Apparently my "fame" has no bounds

I ran into a family member of my neighbor the other day. We've had some nice conversations in the past. When I saw her this time, she asked, "Were you on TV recently? I swear that I just saw you on the X show. I thought to myself, oh, that has to be ATW!"

Here I thought that I could go to the event and avoid the cameras; instead, everyone can see the embarrassing footage of me fumbling through German and people I know saw it too. Oy vey.

Yes indeedy, that had been me. She thought it was very nice, or that's what she told me at least ;) Can I just say that German folks I've met have been, overall, so sweet and nice?

My week: March 5 ed.

This was the highly dreaded anticipated week when I was supposed to go on the radio to promote an organization. I've never done such a thing before and I think my voice sounds dumb so there was some anxiety on my part. After putting together some notes, and even a quiz for the DJ to take about the organization*, I did some metaphorical breathing into a bag to compose myself, only...

...to find out that our radio spot was canceled. I regretted this because there was some special programming that I wanted to highlight. Plus I had some rather dramatic feelings about the whole thing and I had finally screwed up enough courage and just wanted to get the darn thing over with.** How anticlimactic!

However, can I also say that I feel lucky to have opportunities where I get to move out of my comfort zone, promote topics I care about, and add new skills? Even if one such skill might only include trying not to sound like an idiot while being broadcast.

Anyway, many other things happened during the week, too. I met up with tandem partner #2; we hadn't seen each other since before the holidays because we'd both been so busy. We probably won't see each other for quite some time again because we are both having a busy upcoming month.

I also met with my original tandem partner. I'm preparing to take the B2 telc German test; this week, I described a book I've read and even timed myself. From this exercise, I learned that I really need to get better at this. I think I'm going to write up several reviews and try to memorize them because I'm so bad at speaking in German off the cuff in a more formal context.

German class met this week, as usual. An out of the ordinary activity is that I signed up to take the telc B2 German test. There's no turning back now! I had considered taking the preparation course too but now I'm on the fence about it. The telc test is already expensive enough (around 150 euros) and the prep course costs about the same. 300 euros to prepare for and to take a test that I don't officially need for anything is seeming a bit unreasonable at this point. Last fall, my VHS teacher told me that I could pass the B2 test even before I'd finished all the classes in that level and a month ago my Uni teacher told me that she thought I could pass it so maybe the prep course would be overkill. I've downloaded some of the free prep materials from telc and will see how those go.

For work, I planned a networking meeting with colleagues from various locations and organizations. One of the participants was talking about bringing a special exhibition to the area and expressed some interest in including it in the local community. I have met the leadership at two different German organizations and offered to make an introduction for her. My colleague is German herself and said that she can't believe how integrated into the community I've become and that she thought it was great that I know our professional counterparts who work in the German community. I told her that it's because I'm nosy as heck so I've had the opportunity to meet people and learn more. :)

This weekend was the annual Pfennigbasar (more about the sale itself here). I volunteered, as I usually do, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Now that I'm conversational in German, I've hit my groove and experienced the sale more fully.

During my first volunteer shift, I was placed with two sweet French ladies, who spoke English in a lovely way. The only snag was that I was the only one who really spoke German, which is a bit unusual for an American to actually be (mostly) helpful in a foreign language, given that we're not known for such capabilities. For the most part I held my own, except for with the elderly German man who spoke Pfälzisch in a deep and quavering voice. Any part of that combination is difficult for me and when they're together, I just can't understand the person.

My next shift partner was a sweet Polish lady who spoke no English but did speak German. This is a great exercise for me because I couldn't be lazy and fall back to English. We enjoyed good conversation and a pleasant shift together.

I spent my last shift with some women I had met in another group for a cooking demo. They welcomed me warmly and were excited to reunite after our last meeting. I have decided to join their club too so it was a good opportunity to ask more about their activities. One of the women doesn't speak English so it was another good push to only speak German.

Can I just say (again) how cool it is, after years of gnashing of teeth, studying, and whining, to finally be conversational in a foreign language? Connecting with people, experiencing the local culture, and becoming active in the community are just so different -- and awesome -- now.

For example, I wouldn't have felt right trying to join their club if I couldn't speak German. They're a very nice group of women and I doubt that they would have been unwelcoming to a non-German speaker, but it probably wouldn't work out well to join the group because they don't speak English during the meetings. It would not really be reasonable to ask them to translate everything.

I also really enjoyed being able to be actually helpful at the Basar. If the German speakers had to leave the booth, they could, because I could manage on my own.

When I got home, I received a phone call from my friend R, whom I haven't seen in ages. He was in the area and stopped by. I cooked up a huge pot of gobi aloo from a recipe our friend A taught me. That was an even better way to end the weekend.



*I got the idea from listening to one of their radio shows where they answer quiz questions about music. I had no idea if the DJ would've wanted to answer my questions, but I prepared some anyway because it's the Girl Scout Way. Or Boy Scout Way. Well, I'm not entirely if it's any Scout's Way, but whatever. I like to plan for contingencies.

**For things that are anxiety-inducing or are Really Big, I of course have to consider them in great length, discuss my feelings about them/confer with friends, family, and perhaps post office staff (okay, not always the latter), then consider them a bit more. Once I've done that, I'll basically just jump into the activity, which may seem rather sudden if one doesn't know the backstory.

My week: February 26 ed.

On Monday and Tuesday, A and I were in Poland. (More about that later, or so I hope that it's not an empty promise.)

During the rest of the week, I attended German class and also lazed around the house a bit. The lazing-around gave way to a party at some friends' house in a rural village. A dozen of us descended upon the house for the weekend to cook together, play party games, enjoy some adult beverages, and to hike. 

It was a wonderfully international group of people; those who attended hailed from India, Syria, Egypt, Germany, the US, and Morocco. That also meant that we enjoyed many different types of food. I made grape leaves stuffed with rice and herbs. It took forever because the jar of leaves I bought is deceiving; it's about the size of a pickle jar but contains about 100 leaves! Some of the guys helped me and after 40 minutes we finished the darn things. I used the Syrian recipe I had learned a couple weeks ago during the international cooking night.

Even better yet than the marathon of rolling grape leaves? We took a hike in the middle of the party. To more accurately describe it, I'd say we grabbed a couple of bottles of wine and hiked a quarter of a mile up a hill, overlooked the rolling scenery for a bit, then trundled back to the house in the middle of the night.

The next morning we wanted to cook breakfast but didn't have the foresight to bring eggs or milk. My friend said there was nothing to fear for we could buy some at the store. This was Sunday in Germany; where in the world could we find such a thing, since almost everything is closed? 

There was indeed a solution: an automated farm store in the area! How cool is that? In a tiny, sidedoor type store, one can buy milk from a machine, or choose jam, sausage, or eggs from another vending machine. We crammed into the room and my friend filled her milk jug. One can bring her own or pay a small fee for one from the dairy. I had wanted to buy eggs but unfortunately they were all out, which is the first time my friend has seen that happen. 

Seeking an alternative to make for everyone's breakfast, I instead bought 5 kilos of potatoes. Why did I buy 5 kilos? It was the only option. That is a lot of potatoes, folks. I was cooking hash browns for an hour when we got back and I hardly made a dent in the sack of potatoes. For the record, I have very little patience for cooking and prefer baking. I felt as if the task would never be done and that it takes an unreasonable amount of time to cook small strips of potatoes to make hash browns.

All in all, it was a weekend full of just what I like: a diverse bunch of friends and silly adventures.m

My week: February 19 ed.

Freeeeeeedom!

This week I only had one German class after the end of the Uni classes. The Uni distributed our grades from the class and I had the second highest score. I was rather happy about that one. Now I just have to level-up for the C1 class. It feels as if it's such a level jump but I can't put my finger on why that is. For me, it seems if this crazy vocabulary comes out of nowhere. It's definitely where I'm the weakest.

On Saturday, I prepared to leave for a trip to Poland with my friend A. I cleaned up the house so I could come home to a tidy place, which is so much more relaxing.

That night, we drove to Frankfurt Hahn and took a flight to Katowice, Poland. More will follow...

I'm just going to breathe into a paper bag for a while now

Last month, I ended up on German tv. I had not planned to do so but at least during my five minutes of fame (I hoped that) I left a reasonably good impression of my fellow country people. It was definitely a bit freaky to have to speak German and have it recorded. It seems to be my luck that I'm bound to embarrass myself through different media: I just found out that I am to visit a radio show to promote a group!

While I want to have a good attitude about new experiences and I do like a challenge, this is something outside of my comfort zone. I'm going to be speaking English and this isn't for a German station. However, I'm not so fluent even in English when I'm put on the spot. Lately, my brain seems so slow and I pause as I speak. I think it's because I'm tired, often multi-task/solve problems/formulate plans, and think in a weird mix of Denglish. Either way, it's not going to make for a very smooth radio interview and I'm freaked out about not being a good representative of the group.

Can I just go breathe into a paper bag for a while to get over this?*

*For the record, I'm not actually that high strung.

Milking it dry

Am I weird because I was looking to buy some powdered milk at the store, they didn't have any, and I quite seriously started reading the ingredients in baby formula? Btw, that stuff is crazy expensive!

My week: February 12 ed.

Hoo-ee, have I been gone for a long time, thanks to my normal winter schedule of taking two German classes a week. Combined with meeting with my tandem partner, that means I'm practicing German four nights a week, and often traveling for funsies on the weekend.

This week, the university German B2 class ended. Even though I enjoy the class, I am glad to be over with it because I was really running out of steam and need at least one free weeknight (besides Fridays) after keeping up this schedule for four months. I'm tired, folks, especially after the night this week that the class at the Volkshochschule started up and I had to run from the uni class directly to the VHS one afterward.

We took the final exam for the uni B2 class on Friday night; I thought that overall, I performed reasonably well on it. However, the listening portion took me by surprise. In previous tests, we were given a minute or two to read the questions first. Since there were about 15 questions and they used an advanced level of German, I was looking forward to reading them first and underlining some keywords.

That didn't happen; our teacher immediately hit the play button and I scrambled around, madly trying to listen to the selection and read the questions as I went. I missed the first few questions because I was so discombobulated. At least there was a second go 'round of listening but I still lost a lot of it.

The selection featured an expert talking about manners and mentioned something called "Knigge." I've never heard of that term before and didn't latch onto any context clues so I had to go with the assumption that it meant some sort of behavior. In a moment of grasping at straws, I wondered if it was like the Danish word "Hygge," which is basically like Gemütlichkeit.

I let wondering about it go because I had to move on with the test. However, later, I was on Facebook and saw a German article about old books that still have value and there was one from Knigge! Apparently he was a writer, Freemason, and Illuminati member [insert dramatic music here, for sure] and is particularly well-known for his Über den Umgang mit Menschen, which describes human behavior. His accomplishments have morphed his memory into being more like Miss Manners. I'm glad to have found this out because I don't like leaving any stones unturned, so to speak ;)

-During the weekend, I attended one of my favorite annual events, the Grünkohlessenabend hosted by the women's club. During the event, we eat kale (any of its health benefits are drowned out by the sheer amount of salt and fat added to it), sausages, and potatoes in order to celebrate northern German traditions (even though we're in SW Germany).

Along the way, we've created our own traditions around attending this event. As is customary, I invited my friend W, who has been my "date" for all of the last three years, including the infamous first year where we wore Dirndls and were lightly schimpfed for the transgression. There, we learned that setting the table on fire is a tradition, drinking alcohol out of a giant wooden shoe and spoons is practiced, and that one will burn her mouth if she doesn't wait for the shot glass to fully cool. The second time we attended, I was the one to set the table on fire. It was definitely very exciting.

The third year we finally had our act together and knew how things worked. W attended and we also invited my friend A. I had written to the organizer because A doesn't eat pork and I checked to see if anything being served that evening didn't have pork (we found out that everything, except for the alcohol, had pork in it. Whoa!). Imagine my surprise when I found out that she could just order from the restaurant's regular menu! W is vegetarian and during the previous two years she had only eaten the potatoes. We had a good laugh that we finally found out that she could've just ordered something vegetarian the previous years.

I told A to expect the table being set on fire and possibly someone burning her mouth on the flaming shot glass of liquor (I was reminded that I was the one who had done that before). Much to my surprise, no one inadvertently set the table on fire and I was very careful to make sure the shot glass had cooled before I drank the contents. A doesn't drink but when we toasted by drinking schnapps out of our special, big schnapps-holding spoons, she took a shot of gravy from her meal. What a team player she is.

There was a wonderful new addition this year: SEA SHANTIES, accompanied with ACCORDION MUSIC. It was very exciting and even better yet, I think that some of them had dirty lyrics. It was hard to translate them and sing at the same time, but one song was talking about ladies, the Reeperbahn, and St. Pauli in Hamburg, which was a notorious area for sailors and the ladies they visited.

Afterward, W stayed over since she's from out of town. We enjoyed breakfast together and then she went on her way home. I ended up napping the whole afternoon, which I needed sorely after being so worn out from exam week and partying down with the women's club. It was a good end to the semester.