Strange German Traditions

Last night, Latvian Friend's host parents basically shoved her out the door and said, "You are going to a bar, and you are going with Tina."  Which I found a perfectly acceptable plan, so we got all dressed up and headed into the city.  I wore really tight jeans, the lacy black shirt that remains, to this day, the only shirt random straight men have complimented me on on, and ridiculously sexy heels my sister made me buy that look like sex in a can.  Also, my hair (which has gone from Really Long to Really Ridiculously Long) down for full dramatic effect.  And did we get hit on even once?  No.  Because Germans are terrible at flirting.  The only people who even looked at us twice was a table of overweight Spanish men rocking track suits and mullets.  Also some random drunk man who tried to speak English at me.  Then, when we got home (and in typical graceful Tina fashion), my heel got caught in the bike pedal as I was getting off, and the whole contraption fell over with my leg trapped underneath it.  Now the handlebars are out of line with the front wheels, my knees are a flower garden of bruises.  So all in all, it was a pretty successful night, and we had lots of fun!

On that note, I'm going to hit you up with Strange German Relationship Traditions, that Host Mom broke down for me one day, while we were sitting at a cafe watching a random man sweep bottle caps off the street.  Which might explain while Germans are so terrible at flirting.

If you, a man, are not married on your 25th birthday:
Your friends put boxes on your roof.  To symbolize that you are unmarried and suffering from an excess of boxes.

If you, a man, are not married by your 30th birthday:
Your friends take you to the local town square, hand you a broom, and dump giant boxes of bottle caps on the ground.  Then lots of strangers gather around you in a big circle, drink beer, and throw the bottle caps at you.  And you have to sweep them up, sweep them up, and keep sweeping them up, until a virgin kisses you free. Usually this is a small girl child whose parents are all, "Go kiss the strange, old, sweaty man, Johanna, and I'll buy you an ice cream."

If you, a woman, are not married by your 30th birthday:
Your friends throw a party, and make you clean all the doorknobs in the house.  To symbolize that you are unmarried and thus in the mood to clean doorknobs.

If you, a man, are not married by your 40th birthday:
You are very sad because you have suffered boxes on your roof, and the indignity of sweeping things until small children kiss you.  And now it's even worse, because your friends rent a donkey and make you ride it backwards around town.  To symbolize that you are a) unmarried, and b) have terrible donkey-riding skills, which demonstrates how suave you are to all the ladies cleaning doorknobs.

The things you learn living with a family!

Club Portugal

I said it on Facebook, and I will say it again here: I am officially a card-carrying member of Club Portugal.  This means that I have a card.  Also, a T-Shirt, as soon as some overachieving pork chop decides to put one up on Zazzle.

I got up at 5 AM to train it to Hannover, and from there hitched a ride to Hamburg with some guy I found on the internet, because you can do these things in Europe.  I got there at 10.30 in the morning, expecting to wait for three hours like I did last time. Naturally, I was the only person there, and at 10.40, I was right back out on the street, +1 on membership cards, -1 on Things To Occupy My Time Until 8 PM When My Ride Leaves.

So, I called up a Turkish friend from way back when in Konstanz.  He had seen my Hamburg pictures on Facebook, and messaged me saying that he was living there, and next time I was in the city to call him.  So I did.  By 10.55 we were hunting each other down in the train station, and by 11.00, there were hugs involved.  We ran around the city for a couple hours, got lunch, and then took a leisurely stroll through the red light district, for some reason which I'm still not clear on.  I saw lots of naked people, lots of naked people holding bad things, and a sign that said "Funky Snazzy Pussy," which did not intrigue me enough to find out what it was.  And then we went back to his dormitory to hang out and drink tea.

The good news is, if I was still on the fence about studying here, I'm not now.  I met a couple of his flatmates, and we sat and talked until it was time for me to almost miss my train.  The one guy was from Berlin, but his parents were from Afghanistan, which meant I had to attempt to explain American foreign policy while avoiding looking him in the eye for shame.  Also, I wanted to ask him if he spoke Farsi, but I was afraid he would ask me how I knew Farsi was spoken in Afghanistan, to which I would have had to answer "I read The Kite Runner."  Awkward.  Best to keep silent and listen to him tell me about a high school project he did where he analyzed the speaking habits of Obama and Adolf Hitler and found them remarkably similar.  Best to nod and say, "Interessant."

Then I called up my ride and was like, "Dude, I'm peacing out early," before hopping a train back to Celle.  All in all, a successful day.  Tomorrow it's off to the town hall to try and get this shit sorted out, because my visa expires in like, four days.

In other news, after a long, dreary, and generally miserably winter, fall has finally come to Celle.  Unfortunately, my beautiful purple pea-coat is what's known as a "fall jacket" around here, which means it's useless after the end of the week.  I've got my mom and my sister hunting down the sexiest arctic parka they can find, my only requirements being a) a hood, and b) pink.  I figure my body will at least be easy for the rescue guys to find when I freeze my ass off.

EDIT:  The pork chops have been hard at work on Zazzle.  Should I get the shirt with the Portuguese flag, or the shirt with the Portuguese flag, do you think?  There's also a nice blue one with the Portuguese flag.

The Official Rundown and All That Jazz

I hope you guys enjoyed that video, because I said I would be embarrassed about it today and I am.  Because now the whole world knows I'm obsessed with rice cakes. Sigh.

Also, I'm writing this while catching up on Jersey Shore episodes because I experienced a strange nostalgia for guidos while in Denmark.  But it was a distant fondness, the kind where you can't smell the Axe.  So like an Atlantic Ocean's worth of distance, basically.  I just thought you should be aware.

So today is Official Run Down and All That Jazz day, where I put up pictures, write a mini novel, and say "bitch" a lot.  Two weeks is a long time, so forgive me if I don't cover every minute of every day, as I am prone to doing.  This is all about efficiency. Summary, pictures, anecdotes.  Boom.  Bitch.

Like I said in the video, it was a long, long trip.  When we finally arrived at the ferry, we had to chill out in front of the boat for forever while the unloaded all the cars:

Then we packed in like sardines.  Actually like sardines, because we were in a metal box, it was hard to move, and it smelled like fish.

Upon arrival, we discovered our house was called Vossavang, which made me happy for no apparent reason:

And it was lovely and chicken-y, once you got past the whole mold/mice thing:

And there was a super awesome bathtub, which I took a picture of, but did not get to try out.  I know.  Don't judge me.  

Our first day there, we immediately attempted to find the beach.  Our house was advertised as being 600 meters from the beach, which it was not.  We got retardedly lost in the woods, and wound up scrabbling down giant sand dunes and almost dying. We discovered later our house was only 600 meters from the beach, but only if you ignored the mile-long drive to the beach parking lot.

But we found the beach, and the Baltic Sea is lovely!

As is the Snog-A-Bitch Snogabæck harbor: 

The next day we ate lunch on some rocks, and I practiced my mountain-goat skills by scampering around on them:

Also, I found Danish cows:

I don't know what this is, but I took a picture of it:

Look, a bird.

There was lots of climbing on rocks, and almost falling into the sea while doing it:

And glasswork shops with explicitly naked glass-people in the windows:

We spent a lovely afternoon in Gudhjem, where there isn't much to do except look at things.

Look, another bird.

We went to a restaurant, where I made friends with the cat:

Danish signs were cool for the first week, and then my lack of Danish language skills rice cakes got old.

Then we did a day trip to the north end of the island, where we hiked to a castle called Hammershus!  The hike was beautiful:

And I climbed this nonsense entirely in flip flops because no one told me we were hiking that day.  My host parents were blown away that I survived.  I pretended like I managed it just because I'm awesome, and not because I've had too much practice climbing shit in inadequate footwear with Claire.  

DISTANT CASTLES!

ARE NOT AS COOL AS CLOSE-UP ONES!

The castle ruins were SO badass.

Then we went to Rønne, the capital of Bornholm, where I found only two things noteworthy enough to warrant a photograph.  1). The Justin Bieber biography.  In Danish.

2).  Slutspurt.  A most adequate description for pretty much all the people I'm friends with.

Other than that, I really didn't take many pictures.  Bornholm was lovely, but we quickly ran out of things to do and just went to the beach every day.  Which was fine, except I saw so much old naked Danish genitalia, I don't think my eyes will ever heal. One guy was cavorting around completely naked in front of his small children, flying kites, and Host Mom didn't understand why I was horrified and wanted to call social services.  Then she said, "I don't see what's the problem with being naked in front of your own kids.  When I was in school, our teachers even got naked in front of us."  And that actually blew the lid off the discussion, it was about ten minutes before I could say anything besides "What.  The.  FUCK."  It was awful.  I tried to explain how you would lose your job in half a second for that, AND be banned from everything for life, AND be arrested, AND be tarred and feathered, AND be fed to spider monkeys with AIDS.  And she did not understand.  And I did not understand why she didn't understand.  And I spent the rest of the day with my head buried in my towel, trying to avoid looking at Naked Cavorting Man, who was nakedly cavorting too close to us for comfort.  And THAT is when I started missing guidos.  They smell like hairspray, but at least they have pants on.  As a general rule.

Other things of note:  supposedly the soft ice cream on Bornholm is the best in the world.  But I tried it, and I can think of about twelve places off the top of my head that are better, starting with Rita's and the Rutgers dining halls.  Just throwing it out there Denmark, don't feel too triumphant.

All in all, Denmark, though it was at times cold and wet, was a good time.  Lots of hiking and beaching, but I'm glad to be back.  A friend family just got a Latvian au pair, so she and I have already started making plans to go out this week and do fun things.  The country is open again, so tomorrow morning it's off to the riding club and the music school for me.  Also, I just signed up for two seminars in November that looked interesting.  One is called Typish Deutsch? and it's all about critically looking at German culture.  Technically it's meant for Germans, but whatever.  The other one is called Politischer Extremismus (political extremes), which I signed up for assuming the US is going to get mentioned two, three, or a thousand times.  Also, later this week I am off to Hamburg to (cross my fingers) pick up my Portuguese ID card.  My visa expires next week, so all needs to go well or else I'll be like a hobo squatting in Bronx apartment with three walls, except my Bronx apartment is called Germany.  Once the saga is over, I will finally write the Epic Visa Problems post, which is sure to be about as awesome as a Cracker Jacks box of unicorns.

Adios friends!

EDIT:  Oh!  I forgot to give you the favorite song of the day!  

Listen.  Before you judge me, just listen.  It's James Blunt and I DON'T EVEN LIKE IT, but it's been on the radio and I can't get it out of my head.  I hope it hasn't been on American radio, because it blows and it's James fucking Blunt.  And anyone who says Cal-ee-forn-ay-aeeee does not deserve to be on any radio, let alone American radio.  I hate myself for listening to it, but now you can have it!  Hate yourselves!

How a Liter of Milk Ruined my Day

Every time I think I'm coping and being awesome, European, and modern, culture shock punches me in the ovaries.  It particularly loves to do it just as I think I'm totally over culture shocking.  It started today with some milk, followed by some Host Dad, (who has been looking at me recently like he's wanted to say something), and ended with some Something being said.

I drink milk like a fish.  I'm sorry, I don't mean to, but I figure since I don't drink coffee, wine, beer, OR most juices and teas, my milk-drinking is a pardonable offense.  But apparently we were running out of milk today, because Host Parents at dinner said, "Tina, can you make a point not to drink any more milk?  It's running low, and you didn't buy any or tell us so we could buy some, and the child needs the rest for his breakfast tomorrow.  When it runs low, you need to buy milk"  It went in one ear, buzzed through the American translator like a lightning bug on speed, and came out the other ear as: go buy some milk.  I said, "Oh, I'm sorry, I can run to the supermarket after dinner."  And they said, "No, that won't be necessary."  Buzz buzz goes the translator.  Verdict: Yes, please, that would be great!

So, right after dinner, I headed out and bought some milk.  "Look!" I said triumphantly, "milk purchased, problem solved!"  I congratulated myself for my quick-thinking and skillful bike-riding, that saw me screeching up to the store just before it closed.  I patted myself on the mental shoulder for single-handedly saving my family from osteoporosis.  I was the fucking MAN.  Except the fucking man was really confused when the Host Parents got a little pissy about her super-human milk-buying exploits, and said, "You didn't have to do that, that's not what we meant."

Later that evening, Host Dad made a general announcement and said, "Can we all try to keep a little more order in this house?"  Buzz buzz: Tina, you're the only non-German in this room, so you need to get with the German Ordnung Programm.  "Oh, I'm sorry," said I, "where did I make a mess?"  And that was it.  Host Dad went off about how I'm always defensive, take things personally, and don't do things around the house for fear of making a mistake.  Buzz buzz: Tina, you suck, so try not to cry.  "Oh, I'm sorry," I said, "I didn't know what you were looking for.  And you told me to go buy milk."  "No we didn't."  "You said we were running low on milk and I should have bought some."  "That doesn't mean go buy milk now."  "Yes it does!"  "No.  It doesn't."  Buzz buzz: ERRORERRORdoesnotcomputeERROR.  Then I got to hear all about how if I keep assuming indirect meanings, Germany is going to eat me and I won't be able to study or work or walk outside without the entire country rising up to poke me with sharp sticks.  Buzz buzz: fail at life.

So where does that leave me?  In my room, eating my way through the last box of Cheez-Its my mother sent me, watching America scroll by me on Facebook. Land of the free, and home of the people who, reassuringly, never say what they actually mean.  I miss it.

I'm back from Denmark!!

I'M BACK FROM DENMARK.  And as much as I enjoyed the trip, I'm so relieved to be back in Germany it's almost obscene.  Last night I stared at the ceiling for three hours, unable to sleep, hating everything and wondering why on earth I thought moving to Germany could ever have been a good idea.  Then I realized I wasn't in Germany, I was in Denmark, and I was culture shocking over the retarded food products, lack of internet, and cold beaches.  When we got off the ferry and I could understand the signs around me again I was so happy I didn't know what to do with myself.

In other news, what the fuck, Wells-Fargo.  Charging me for using my debit card abroad?  Fuck you too.

In other other news, the IIGOIIDanish consensus was for Danish.  Really?  I was ready to bet my soul on his gay-ness, which just goes to show you how out of whack Europe has thrown the gaydar.  So in summary, the scoreboard reads:

German: 1
Crazy and Homeless:  1
In Denial:  1
Danish:  1
Gay: ...0

Not a single gay guy?  Really?  Shit.