A linguistic special

Last Saturday I had dinner with a Russian from Belgium, a French person from Switzerland, a Romanian from Germany and a couple of Germans. And to top it all off, we'd all met in America! But now I am back in my very german village, where even someone from Stuttgart is deemed foreign!

Here in South Germany life goes on. L is nearly better, so he's back at school, but is supposed to take things a little slowly (whatever!) The mum took a week off work last week to make plaetzchen (little biscuits) and other Christmasy related crafty things. That made my life easy, but now I'm back to looking after extremely hyper child. Luckily he's really into the rubiks cube (he can now do it auswendig!) which keeps him amused for ages. We're at the stage where me doing a 4x4 vs L doing the 3x3 is an evenly balanced race.

The world outside, which is currently out of bounds wegen L, is a winter wonderland. It has already snowed a fair bit (making walk to Kindergarten very tedious) and tomorrow it is supposed to snow alot! Amusingly, even here, a bit of snow messes up the train. I can hear the train announcements from my room (it is an unmanned station, so delays are broadcast over loudspeaker) and I've been woken up the last few days with an announcement regarding the next train's Verspaetung.

I've been here for long enough, that sometimes I have to think twice to remember certain english word (for example when singing a song in English at church, I noticed I was replacing alone with allein...) So in this blogpost I thought I'd share what I've picked up of the Allgau accent/dialect.

• The most obvious (to me) has been the numbers. I play in the local concert band where the conductor has a rather strong local accent. So when he says the number of the bar (takt) we're playing from, to begin with I could hardly understand it, but I'm getting better. For example 41 = ein-und-vierzig turns into uzaviersk.
• Secondly the ending -en, so prevalent in the german language is turned into '-a'. As all infinitives end with -en, this affects alot of phrases so now I've noticed it, I can understand alot more!
• Another common ending -chen is replaced with 'ele'. For example bisschen -> bissele. -chen denotes small (like -ette in English but more widely used) and I think 'ele' sounds far cuter.
• One of my favourite new words, which may or may not be regional, is Bock. It is used in the context 'Ich hab kein Bock mehr' i.e. 'I can't be bothered with this anymore'  As far as I can gather Lust and Bock can be used interchangeably, but the latter sounds a lot cooler.
• And finally, something that is definitely regional and would be met with blank looks if used elsewhere is the way of saying hello/goodbye. Hello is Griass di and goodbye is Pfiat di, I would be fascinated to hear the origins of these phrases if anyone knows. I've also heard Servus being used, but I think that is more universal, a bit like the german version of Salut.

And so ends my very random blog post, Pfiat di and good night!

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Bonus funny children moments for those looking for further procrastination material;

- M and L were playing energetically when M suddenly cried out in pain and started hopping around. L proceeded to get told off by mum and furiously protested his innocence. After a couple of minutes M admitted to standing on lego man.

- One morning I came out of my room, M was on the landing. He came to give me a hug then changed his mind, scowled and said 'Du bist die gemeinste Rebecca der Welt!' charming! (Translation: You're the meanest Rebecca in the world, a common insult)

- The same morning M was hiding in the corner, avoiding getting changed The dad was getting impatient so tried the counting down technique. '3...' then a small voice from the corner quickly followed '2 1'... That's not how it's supposed to work!

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And if you've got this far, here's your bonus song:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01m70dx

Enjoy!

Bugs, Birthdays and Besuch

It's about time that I updated you on my life, especially as a fair amount has happened recently.

Firstly, you know how I mentioned illness briefly at the end of my last post? Well it turns out L doesn't have your bog standard bug, rather he somehow caught Lungenentzungung which, for those uninitiated, is pneumonia (yes I did use a dictionary too). 3 weeks later he's still not better, although you could hardly tell from looking at him. "Ich will raus!" is a common refrain nowadays, but tomorrow he gets his wish, he's allowed to go to school! That has meant he has been at home all the time, but on the positive side, he has got very good at french knitting, dot-to-dot and the rubik's cube. Thankfully M caught only the normal bug, so he only missed 2 days of Kindergarten.

One of these days missed was MY BIRTHDAY! Birthdays are very big things here, so it didn't matter that both kids were ill, the entire family still came round for Kaffee and Kuchen. I was woken at 7 by the kids so that they could give me my present, cake and sing happy birthday before their insanely early doctor's appointment. M and L's present to me was a 4x4 rubiks cube, as I'd got a bit too good at the 3x3 (Many a day was spent with L mixing up the cube, and then giving it to me to solve, now that I have the 4x4 he has actually taken it upon himself to learn how to do the 3x3 himself!) I spent the peace and quiet time playing with that before heading to my friend's house for breakfast. Turns' out birthdays are a big thing here, so she had invited some of the other ladies from church to come too, which was a lovely surprise. I left 'breakfast' at about midday and returned home where the mum was in her element; baking, cooking, and assembling matching decorations for the table (she even had to nip out for red napkins, because the yellow ones didn't go!) M spent the entire afternoon asking when the guests were coming, which wasn't helped when they were delayed by traffic on the lone road to Sonthofen. Eventually all the guests arrived, much cake was eaten, coffee getrunken (I put that in german because I can't remember if it's drunk or drunken), and presents given, which mostly incorporated alot of chocolate! The mum had made this creamy cake which consisted of thin layers of cake, and fat layers of cream made out of the marshmallowy bit from marshmallow teacake, and bits of orange. It had a special name, which I promptly forgot, but it was lecker.

The decorated table, completed with matching napkins

A close up of the cream cake (photos courtesy of L)

The day after I left sick children, mountains and snow behind to visit Helen in Halle/Leipzig. It's about a 7hr journey so I broke it up with a couple of hours in Nuremberg, which is very pretty, and has loads of cool bridges! Unfortunately the marketplace was a bit of a buildingsite in preparation for the world famous Christmas market, that I was about 2 weeks early for.

One of the exciting bridges in Nuremberg

 Leipzig is in what was East Germany, which I knew but hadn't really thought about it. I'd not really thought about the east/west division, I knew it existed but assumed it was like the north/south division in England, so I was surprised when I had this converstion (translated and paraphrased for your convenience)

Person A: How was your trip to Leipzig?

Me: Yeah, good, have you been?

A: Hahahahahaha, No.

M: Oh, um, well I suppose it is a long way away..

A: Hahahaha that's not the reason

Person B: Oh, how come then?

A: Well it's in the east

B: Um, I'm from the east

A: Oh my God!

*Awkward pause, conversation quickly terminated*

Despite the misconceptions that it is a terrible place because it is in the east, Leipzig (and Halle for that matter) are very interesting places to visit, and I certainly didn't feel that it's only redeeming feature was that Helen was there! There's the obvious recent history, and we did visit the Stasi museum and saw the Nikolai kirche where the monday demonstrations originated (although ironically, despite still having the 'Offen fuer Alle' sign, the church was closed when we passed). But then Leipzig and Halle are older than that and have played host to many famous musicians (Handel, Bach, Mendlesohn (sp) to name a few). We visited Handel's childhood home and the bells in Halle play the same tune as Big Ben because it's one of Handel's pieces (London being Handel's adult home).

A famous composer, a statue of Handel in Halle's marketplace (complete with preparations for the Christmas market)

So as well as the recent history and older history, the towns also have very pretty and interesting buildings. In Leipzig we climbed the tower of the M?????kirche which has a flat right at the very top where the warden lived whose job was to ring the bells and watch out for fires in the city. From the top we got to go out onto the balcony and got a view of Leipzig at night (we were also lit up very brightly, so most of Leipzig's residents also got a view of us!)

Leipzig cityscape at night. That massive tower is the new town hall.

Nevertheless, it has only been just  over 20 years since 'die Wende' and there are still scars from this, particularly in Halle which suffered from mass emigration immediately after the collapse of its industries. There can be one perfectly decent building next to a completely derelict shell, and in some places just gaps where buildings once stood. However industry is recovering, and I went to visit the most important one, the chocolate factory! The Halloren chocolate factory has been going strong since its inception, aside from the slight blip when it was used to produce ammuntions, and was aubsequently bombed. After the war the soviets recognised the amazingness of chocolate and the factory was only out of action for about a year. Of course I visited the chocolate museum too, and sampled some Halloren kugel (very sweet but tasty).

The chocolate museum was complete with a chocolate living room, including piano made entirely out of cholocate! (The books on the bookshelf are also chocolate.

So completes an abridged version of my life to date, and if you've read so far here is your complementary song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UG_N0X5WsSo It was on the radio earlier, and I just love the key change!

Biscuits, Bergs and Burgs

Last term was half term, and for this post I will resort to the standard chronological method of writing (but will endeavour to include photos to make it interesting) M still had Kindergarten, but I had to look after L all day.

Monday was a beautiful sunny day. All 3 of us cycled to Kindergarten together, and we met another parent with stroppy child in tow saying 'see L had to get to get up early to come to Kindergarten too' I'm glad L still enjoys his brief visits to K'garten! Mid morning, L and I cycled to the playground in the neighbouring town. By the time we arrived it was 11am, but to my surprise there were no other kids there, clearly playgrounds are an afternoon activity! This meant I had to play with L, which almost ended in disaster on the giant tyre swing. This installation is clearly designed to appease the town's teenagers as even I find it tricky to get on. It is a giant pole on which a contraption of 4 tyres at the end of poles is balanced. L had persuaded me to get on one of the tyres and despite me holding my feet clear of the middle pole, the tyre somehow managed to swing round such that my foot got squished between the tyre and the middle pole, ouch! Nothing broken, but it left me with a wounded foot and pride. Back in Altstaedten, M abgeholt and lunch gegessen we embarked on our 2nd playground trip, this time on scooters (or in my case foot) and to the local one. Whoever invented the concept of playgrounds is a genius!

Tuesday it rained, ideal weather for learning the Rubik's cube. L stuck with it and several hours later had one completed Rubik's cube. It was carefully hidden out of reach of M, but managed to get muddled when L was showing it off to his uncle, so naturally we had to start all over again! Much quicker 2nd time round. No normal 7yo is going to be occupied by a rubik's cube for an entire day, so we did also bake and decorate biscuits. Through these encountered an interesting culture clash, as apparently such treats here are normally solely for Christmas.

Mmmmm - Plaetzchen

 The exciting activity for Wednesday was a trip to the bank! Today was world saving day (apparently) so the kids took their piggy bank to the real bank and the collected monies was put into their bank account. To make it more child-friendly, they got to pick a free toy. M chose playdough (standard) and L chose the very boring looking bike light. L was so excited about his new toy and thought it would have costed 'at least 60-70 Euros, because LEDs are expensive you know!' With bubble wrap fully popped, and light returned to box for safety, a happy afternoon was spent playing with the playdough.

The exciting activity for Thursday was going to be swimming, but unfortunately L came down with a fever. So instead the exciting activity for the day was a preemptive trip to the doctors with Oma (I picked up M instead). A preemptive trip was required because...

Friday was Feiertag! (Bank holiday - ergo doctors shut) After weekend breakfast, I was picked up by a lovely couple from church punctually at 9 for a drive through the mountains to the weekend away. Unfortunately car rides have the ability to still send me promptly to sleep, so I missed most of it, but each time I opened my eyes the scenery was beautiful. We were staying in the youth hostel in Garmisch-Partenkirchen which is at the foot of the tallest mountain in Germany (Zugspitze-2962m) It's a bit of an expedition to climb such a mountain so I didn't, but instead we had the standard afternoon 2-hr walk. The weekend away was good and, despite being only 20 (mostly middle-aged) people, was remarkably similar to 'The Great Escapes' and 'Houseparty'. The timetable revolved around various food-breaks, and included lots of talks and the afternoon free-time during which practically everyone (bar those on crutches) went on a Wanderung. I understood something from the talks, but have to admit I skipped the extra discussion time as my brain has a finite capacity to understand theological discussions auf deutsch! It was also nice to have a bit of peace and quiet.

Wenderfels, a ruined castle overlooking Garmisch-Partenkirchen

I returned to an empty house, the family not returning for a couple of hours. When they returned (they had bought a new cupboard) L proudly told me he had gekotzt, in such a happy tone that it took me a while to twig that he was telling me he had thrown up! Unfortunately the illness from Thursday was not yet cured and has so far spent this Monday and Tuesday at home. Most of the time you couldn't tell he was ill, but today he ate a yogurt and promptly threw up, so he's not faking! He also missed ice-skating today (that's a school sport for 7yos, jealous!) so wasn't too happy. Hopefully tomorrow he will awake ohne temperature and peaceful mornings shall be mine once again. However M was today complaining of Bauchweh so I'm not going to count on that....

And your prize for reaching the end http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv9mQIBDx3I Bit different from a song this time, but pretty epic