Hey all!
This is me, coming at you from the deep deep deep DEEP south of Germany--we have a view of the alps, and the option to go to Austria if we felt like driving the twenty minutes there. Currently I am sitting in the hotel while Al is doing political things, which is probably fun and exciting but I can't really say because I'm in the hotel. Which is also fun and exciting!
The weekend started on Thursday, right after our Swedish test. Which, for the record, wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be, and since I finished with so much extra time, I decided to entertain myself by drawing all over my exam. I drew Viking pirate ships taking on a shark, a moose that could be mistaken for a skull and crossbones, even a really lovely self-portrait to compliment the "About Me" short text we had to write. It had polar bears eating people in the background. I risked a glance at my professor two minutes after she took my paper, and she was starring at me and turning red. Hopefully she was stifling laughter, and not the burning desire to skewer me for defacing her test.
Afterwards we headed straight down to Bavaria, to spend the night at Al's house, and early yesterday we headed over to Munich to run around and see some of Al's friends. They were all lovely, fun people, and Munich was lovely as always. We also met a super funny Turk-German, who, on top of being able to imitate every accent in Germany, does a hilariously spot-on impression of Adolf Hitler. Oh! And I got my sister the GREATEST postcard of all time.
Today, the half hour trip to our current location took an hour and a half thanks to Autobahn traffic. On the plus side, I learned that every single car pulling a camper has a Dutch license plate. Apparently the Dutch enjoy pulling campers, and possibly even camping in them.
And that brings us to this moment in time, where I'm taking a break from correcting papers by writing a blog post. In a couple hours, I get to be Al's official guest to a political function, which is both cool and terrifying. Cool because when was the last time I went to a political function? And terrifying because I'm meek and I'm foreign and when I talk to really important people, I always have the feeling I'm playing blackjack, in the dark, for ridiculously stakes that no one's quite defined for me. And the dealer is God.
Back to correcting dissertations. See you guys Monday!
14 July 2012
10 July 2012
The first semester home-stretch!
And we are officially in the home-stretch of the first semester, which is both nerve-wracking and a relief to me. Nerve-wracking because I've got to do it all again next semester, but this time for all the marbles, and a relief because sweet JESUS am I tired. But one thing I'm sure about, I'm discovering that when the going gets tough, I actually have the ability to sit down and be self-disciplined. Which is somewhat mind-boggling to me, seeing as I spent most of my undergrad career happily skipping through a field of daisies, playing with kittens, and riding unicorns through the rainbow skies of procrastination, and yet I still somehow pulled magna cum laude out of my magic hat. Except this shit doesn't fly in German grad school--which would be sadder if I hadn't unlocked the bonus level and gained the ability to pull seventeen-hour homework days. I don't know where this motivation reserve has been hiding my entire life, but damn is it useful. Although it is equally possible that the fuel to my fire is in reality just a toxic mixture of anxiety and chocolate milk--looks like motivation, will actually kill you. Whatever man. Don't look gift creatures in the mouth, my mother always said. Actually what she said was, "If you kill a lion, make sure you throw a hat at it," but that's pretty much the same thing.
As most of you have gathered from my Facebook page, Oscar, the Golden Usurper, False King of the West, has committed suicide by leaping from his castle tower. The whole kingdom is in mourning, and the jesters I've surrounded myself with can't stop laughing about it. For the record, THE FIRST FISH GOT SICK, THE SECOND KILLED HIMSELF. I did not have a hand in either of those deaths, so the next person who tells me I should consider a job on a fish-farm will find himself following Oscar to the great toilet bowl in the sky.
I gave my big presentation today--it went just fine, and the discussion it sparked afterwards was also pretty interesting. I've found that people asking me questions in a college setting about the research I've done no longer freaks me, even though I continue to struggle with academic German. Whatevs. One day. Swedish final on Thursday, two more papers to hand in, and then I am done done done. I've elected not to take the Portuguese final, for several reason: 1) it irritates me out of principle that the professor said I can't take the next level class without taking the test, even though I'm not taking the class for credit, 2) I can only take so many "Don't you wish you had a culture?" comments before I want to take my culture and hit somebody with it, and c) the guy teaches Portuguese like foreign languages are taught in Portugal, that is to say, terribly. I can teach me better than he can. And I WILL, goshdarnit.
That's all I've got for today. I'm falling asleep at my computer, which is generally my sign that I need to turn it off. Adios!
As most of you have gathered from my Facebook page, Oscar, the Golden Usurper, False King of the West, has committed suicide by leaping from his castle tower. The whole kingdom is in mourning, and the jesters I've surrounded myself with can't stop laughing about it. For the record, THE FIRST FISH GOT SICK, THE SECOND KILLED HIMSELF. I did not have a hand in either of those deaths, so the next person who tells me I should consider a job on a fish-farm will find himself following Oscar to the great toilet bowl in the sky.
I gave my big presentation today--it went just fine, and the discussion it sparked afterwards was also pretty interesting. I've found that people asking me questions in a college setting about the research I've done no longer freaks me, even though I continue to struggle with academic German. Whatevs. One day. Swedish final on Thursday, two more papers to hand in, and then I am done done done. I've elected not to take the Portuguese final, for several reason: 1) it irritates me out of principle that the professor said I can't take the next level class without taking the test, even though I'm not taking the class for credit, 2) I can only take so many "Don't you wish you had a culture?" comments before I want to take my culture and hit somebody with it, and c) the guy teaches Portuguese like foreign languages are taught in Portugal, that is to say, terribly. I can teach me better than he can. And I WILL, goshdarnit.
That's all I've got for today. I'm falling asleep at my computer, which is generally my sign that I need to turn it off. Adios!
06 July 2012
Things are looking up!
Good news! Things are looking up!
You know what they say. When the universe closes a door, it makes a point to open a window--even if that window is framed by hideous grandma curtains and you're too short to reach it. Or something along those lines. And when I say "window," I mean "highly theoretical math dissertation you get paid to correct," which is stupidly exciting to me. It won't pay my rent, but it's a step in the right something-about-vectors-I-didn't-quite-catch. I have negative idea as to what the paper I'm correctly is about, but I do know that in between all the complicated mathematical fauna, there is enough English for me to fix commas, add hyphens, and suggest better word choices. HELLS YEAH! So pumped. Not having an income makes me nervous, since I'm pretty much the undisputed Queen of Budgeting, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed this is the beginning of what may eventually turn out to be making dollars. I mean euros.
Because I really, really need money. Not so much for studying right about now (semester's practically over), but because Claire and I booked tickets to IRELAND!! Epic bike tour, here we come! What's that you say? We've never biked for more than like, half an hour at a time? Yes, well. I'll interpret that as "You guys are brilliant and have only brilliant ideas."
Despite our brilliant ideas, I'm electing to take out travel health insurance for the month of September. Not because I don't trust our biking skills. Mostly because I'm still not entirely sure what side of the road we're supposed to bike on, and having to explain to the EMTs I'm stupid as well as health insurance-less is not my idea of an Irish adventure. That would theoretically involve a shit ton of sheep and castles.
Other good things! I turned in my paper and did my short presentation, which I mentioned in my last post. What I didn't say was I think went well, even though I threw it together an hour before I had to be in class, and ran it by Al as I was practically walking out the door. My professor said it was super interesting, so yay! I'd much rather talk than write anyway. I find if I fuck up while talking, I can play it off for charm, but if I fuck up while writing, the only thing I accomplish is making myself looking like a German twelve-year old who's been hit on the head with a brick.
Oh! In case anyone was wondering, the Is it Gay or Is it German? series is not dead. It's just that most of the people I see nowadays are in their twenties, and they know how to dress themselves.
Spent most of yesterday and today working, but took a brief break to go chill on the Kiessee with friends and grill (read: watch other people grill) things. We played a round of flunkywhisk, which is always a blast. And now I've got to go read some more, and put together my giant presentation for Monday.
Yay!
Edit: Not a sarcastic yay. My presentation is retardedly interesting to me.
You know what they say. When the universe closes a door, it makes a point to open a window--even if that window is framed by hideous grandma curtains and you're too short to reach it. Or something along those lines. And when I say "window," I mean "highly theoretical math dissertation you get paid to correct," which is stupidly exciting to me. It won't pay my rent, but it's a step in the right something-about-vectors-I-didn't-quite-catch. I have negative idea as to what the paper I'm correctly is about, but I do know that in between all the complicated mathematical fauna, there is enough English for me to fix commas, add hyphens, and suggest better word choices. HELLS YEAH! So pumped. Not having an income makes me nervous, since I'm pretty much the undisputed Queen of Budgeting, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed this is the beginning of what may eventually turn out to be making dollars. I mean euros.
Because I really, really need money. Not so much for studying right about now (semester's practically over), but because Claire and I booked tickets to IRELAND!! Epic bike tour, here we come! What's that you say? We've never biked for more than like, half an hour at a time? Yes, well. I'll interpret that as "You guys are brilliant and have only brilliant ideas."
Despite our brilliant ideas, I'm electing to take out travel health insurance for the month of September. Not because I don't trust our biking skills. Mostly because I'm still not entirely sure what side of the road we're supposed to bike on, and having to explain to the EMTs I'm stupid as well as health insurance-less is not my idea of an Irish adventure. That would theoretically involve a shit ton of sheep and castles.
Other good things! I turned in my paper and did my short presentation, which I mentioned in my last post. What I didn't say was I think went well, even though I threw it together an hour before I had to be in class, and ran it by Al as I was practically walking out the door. My professor said it was super interesting, so yay! I'd much rather talk than write anyway. I find if I fuck up while talking, I can play it off for charm, but if I fuck up while writing, the only thing I accomplish is making myself looking like a German twelve-year old who's been hit on the head with a brick.
Oh! In case anyone was wondering, the Is it Gay or Is it German? series is not dead. It's just that most of the people I see nowadays are in their twenties, and they know how to dress themselves.
Spent most of yesterday and today working, but took a brief break to go chill on the Kiessee with friends and grill (read: watch other people grill) things. We played a round of flunkywhisk, which is always a blast. And now I've got to go read some more, and put together my giant presentation for Monday.
Yay!
Edit: Not a sarcastic yay. My presentation is retardedly interesting to me.
04 July 2012
Happy 4th!
Hey America! Happy fourth of July!
I spent the weekend freaking out and researching my face off, which culminated in an epic sixteen hour yesterday, which Al and I spent locked in his room at our respective computers, occasionally stopping long enough to eat rice cakes. This morning I turned my paper in, presented it, and then went straight to the library to spend another hour and a half in the library being all research-y for my giant presentation due on Monday. Joy.
At this precise moment in time, I am allowing myself to take a short break. I am maximizing this short break by cooking, typing, and watching the Glee Project all at the same time. I'm only on the first episode, although I have the feeling the producers are more attracted to sad background stories as opposed to, you know...talent.
In other news, I got another fish. I wanted another betta, but I was too embarrassed to call the guy giving them away, and they're too expensive to buy in-store. So I bought a one-euro goldfish. His name is Oscar, the Golden Usurper, False King of the West. May he live longer than the king he usurped.
My financial aid application is over before it began. Thanks to Germany being a little bitch, Al and I (but mostly Al) spent a metric fuckton of time on my application, only to hand it in and discover the paper that says I can live and work in Germany isn't enough--the office wanted an extra form that said I also have a right to remain as a permanent resident. Never mind that as an EU citizen, I have every right to remain a permanent resident, it's just they wanted to see it on my paper. So I went back to the foreigners registration office, and got a new paper. The financial aid people turned that one down again, because it was still missing the words "permanent resident." So I called the foreign registration office and was like "Bitches, I need this word on my paper." Only to be told that I don't qualify to have that word put on my paper because I haven't lived in Germany for five years.
So to summarize:
--I am an EU citizen, and a permanent resident
--I'm not allowed to have the word "permanent resident" on my sheet of paper until I've been a permanent resident for five years
--Because I haven't lived in Germany for five years, and don't have the word on my piece of paper, I can't get financial aid.
--Instead of putting a little addendum on there, like, "Only Foreigners Who Have Lived In Germany For Five Years Will Get Money," financial aid lets you take a bath in three weeks, a hundred hours, and approximately nine million gallons of stress hormones as you fill out the form, while they giggle and rub their hands together behind your back.
--After you triumphantly spend all that time, money, and energy gathering documents, getting shit stamped, and checking off deliberately confusing, unclear, and overly wordy boxes, financial aid smiles, pats you on the back, and says "Get the fuck out of my country, foreigner."
That was the moment when the "hate Germany" switch in my brain clicked over to "on."
I love grad school. I love my friends. I love the language. I love my life. But I hate hate hate hate HATE. Germany.
On the plus side, I never thought I'd say this, but thank God I'm American. It means that when I go back over Christmas, I can get a student loan.
On the other plus side, I need to buckle down to my Swedish homework. I'm going to need it in about two years.
I spent the weekend freaking out and researching my face off, which culminated in an epic sixteen hour yesterday, which Al and I spent locked in his room at our respective computers, occasionally stopping long enough to eat rice cakes. This morning I turned my paper in, presented it, and then went straight to the library to spend another hour and a half in the library being all research-y for my giant presentation due on Monday. Joy.
At this precise moment in time, I am allowing myself to take a short break. I am maximizing this short break by cooking, typing, and watching the Glee Project all at the same time. I'm only on the first episode, although I have the feeling the producers are more attracted to sad background stories as opposed to, you know...talent.
In other news, I got another fish. I wanted another betta, but I was too embarrassed to call the guy giving them away, and they're too expensive to buy in-store. So I bought a one-euro goldfish. His name is Oscar, the Golden Usurper, False King of the West. May he live longer than the king he usurped.
My financial aid application is over before it began. Thanks to Germany being a little bitch, Al and I (but mostly Al) spent a metric fuckton of time on my application, only to hand it in and discover the paper that says I can live and work in Germany isn't enough--the office wanted an extra form that said I also have a right to remain as a permanent resident. Never mind that as an EU citizen, I have every right to remain a permanent resident, it's just they wanted to see it on my paper. So I went back to the foreigners registration office, and got a new paper. The financial aid people turned that one down again, because it was still missing the words "permanent resident." So I called the foreign registration office and was like "Bitches, I need this word on my paper." Only to be told that I don't qualify to have that word put on my paper because I haven't lived in Germany for five years.
So to summarize:
--I am an EU citizen, and a permanent resident
--I'm not allowed to have the word "permanent resident" on my sheet of paper until I've been a permanent resident for five years
--Because I haven't lived in Germany for five years, and don't have the word on my piece of paper, I can't get financial aid.
--Instead of putting a little addendum on there, like, "Only Foreigners Who Have Lived In Germany For Five Years Will Get Money," financial aid lets you take a bath in three weeks, a hundred hours, and approximately nine million gallons of stress hormones as you fill out the form, while they giggle and rub their hands together behind your back.
--After you triumphantly spend all that time, money, and energy gathering documents, getting shit stamped, and checking off deliberately confusing, unclear, and overly wordy boxes, financial aid smiles, pats you on the back, and says "Get the fuck out of my country, foreigner."
That was the moment when the "hate Germany" switch in my brain clicked over to "on."
I love grad school. I love my friends. I love the language. I love my life. But I hate hate hate hate HATE. Germany.
On the plus side, I never thought I'd say this, but thank God I'm American. It means that when I go back over Christmas, I can get a student loan.
On the other plus side, I need to buckle down to my Swedish homework. I'm going to need it in about two years.
28 June 2012
Agh.
Agh. An entire week without blogging.
I'm SORRY! I really, really, really am. In approximately a week and a half, my life will go from full speed ahead double turbo pirate shit to leisurely pedal-boating down the river of my life, but until then, it's all GET UP ON DECK YE BASTARDS.
Up until yesterday, the demon in my life was my Kony 2012 essay. I don't know what it was--how complicated my thesis wound up being, anxiety about turning in my first grad school essay, or maybe just the fact that I was out of practice--but my 4-6 page essay turned into four days, 10-15 hours per day, sitting in front of my computer, dragging this essay piece by screaming, crying, over-researched piece out of my brain and into Microsoft Word. Never in the history of anything has an essay taken me that long--generally I tend to start them at 11 PM and I'm done three hours later. It's not even like this essay was in German, which would at least have given me a bit of an excuse. But I'm super happy with the end result though, and, geekily enough, kind of proud of myself. I think it's a damn good essay. The only problem is that when I format it my way, it's a page over the limit. When Al reformatted it the German way it was...four pages over the limit. And apparently, there are a lot of professors in Germany who will knock giant chunks of your grade out for that. Yeah, whatevs. So be it. I've already edited it down to the bare-bones, so if coloring within the lines is more important than turning in a solid paper, then consider me the Jackson Pollock of the ethnology department, but minus the alcoholism.
Now I've got to produce yet another 4-6 page essay (research, not thesis, thank Zeus) for Wednesday, although this one has to be in German, accompanied by a ten-minute presented introduction. Then I have just five short days to come up with a forty-five minute presentation. In German. By myself.
The good news is that after, I'm more or less done. I'll have to turn my presentation into a 12-15 page paper, but that'll get done in English, and then produce another 4-6 page essay for another class. My goal is to get everything done by the end of July, so I have all of August to spend in Berlin/Poland, and all September for Ireland.
Things that are interesting! Al and I went to Hannover and Saturday, and met up with Latvian Friend in the process. It was really nice seeing her again. The three of us wandered all around the city and took fun pictures, which I will post as soon as I steal them from Al. But here, have this picture of a massive, massive, massive carp.
I'm SORRY! I really, really, really am. In approximately a week and a half, my life will go from full speed ahead double turbo pirate shit to leisurely pedal-boating down the river of my life, but until then, it's all GET UP ON DECK YE BASTARDS.
Up until yesterday, the demon in my life was my Kony 2012 essay. I don't know what it was--how complicated my thesis wound up being, anxiety about turning in my first grad school essay, or maybe just the fact that I was out of practice--but my 4-6 page essay turned into four days, 10-15 hours per day, sitting in front of my computer, dragging this essay piece by screaming, crying, over-researched piece out of my brain and into Microsoft Word. Never in the history of anything has an essay taken me that long--generally I tend to start them at 11 PM and I'm done three hours later. It's not even like this essay was in German, which would at least have given me a bit of an excuse. But I'm super happy with the end result though, and, geekily enough, kind of proud of myself. I think it's a damn good essay. The only problem is that when I format it my way, it's a page over the limit. When Al reformatted it the German way it was...four pages over the limit. And apparently, there are a lot of professors in Germany who will knock giant chunks of your grade out for that. Yeah, whatevs. So be it. I've already edited it down to the bare-bones, so if coloring within the lines is more important than turning in a solid paper, then consider me the Jackson Pollock of the ethnology department, but minus the alcoholism.
Now I've got to produce yet another 4-6 page essay (research, not thesis, thank Zeus) for Wednesday, although this one has to be in German, accompanied by a ten-minute presented introduction. Then I have just five short days to come up with a forty-five minute presentation. In German. By myself.
The good news is that after, I'm more or less done. I'll have to turn my presentation into a 12-15 page paper, but that'll get done in English, and then produce another 4-6 page essay for another class. My goal is to get everything done by the end of July, so I have all of August to spend in Berlin/Poland, and all September for Ireland.
Things that are interesting! Al and I went to Hannover and Saturday, and met up with Latvian Friend in the process. It was really nice seeing her again. The three of us wandered all around the city and took fun pictures, which I will post as soon as I steal them from Al. But here, have this picture of a massive, massive, massive carp.
You know your life is sad when the most interesting thing you have to post on your blog is a swan-eating carp.
That's not entirely true. I do have one or two good stories up my sleeve, but they're still in process, and I want them to finish so I can properly mock them And by "them," I meant the batshit psycho old people who live under us.
Fun things that happened today! I headed down to the river, because the summer gods had seen fit to bless us with the first day of good weather in like a month. There I ran into British Friend, who was apparently about to text me and invite me to come meet her. Yay for being efficient and/or psychic!
So we chilled on the river for a few hours, and talked about lots of highly entertaining things, including the advantages of adopting a baby from Africa (you can keep it's head shaved so you don't get lice). I also learned that while I told all my friends about the blog, I'd apparently forgotten to send them the link, so they had to spend a solid amount of time google searching it. However, googling my blog is hard--the search terms that eventually worked were "tina" "germany" "game of thrones," which makes me really, REALLY happy.
Then it was time for the Italy/Germany soccer game, made even more exciting by a brief confrontation with some random old dude who threatened war if the people for whom we were saving chairs didn't arrive soon. The people we saved chairs for showed up, and Germany did not win. I know this is blasphemous, but I was fine with it. It meant I didn't have to deal with people screaming.
Don't tell anybody I said that.
Yes I AM the lamest person in the world.
Tomorrow is Culture Night in Göttingen, so we're going to get together, go to random bars/concerts/see Galway perform at a local club. Three cheers for having fun even though I'm relatively certain I will not survive until next Monday!
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