A Saturday of Many Adventures

Today's adventures for your reading pleasure...

Chapter 1: In which your fearless author learns all about German recycling

I woke up early this morning and drove to the Real. (You may recall from earlier posts that this is something akin to a Wal-mart.) I had been advised by the relocation advisor to buy a fan as soon as possible, as Germany is notorious for a) not having air conditioning and b) the stores running out of fans as soon as a warm spell hits. I also was eager to try out the mystery of recycling my plastic and glass bottles, as a co-worker had clued me into the purpose of the weird looking machines in every grocery store.

This is what the recycling machines look like.

It turns out to be ridiculously easy. You put your bottle in the hole, lying flat. The machine scans the barcode. If it is an "accepted" bottle, an amount shows up on the screen and the bottle disappears. The machine also has a spot at the bottom for people load crates of used bottles. This is quite common as I've noticed that Germans tend to buy their water by the crate. They also don't seem to drink tap water, and think Americans are crazy for doing so. Every time a German finds out that I not only drink, but love, wasser mit kohlensauer (water with carbonation, basically), they go crazy with applauding my good taste and commenting on the poor water-drinking habits of Americans. So I put my bottles in the machine and received at receipt entitling me to 0,75 Euro. Easy money, considering I was getting about half the purchase price back per bottle.

Chapter II: In which your fearless author learns the power of the Google Translate App

I then went in search of a fan. I figured this would be fairly easy, as most appliances tend to have boxes with pictures on them. What I didn't expect was for there to be so many versions of fans. I suppose it is still a bit early to be buying one (as the temperatures haven't gotten above about 75F), but I was still a bit surprised. I harnessed the power of the camera function on the Google Translate App to be sure I was getting the right kind of fan (there were desk fans, heat fans (?), rotating fans, air fans (again a ??), and so on and so forth). I finally found a reasonably priced oscillating tall fan and went to check out. Now, my German is improving by the day. I can say hello, and thank you, and that's all, and I can even understand a few numbers. What I didn't understand was the minute long speech I received upon buying the fan. I suppose my look of blankness caused the cashier to take pity on me, as she then switched to broken, heavily accented English to explain that my receipt carried a warranty for the fan and that I needed to keep the receipt. It was kind of her to make sure I understood. I thanked her profusely, apologizing all the while and muttering "klein Deutsch, klein Deutsch" -- which literally means "small German". The entire line found this very funny and I left, glad to have brought some amusement to their day.

Chapter III: In which your fearless author threatens to shank her GPS

I sort of know the way home from the REAL, and so I was surprised when my sat nav (GPS) decided to take me a different route. I was skeptical, as they are doing some major construction on a few government buildings right down the road from me, but I put my trust in TomTom in hopes of finding a new shortcut. So, yeah. TomTom is clearly not in the loop with regard to big ass holes in the ground and road closures. Despite the software being updated like 2 weeks ago, my buddy Tom kept trying to take me straight through a construction zone. Every time I tried to go around it, I got re-routed back the same way. I finally decided to go old-school and use my (very) latent navigational skills... which took me in exactly the right direction, and put me on my street exactly where I thought I would end up. It helps that the town isn't big at all, and that the huge crater in the road creates a nice frame of reference.

Chapter IV: In which your fearless author wanders, fights with Vodafone, and meets some nice French boys

I decided to go back out into the town square after unloading my fan, as it happened to be a beautiful day and there was a farmer's market going on. I also needed to have some words with the Vodafone rep, as they are always closed when I am coming home from work. I stopped there first. Turns out my English-speaking buddy who set up my account was not working. I never did get the name of the guy who was working, but he looked just like that German kid from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (the original) if he were about 25. And he spoke basically no English. I kept using Google Translate to explain that my bill was wrong, and asked him to look it up on the computer and fixed it. He pointed at the computer as if it were a weapon of mass destruction, shook his head and kept saying "Montag, Montag you comes." Apparently Monday is the day when the English-speaking staff work. So, since the hours are all crazy, I am going to try to call on Monday and see if I can get anywhere. My bill is essentially triple what it should be. Why is it that no matter what the country, telecommunications are always a hot mess?!

The upside is that I ended up walking further down the road to blow off some steam and I discovered that the town has a Woolworth. Might be the only Woolworth still in business for all I know. But I was able to buy a (non-demonically possessed) toaster, a kettle and a few odds and ends (hangers, some plastic bins, etc). I also got the same receipt speech. Seems my 10 Euro toaster is guaranteed for 2 years. Right on, Germany.

The farmer's market was predictable - some bread stands, a cheese stand, a huge vegetable stand and a whole stand filled with olives and other weird stuff - like spreads and jellies and all sorts of things that I wanted no part of. The place was jam-packed with the over 60 crowd, who were all about getting das shop on. None of the vendors spoke a lick of English - which meant the only thing I was able to successfully buy was bread. I tried to buy some vegetables but the urgency of the crowd meant that the lady selling them had no time for my version of charades and pretty much just gave up on me. I even had my travel phrase book with me but clearly my pronunciation leaves a lot to be desired because she was just not picking up what I was laying down.

Imagine my delight when I spotted a French flag and a table selling all sorts of goodies from France. I hoped for the best and began speaking French - and the looks on the faces of the two teenage boys behind the stand revealed that they were just as as happy as I was not to have to deal with the German for a bit. We had a nice chat about the weather, the day, the market, their trip over from France, etc. I didn't really need anything they were selling, but I bought some sea salt just to be a good sport. (I used some tonight during dinner - it was well worth the 2 Euro!) The guys were nice and invited me to a "disco" tonight (there's a disco in Ingelheim? Pretty sure it couldn't have been in this town), but I wisely declined - seeing as how I'm probably at least 15 years older than them.

I have my first German lesson Monday morning and the thing I'm looking forward to most is learning how the various letters sound. Words are starting to make sense, but I can't seem to make them sound the way they should. I don't think it will happen overnight, but I'm determined to master this language. By the end of the year, I want to be able to have an easily understood conversation - and not just with myself!

Tomorrow is Sunday, which of course means everything is geschlossen. So I plan to do laundry, clean and read. Mostly just laze around because I'll be away/traveling the next two weekends. I bought some walnut pastry thing from the bread man at the market - can't even begin to remember the full name, as I couldn't even pronounce it and had to just point at it - and so I plan to try that with some coffee for breakfast tomorrow. Slowly working my way through the 300 breads of Germany, one day at a time...