, I got to drinking with some Australians and gradually started speaking in (what I thought to be) their accent, so that was noteworthy.

Leipzig-zagging in a Renault

Now let me start by saying I love my father, really I do, but sitting in the back seat of a manual Renault while “navigating” the streets of German cities and the Autobahn was less than fun. I thought I was going to die about every 200 meters.

He auto be bahned from driving in Europe! Haaa. I feel clever.

My parents flew in Wednesday morning (and boy, were their arms tired! (I hate that joke.)) and arrived in Göttingen the same day. We spent Thursday here, then went to visit Leipzig for the weekend. Leipzig is home to Bach, as well as many other, less memorable things. Most of our time was spent in churches, museums, and not knowing where we were (see also: “looking for parking when there are angry German drivers behind you”). We went to a concert in Bach's church, which was pretty awesome, since the SATB choir that performed was fantastic (of course, with acoustics like that, a warbling Brooklyn smoker with a karaoke machine could pass for angelic.) They sang "Hold On" (WGC, I thought of you!) and a pretty nice modern piece, the title of which I have forgotten. Maybe I'll remember and then post a link to it or something. That would be cool.

Who are you people? Get off my lawn.

But seriously, there are 96 new people at the Institute this term. NINETY-SIX. I'm pretty sure that's more than double what was here before, in new people alone. It's a little overwhelming, especially when we'll be missing the friends who left... but new people are fun, right? Right.

Can't believe my time here is half-over. Already feeling sad. Grammatically incomplete sentences.

Thank goodness I have South Africa to look forward to at the start of July; it'll assuage the inevitable bummed-ness of leaving Deutschland...

Have to make the most of the time I have left! More incomplete sentences! 

All mice must die.

Blauen Sänger are singing a song called... well, it's an incomplete (but lengthy) sentence in German, but the title isn't important. What matters is the text. It begins by talking about all the different kinds of mice, which sounds nice, right? Field mice, house mice, water mice...

Fact: When I was little, I had a lot of books about mice (Beatrix Potter, anyone?) But specifically, there was a book called "The Biggest Pumpkin Ever." It was about two mice, one from the city and one from the country, who unwittingly fertilized and nurtured the same pumpkin (gasp)! Mr. City Mouse gardened during the day and Mr. Field Mouse gardened at night. The night before the big pumpkin contest, they found out that each other existed, but thankfully were able to resolve their socio-economic differences and enter the contest together.

(And of course they won. It was the biggest pumpkin ever.)

So this was my mindset; happy, cheery mice from different homes. That is, until we sang (in a cheery 16th C. melodic fashion, of course:)

"Alle müssen sterben und verderben!" All must die and be ruined.

This, friends, is the most stereotypically German thing I've experienced first-hand. I mean, of course the mice die, because everyone dies! All the mice die! Yes! Hyper-awareness of mortality!

Happy endings are hard to find in German lore, so I really shouldn't be surprised, but... it made me laugh until I was in tears. Brilliant.

(Speaking of mice, Heather and I saw this little guy running along the sidewalk. Blurry, but still adorable.)

^ must die.

Reality TV Pitch (also, German Dogs)

Things are going well here in Göttingen. The weather has finally taken a turn for the better (although this whole "celsius" thing is weird), class is manageable, and I've made friends who can cook for me. Being in the mental institute is really something special. Every day it proves how people from different places and different backgrounds can, under the right conditions, become friends. (God, this is turning into something really tacky... Full House teaching moment anyone?) But seriously, it's a beautiful thing, restoring my faith in humanity bit by bit. If I can play mini-golf with an Iranian and cook dinner with a Chinese guy, what can possibly stop us from solving the world's problems!? Optimism, surging through my cynical, liberally-educated veins!

Maybe we should make all the world's leaders live in an institute and learn a language that none of them speaks. Like some obscure aboriginal language from the middle of Australia, or Elvish (Liv Tyler can teach them.) And we could make it a reality TV show, I'm sure E! would be interested. Then, they would all work on their homework together and before you know it, they're solving the world food crisis (in Elvish!)

Something different:
The dogs in Germany are probably the coolest animals ever. They just trot along, leash-less, checking behind them once in a while to ensure their owner is coming. They aren't wearing sweaters, or being carried in bags, or attacking other dogs... they're so well-trained it's blowing my mind. Dogs, hanging out in restaurants! No big deal, I'll just sit here by my owner, not bothering anyone. That being said, I've only seen one cat so far, but I'll bet they're equally cool.

I'm Blau (da ba dee da ba di...)

Let me tell you why my Monday was awesome.

A woman studying here at the institute told Heather about a choir that rehearses every Monday night, with the subtext “everyone welcome” (well, if you insist.) So of course, Elisa and I both went along too, and I’m so happy we did. I mean, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here, I barely understood what any of them were saying most of the time… but hey, it turns out some choral techniques are international, like imagining a string pulling from the top of your head or throwing an imaginary dart for accuracy. You know, the fun stuff.

The choir is very small; there were about 15 girls and only 5 or 6 guys (which made for a bit of a middle-school choir balance, but it could be worse.) It's run by students for whoever wants to show up, but it’s primarily university students who attend, some of whom live in the house in which rehearsals are held. It seems to be some sort of music fraternity-esque thing. The director is a student, too, so it's very relaxed, and we sang pretty simple, 4-part songs from the 16th century. I was just happy to sing again, despite the fact that there was an entire song about a flea.

But I saved the best for last…

What is this random, user-friendly choir called?

Blauen Sänger!

Is it merely a coincidence that it’s similar to “Midnight Blue?” Um, doubt it! Clearly, it's meant to be. (Also, the director was playing Lord of the Rings music during the break, so... we're going to get along just fine.)

Hurray! I get to sing in a choir in Germany! With university students! Eeee!