Erfarene Reiterin (30) sucht Mitreitgelegenheit im Raum FR.                           Experienced female rider (30) searches for shared riding opportunity near Freiburg.

That is what my posting in the classified section of the local newspaper said. How I got to that point is one story. What happened afterwards is another!

This is a novella folks! So, grab your wine (if it’s “Wine Night”), Captain & Coke and DiGiorno, Rex Goliath and Rold-Gold’s, or O’Doul’s and favorite cat and tuck in for a long one!

It all started with my new Tandem Partner. A Tandem Partner is someone who wants to improve their second (or third, or fourth) language and is willing to help you improve yours. These are casual and free meetings, taking place wherever, with the sole purpose of gaining speaking practice. So, half of the time I speak English with my Tandem Partner and half the time, German. She is a 66 year old retired teacher, and is not afraid to tell me exactly what she thinks!

Here are the highlights of our first several meetings, and the journey to my first “personal ad”.

Meeting 1 – During our first meeting, we went through the usual small-talk/get-to-know-you banter. I explained to her my job, why I was living in Germany, and that my husband has a “scholarship” that is allowing him to study at the University. She promptly proceeded to ask me if we have enough money! She also told me that she would help me find friends and a job that would allow me to speak more German. Um…I didn’t feel at a loss for either of those, but whatever. Since it took about half an hour for her to be satisfied with the explanation of my job, I just let it be. I won’t even get into the racial generalizations that she made or when she told me that my English was wrong. Ha! A normal person would never have met with her again. Apparently I am a glutton for punishment…

Meeting 2 – This week, after clarifying for about the fifth time that I already had a job, she finally seemed to let go of that topic. I politely listened as she told me I needed more friends and how I should go about getting them. Then, she decided to focus on my hobbies. Alright, I thought, this is safe. I have been through this conversation numerous times by now. Ha!

I told her that one of my hobbies is skiing. Her response: “Well, that is not very good. You can’t talk to anyone while you are skiing.” Ok, moving on. I told her my other hobby was riding horses. Her response: “That is even worse. You can’t speak German with a horse. They don’t talk back.” I tried to explain that I usually talk with the other people who are riding the horses, or with my riding teacher. Her response: “You don’t even use complete sentences while riding a horse. Only commands like: Go, Stop.” Little did she know that I was giving myself commands throughout our entire conversation:  Smile. Nod. Keep speaking German. Smile. Nod. Keep speaking German.

Meeting 3 – This week, despite her clear disapproval of what I choose to do with my spare time, my Tandem Partner pulled out two newspapers from her backpack. She had searched through the “Pferd” (Horse) section of the classifieds and unfortunately “only found horses for sale.” I told her that I appreciated her thinking of me and tried to move the conversation away from hobbies. Instead, she said, “Get out a piece of paper. We will write a posting for you to put in the paper.” Sometimes it is just easier to do things, than to explain why you don’t want to. Especially in another language.

Meeting 4 – This week we start talking about the trip that Joe and I have planned to Luxembourg. She asks me why I would want to go to Luxembourg. “Why not?” I respond. She then tells me that no one goes to Luxembourg and that there are so many more beautiful places to go besides Luxembourg. After at least 5 minutes of ranting about why going to Luxembourg is a bad idea, she finally tells me that she has never been to Luxembourg. I resort to my well-practiced mantra: Smile. Nod. Keep speaking German. Smile. Nod. Keep speaking German. As I am struggling to find my happy-place, she snaps me back to reality with the question: “Should we go post your classified ad now?”  What?! Was she really serious? I politely declined and told her that maybe we could do it next week, hoping she would conveniently remember her disapproval of my life-choices.

She then moves the conversation to a serious of interesting questions she has about the United States and Americans: Why does everyone want to have 2.5 kids, a dog, and a cat? What is the obsession with “The American Dream”? Why do Americans use up 1/3 of the world’s energy resources? Why was President Bush so hungry to go to war? When the questions changed from “Americans” and “the United States” to “you” (Why do you blame everybody else instead of doing something yourself?), I switched to English and returned to an altered mantra: Smile. Nod. Don’t bite this lady’s head off. Smile. Nod. Don’t bite this lady’s head off.

Then, she suddenly said, “Should we go post your ad now?” It truly seemed like the better option, even though I had already said no. Anything was a better option than the conversational path we were headed down.

So, we walked to the newspaper office and put my classified ad in the paper! I chose to use my e-mail address instead of my phone number. (Let’s just say that phone calls in German are not…that…easy!) I figured nothing would result of this and she and I could put the topic to rest.

By now, you’re probably asking yourself why I keep meeting with her. My friends here in Germany keep asking, “Did you break-up with your Tandem Partner yet?” The bottom line is that she forces me to speak German. She corrects me and makes me repeat things until they are right. I hate it, but I need it. She also corrects my English, which I don’t need, but find totally hilarious. Finally, I believe that people come in and out of our lives for a reason.

Meeting 5  – Ironically, the paper is published the same day I have meetings with my Tandem Partner. By 7:30am I had received three responses from people that needed help with their horses. I printed them and brought them to our meeting. She had an opinion on every single one: “You don’t want to do that. That is too far away. These people want you to pay money. You can’t pay money.” She told me to get out a piece of paper and the she proceeded to dictate a response to each of the requests. Her response. I was a dutiful scribe, then went home and responded to the e-mails in my own prose.

By the end of the day, I had received two more e-mails. By the end of the week, 5 more. Ten in total (plus the one freaky e-mail that obviously came from someone who got a thrill from sending sketchy e-mails to strangers)! Again, good thing I used my e-mail. Eventually the e-mails became hard to keep straight. The German was getting all blurry in my head. The details of who had what horse and what they needed, started bleeding together.  My heart dropped every time I read: Please call. I prefer to speak further via phone. Phone calls are the worst.

I believe that people come in and out of my life for a reason. Clearly, a higher power wants me to find ein Deutsches Pferd.

To be continued…

I haven’t had a haircut since I lived in the United States. Even then, I was so busy working and getting ready to move that I can’t even remember if my last haircut was in June or August! So, we are talking at least 5, perhaps 7 months of quality split-end collecting! I was basically wearing a hay bale on my head.

I finally mustered up the courage last week to call and make an appointment on the phone…in German. That was successful. At least something was.

Knowing that it could be challenging to explain what I wanted in German, I tapped into the old adage of “a picture is worth a thousand words”, and spent an afternoon gathering “good-hair-day” pictures of myself to take with. I felt pretty vain, but thought it would help.

When my Friseurin (hair stylist) arrived I showed her the pictures, used another Friseurin to help explain in English, and hoped that she understood. Time to wash. She gave me a fantastic head-massage which resulted in shampoo in my ears and half-way down my forehead, but she did a good job cleaning the suds up. Then she asked me to stand up while she dressed me in a gown. No joke. She put my arms through the sleeves, just like a coat, then tied it twice in front. (Were they nervous that my shirt was going to escape?) This was followed with a weighted neck-wrap that she draped over my shoulders to keep the gown in place. I couldn’t tell if I was at the hospital or getting an X-Ray at the dentist.

Time to cut. She pulled up a chair and sat down right beside me and started to comb. No hydrolic, spinning chairs, and no standing stylists. There was also no conditioner during the washing process, so even combing through my cobweb-thin hair was a challenge. A quick moment of déjà vu brought me to the side of the swimming pool as an 8 year old, being scolded by my mother, as she tugged and yanked, for failing to wash the chlorine out of my green-blond hair. The snip-snip of sharp shears ended that unpleasant memory.

I could feel the cold metal creep farther and farther up my neck. Why was she still cutting?! I told her that I wanted my hair to stop at my shoulders. As she inched closer and closer to my ears I feared that I had mixed up the words shoulder and chin. Then, she started to “texturize” the hair around my face… above my eyes! I know I didn’t say anything about eyes or foreheads. My German isn’t that bad. There she was, nevertheless.

Then came the moment every woman fears at the hair salon. As you are sitting in the chair, a big chunk of hair suddenly appears in the space between your face and the mirror, time freezes as you discern whether or not it is still attached to your head, and when you realize it has been erroneously severed from its follicles, you feel your stomach hit the floor before the hair even has a chance to settle in your lap.

She continued to chop and prune, trying to fix the un-fixable. Again, the déjà vu. This time I am in 6^th grade and my mother has failed make a straight line of my bangs, resulting in hair so short that it stuck out like a tutu from my forehead. So, I think/hope the cutting is done as she blow dries and fusses and primps and sprays and seemingly procrastinates about declaring this the final product.

Her final response (in English): “Its short!”   Yup…ya think…

I undressed from the X-Ray proof neck guard and double-tie straitjacket, paid, and took as many deep breaths as the Earth had air for. I got on my bike and let the wind blow through my hair.

Oh wait…that last sentence is a lie. My hair was too short for the wind to get any traction in.

Joe and I always comment about how awful our elevator is because there is a full-length mirror that you can’t not look in. Even on a good day, nothing kills the self-esteem more than that elevator. I don’t know why I didn’t take the stairs today. I really should have. I really really should have.

I immediately got into the shower, hoping that my worst nightmare would wash down the drain. After combing, spraying, blow drying, pomadeing, barretting, and pony-tailing, the mirror could not lie. I was sporting an amazing new projection from my scalp: a nice clump of really short bangs that refuse to do anything but stick straight out.

I can deal with a haircut that is way too short. Hair grows. Thank God.

The new bug-antenna, on the other hand, is going to be a real Arschgrobbler.

Joe and I got home around 5pm from Berlin tonight. We anticipated a
relatively quiet night, with dinner and drinks at home, and then a
walk to the bridge at midnight to watch fireworks. The cracks and pops
started around 6pm. Some of them sounded like there were exploding
inside our building. It was just a small pre-curser of what was to
come!

Around 11:30pm we heated up some Glühwein, filled the thermos, and set
out for the bridge. We had been told that everyone goes there at
midnight to enjoy fireworks, so I assumed that we would be able to see
the displays of several different towns from there. How totally wrong
I was.

As we walked down the street, our favorite bar/café was totally empty.
This should have been a clue, but I was assuming (wrongly) that
everyone did what Americans do on New Year’s Eve – flood the bars and
drink themselves to oblivion. Instead, Germans prefer amateur
fireworks. Specifically, professional-quality bottle rockets.

The first one I paid particular attention to went off right onto the train tracks. Ouch, I thought. That can’t be safe. Then several were lit underneath the bridge.
Hmmm…that also doesn’t seem like the best choice. My neighbors were
lighting them off their balcony. The closer we got to midnight, the
more bottle rockets were lit. It was unbelieveable! There was a constant rumble of explosions, some of them making it gloriously into the night air,
while others exploded (successfully or not, depending on your
perspective) right in front of our faces. Everywhere you turned, near
and far, the fireworks were exploding. We were shoulder to shoulder
with most of the town of Freiburg, each one prepared to bid farewell
to 2011 with their personal selection of explosives. Out of Champaign
bottles, beer bottles, in the middle of the street, between parked
cars, by kids, by adults. There was no count down to midnight. Just
thousands of pyromaniacs, lighting individual celebrations out of
bottles as fast as they could, in the pouring rain no less.

We were totally surrounded by exploding fireworks. It was actually
really beautiful and totally amazing…if you suspended all concern for
safety. Better than any professional display I have ever witnessed.

The video here was taken after midnight. It is not the best quality, unfortunately, as I was trying to get a 360 view as quickly as possible to keep the camera out of the rain, and the bridge structure blocks some of the view. However, if you listen to all of the explosions, and look into the distance as well as close by, you can get a small feeling of the unbelievable quantity of fireworks being lit.

Silvester on the bridge – video clip click here.

To close out the evening, we watched “Dinner for One”, a 20 minute
skit that has been playing on German television every New Year’s at
12:30am since 1963. It is the story of Miss Sophie’s 90th birthday
party. She has outlived all of her friends, so the butler “sits in”
for each of her 4 imaginary guests and he gets progressively
inebriated as he drinks toasts for all four guests during the
multi-course meal. Pretty funny actually. Watch it yourself! (click here)

“Same procedure as every year.”

Willkommen 2012! Shönes neues Jahr!