Last Friday I had to go to the government insurance office and set up my policy. Even though I get the coverage through my office, I apparently have to set it up myself. I was armed with my passport, a copy of my signed work contract and the word that meant new policy “mitgleidschaft” but I was really hoping that someone spoke English because setting up an insurance policy in Germany could be tricky.

I walked in and said “Sprechen sie Englisch?” and the lady immediately shook her head and said “nein”, a response becoming very familiar to me. She asked other people in the office and no one spoke English. She printed out a bunch of paperwork for me to fill out but then realized that there was no way I was going to be able to fill out a bunch of insurance papers that were all in German. Luckily I was the only one there and she seemed quite ok to help me. She filled them out for me, mostly with information she found on my passport and my contract. She did have to ask me some questions and we had to find ways to talk without using too many words because while I’d been learning German for a few weeks at the point, I only knew pretty simple stuff at that point and full on sentences were still beyond me. Like when she wanted to ask if I was married she pointed to her ring finger and I showed her my wedding band because I didn’t know the word for “married” at that time.

I ended up walking out with some sort of paper that my office then told me meant that I had signed up for a policy and they would be mailing me a card soon. It’s amazing how well you can actually communicate with someone without using words. Well, I guess I’ll see what kind of insurance I signed up for before I determine if that was actually successful or not ;-)

On Sunday, January 20th, we went with Wolfgang and Annette to Heiligenberg to witness the craziest parade I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I waited to post anything about it because we’ve been experiencing camera trouble and lost all of our photos but I had hope that somehow, some way we would recover them and thanks to Marshall, we were in fact able to bring them back. Marshall even braved the freezing cold to get video of most of the parade while I took several photos. I will post some snippets of video in a later post, after I’ve gone through it and pulled out some of the best moments. The entire parade itself last for a few hours.

Basically, this is the time of year when the typical non-wild Germans go totally crazy. Some places in the world it is known as Carnival, or Mardi Gras, and here it is a huge series of events called Karneval but in our region it is known as Fasnacht.

We got to the small town in the hills, just 15 minutes up in the foothills (with a very fast-driving German) from Überlingen, a little bit after noon. It seemed like the sun was still rising and there was a gold glow over all of the hills and it was just an amazingly beautiful day. Although it was also bitterly cold. We wandered around the grounds and saw the beautiful castle, although it was all closed up and unavailable for touring since it was non-tourist season.

But of course, being early in the day certainly didn’t stop people from crowding into the music-blarring bar areas to drink some pints. I suppose they are Germans after all – you can never start drinking too early and there are never enough pubs. Even with as many tents stuffed full of people singing and sloshing beer around (no joke, I seriously felt as though I was in a movie walking through the buildings and tents) there was even a makeshift one set up in the back near the castle with a handwritten sign. Although the funny thing is, in German the word “bar” is also the word they use for “cash”. On our way past some food carts, we grabbed some sort of pastry that was similar to an elephant ear that you might get at an american festival except this one was a little more donut-like.

As it got closer to the parade time, those not in the parade began to gather along the main street. I can’t even begin to tell you everything that Wolfgang told us but basically the parade was those dressed up in the costume of each town within 50 km of this area. There were 53 towns represented here. And each went down the street in their costumes yelling some sort of word or phrase like “Narri!” and the people standing and watching had to yell back whatever they were supposed to yell in response like “Narro!”

Luckily we had a paper to direct us to such a phrase although none of them made any sense and some were really long. But oh man, if you didn’t keep up on what town was going by and what to say someone in the parade would do something to you like throw paper at you, mess up your hair, put leaves down your shirt or in my case, take the hair band right out of my ponytail and then run down the street with it laughin. It wasn’t easy either, I thought he was going to rip half my hair out. And yes, it was caught on video. We also had paper thrown at us and our hair messed up. Someone even tried to throw me in this crazy spinning thing that went whizzing down the street.

But if you said the correct phrase when someone went by with candy, they would throw candy at you. But aside from that, they were just generally doing silly things as they went down the street and it was hilarious. They had strange contraptions that they would grab people and throw them in, they had these large tong-like things that Wolfgang called “people grabbers” and just all sorts of creative things. And no one was safe. If you weren’t paying attention, they’d get ya and if you thought you were out of the line of fire, somehow, they’d get ya. One lady was watching from her balcony thinking that she was safe and then a group of people in the parade ran up with a ladder and climbed up to her balcony! There is no such thing as a safe place to watch.

But all the silliness aside, the costumes were nothing short of amazing with hand painted clothing and hand carved wooden masks, each special to the individual town and their story. Many of them were colorful, made various noises and have amazing creativity in their design and construction. There were men, women, teens and children…even some babies in decorated strollers. Many towns also has a band of some sort and witches that followed with brooms and were the most mischevious of any of the characters. One even lit a fire in the street while many of them made a silly show of trying to put it out by putting paper on it! Here are but a few pictures….

Last week we were determined to find the “mysterious” El Fuego restaurant, a Mexican restuarant said to be somewhere in downtown Überlingen. We looked and looked and went up and down every street with no success. We finally gave up and ate at a very small Italian restaurant, Al Lago.

Al Lago was a little hole-in-the-wall Italian place that we decided to check out for lunch last Friday. It was a beautiful little place with table clothes and candles. And a menu of Italian food written in German. We decided to play it safe and order the Pizza Salami, which by the way is a Pepperoni Pizza here and Pepperoni is actually peppers. But we were pretty proud of ourselves for ordering the pizza, a salad to start and even ordering our drinks and specifying the large size. We were feeling pretty good about our ordering abilities until the waitress plopped down a full, large sized pizza in front of each of us. I’m sure the looks on our faces were quite amusing. We wondered why she didn’t warn us of the size but then realized we probably wouldn’t have understood her anyway.

We each managed to eat half of our pizza and then we had to overcome the next obstacle…how to ask for a box. We pulled out the handy dandy pocket diciontary and found a word for box and asked if she could bring us one. She left and came back with a box and we felt pretty accomplished. Next obstacle, paying the check. In Europe you will not be brought the check until you specifically ask. That means you could sit there for awhile if you don’t flag someone down. We finally got her attention, got the check but then she stood right there as Marshall pulled out his money and counted it out. This is a standard thing as well, we are told, and you must pay on the spot, including the tip. If you give her more money and expect change, you need to tell her how much change you want back. We are told never to leave money on the table, it is not done that way. So after all that, we made it out of there full and with a whole pizza for dinner.

By the way, take a look at the restaurant next to Al Lago…

image (c) Lisa Town

The phrase takes on a whole new meaning here. Think of that time when you were flipping around and all that was on was sports and business. Then imagine there being only sports and business but most of it is in a foreign language and one that you don’t understand.  I’ve discovered a new sport called Snooker that is something like pool…but not.  It’s become a game in itself to watch it and make up my own commentary and continually try to guess what the rules are.  It seems like a big thing here since it’s on all the time.  Other than that, the most interesting stuff we can come up with is coverage of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the BBC bashing the the US presidential candidates or The Simpsons in German. We did discover that on the weekends at night we do get a couple of the NBC Late Shows.

But aside from the many different music video channels from many different countries being fairly amusing, we did find a channel we like, Baby TV.  Not tv about babies….tv FOR babies.  Oh the brilliance!

It’s a wonderful thing and very soothing. It is usually pretty pictures put to soft music or animations to cute little songs. I think if I were living in the US I might find the song part rather annoying but that just goes to show how much I crave any spoke words that I can understand. And oddly enough it all is being sung with an American accent, not a British one. I like it a lot and often turn it on at night when we are starting to wind down.  My personal favorite is little bit that starts out as a view of water and then different colors are squirted in from all sides and they end up swirling around to make dramatic patterns and colors.  All set to intellectually stimulating classical music.

 I often find myself staring at the tv in wide-eyed amusement just as I’m sure babies would do.

Überlingen is what is known in Europe as a certified “Cittaslow” or literally “Slow City”, derived from the Italian word “citta” for city and “slow” from the English words meaning, well, I don’t think I need to explain that one. The movement began in 1999 in Orvieto, Italy and has branched out into other countries in Europe with the first German city, Hersbruck, to attain certification in 2001.

This term however is not to be confused with a city that is not modern or slow in the technological sense but rather in the sense that the designation is intended to preserve a slower paced, healthy, high quality of life for the cities inhabitants. The goal is to maintain an inward focus that strengthens the local businesses, supports the area’s agriculture and preserves the rich history and identity of the city. This all, of course, means no fast food within the city limits which keeps the charm of such certified cities in tact.

Überlingen is very pleasant with walking trails at every turn, more green roofs and solar panels than I’ve ever seen all smashed in one city block, beautiful views and probably the cleanest air and water around.  It’s a lovely place indeed.

But on the downside, it is also quite expensive and it can be annoying to not just have the ability to grab a quick meal, especially when you are an American in a very small German town with most of the restaurants closed for the winter.  Normally I would never consider McDonald’s food as anything even remotely resembling comfort food nor do ever eat there back home but just being able to understand the menu means the world to me right about now! Thank goodness for big colorful pictures.

So today is Marshall’s birthday and as a special treat we thought we’d take a hike out to the McDonalds that sits just at the edge of town, conveniently right outside the “Cittaslow” line with all the other big chains. In the US I would never eat at McDonalds nor even fathom the idea of walking outside of a city to do such a thing. But it’s amazing the lengths you will go to be able to feel comfortable ordering food. Also next to nothing is open in this town right now due to it being the non-tourist season. It was an interesting adventure though and we took the complete roundabout way to get there through the scary and very dark forest but at least we got there, eventually.

image (c) Lisa Town

We were so excited when the guy behind the counter could speak a little English so that we could sort of understand what questions he was asking. The menu was setup in a really different way than any US menu, with food items very much catering to German tastes and also far more expensive, but at the same time, the ingredients seemed to be of a much higher quality.

Once we sat down with it, we were so happy to have food that somewhat resembled something we recognize. Which is an especially funny thought seeing as how I don’t normally eat this kind of food back home! I don’t think fast food burgers have ever tasted so good! I got a big cheeseburger, large fries and a cola. Ah, it felt good to chow down on some nice unhealthy fast food.

By the time we finally made it back it was pretty late but we were happy and full. I have a feeling we’ll visit there again.

Last week was my first week at my new job here in Überlingen with Atelier Dreiseitl.  They have done a lot of interesting work that I find inspiring in my own career and I’m excited to be a part of the team. I’ll be working on a couple projects in Seattle and I am doing a little bit of work on another one in Pittsburg. More projects will likely come my way as time goes on. You can also see my lovely picture on the website that was practically a surprise photo as someone ran up to my desk with a camera.  Notice the lovely big glass bottle of water.  Actually, it’s warm sparkling mineral water and quite practically the grossest thing ever.  Instead of a water cooler, they have crates of these bottles that sit in the hallway.  What I wouldn’t do for an ice cold glass of fresh NON-carbonated water!

image via Atelier Dreiseitl

My first thoughts are that this office is in some ways familiar but certainly different from any office I’ve worked in thus far. It’s relatively quiet and socializing does not seem to be something that happens too much during the day in the informal manner that I’m used to seeing.  Instead, there are two 15 minute coffee breaks during the day. Each day, at 10am and 4pm, there is an announcement over the speaker that coffee is ready. Coffee and tea are available at that time.  It’s something of scheduled social times.  And from what I’m told, this is very rare in German offices that they would incorporate and encourage social time during the day (yet still scheduled mind you).  While it seemed very strange to me at first, I find that I look forward to the breaks in the day to physically get up and walk away from my desk.

People are very nice at the office but at the same time they are very formal, something I’m not used to. Also I thought that most everyone would be able to speak English well but to my surprise, that is not entirely the case and amazingly several people told me that they learned to speak English while at the office.  It is actually less international than I was expecting and is in fact very German.

The other interesting thing is that my computer is completely in German as are all of my software programs like AutoCAD,Office and the Creative Suite. I have to do my time sheets in German as well. It’s a challenge to say the least. Sure I’m learning some German as I go but it’s less conversational and instead words like cut, paste and save. Doing even the simplest task takes 3 times as long and I basically feel dumb and slow right now.  At least I know it will get better and I’m sure it will be nothing but interesting along the way!

The Birnau Abbey, a beautiful old church outside of Überlingen, sits among vineyards just on the edge of Lake Constance. The church was built in 1746 and contains a beautifully hand-carved alter with amazing detail and paintings all over the entire church including large murals on the ceiling. An interesting detail was that while glossy marble was used in several key areas throughout, the columns themselves were actually painted to resemble marble and to hide the wood beneath. I never thought I’d see faux marble painting in an old European church. In fact most of what is visible in the picture below…totally faux.

images (c) Lisa Town

Upon return from our excursion with Wolfgang to Birnau, we bundled up and walked downtown to try to get our passport photos taken for our German residence permits. We could not get them taken in the US because Germany requires that they be Biometric which is something that we could only get here. With our serious lack of German speaking skills, we attempted to try to explain to the person at the counter what we needed and we eventually got it figured out.

We then, thankfully, got a photographer who spoke some English which made it a bit more easy to follow directions. With the passport photo we were also given little portrait pictures which actually turned out quite nice. A funny note about the photography studio where we got our photos taken is that they apparently specialized in not only wedding photography but nude photography as well. Large framed photos were hung all over the studio of both types of photography. Yet another reminder of how different Europeans and Americans are. I can’t imagine an American studio putting a picture of a newly married couple next to a nude female with a little toy car on her hip. Come to think of it, I’m not even sure I understand the latter photo at all.

Outside of the studio there was a loud whip cracking sound. We’ve been hearing children with these wips all over the town since we arrived. We aren’t sure why they are doing this exactly but it seems to be quite normal because nobody even looks twice when kids start throwing whips around in the middle of town. I heard Wolfgang refer to it as some sort of ritual about chasing the winter away. I was able to grab a quick video of one kid doing it downtown, right in the middle of the street.

On our way back to the apartment, we found a store that sells things like shampoo, soap and basically stuff you’d find in a grocery store that isn’t actually food. Except anything too specialty, there are other stores for that stuff. Then across the street was a small grocery store. We went in and successfully made a small grocery run and then headed back up the hill to the apartment. An interesting note about Germany, and I think most all of Europe, is that grocery bags are not given to you. If you want bags or did not bring your own, you must purchase them at the time you purchase your food, which I personally think is like the smartest thing ever. Take note American grocery stores! Luckily I had bought a small bag that squishes down into a little keychain pouch that I carry with me at all times for such purposes as an impromtu grocery run. Little by little we are learning and each little thing we manage to do, no matter how small, is actually a big accomplishment here.

Moving to another country is a dream, something that is very exciting with new experiences and challenges.  And language barriers.  It’s amazing how even the littlest tasks can become so complicated when trying to do it in a foreign language and trying to follow the logic of another culture. 

Take washing clothes for example.  Not only are the words foreign but the way the machine operates is foreign.  I spent some quality time with my German-English dictionary and the washer, trying to get better acquainted.  After only having been in Germany for a short time, it has become incredibly evident how truly different Americans and Germans really are and that it is so much more than just the language.

image (c) Lisa Town

We ended up having to get Wolfgang’s help. With German washing machines they don’t just have a setting for warm or cold water like we have at home but rather have specific temperature settings. Wolfgang asked us what we were washing but when I said “colors” he just gave me a strange look. He then told me that Germans wash clothing items separately and at certain temperatures like sweaters at 20 degrees C, pants at 30, and under garments at 40. He didn’t understand why I would wash different types of garments together. But it all got figured out eventually, I got a load washing and was pretty happy.

The downside is that we do not have a dryer so we can only wash one load per day, not because of time (although the washer does take a couple hours even on the “kurtz” or short cycle) but rather because we only have so much space around the bathroom for our clothes line and to hang clothes so we have to wait for them to dry before washing and hanging another load. Basically our bathroom will just have clothing continually hanging all around the bathroom. It will be like our ever-changing yet still permanent bathroom art gallery.

After Wolfgang helped us he said that it was a good thing that we were staying here, “not just because it’s my apartment” he clarified, but because it was obvious that we could use a little help and he was happy to do what he could for us. We are definitely very grateful for his help. It’s like living in a grandparents’ basement which is most certainly a comfortable place to be in a foreign environment.  I have never found myself more grateful for the kindness of others!

Today we met up with Wolfgang at 10am and went in search of a bank to open a German account. We were hoping for one that would offer online banking in English and also have someone that could talk to us in English. We decided to try Deutsche Bank because it was the most likely to offer English services and we lucked out.

The guy that worked with us on setting up our account, Tobias, seemed excited to have people to speak English with and wanted to chat a bunch about things not having to do with the bank account. He told us that he studied in California and had an American girlfriend from Chicago who now lives in London but has been trying to get transferred closer to this area. He lives in Konstanz which is, he told us, about 45 minutes to an hour away by boat or train. He said we would like it because it is a younger and larger area and even has a university there. He invited us to visit the town and said that we could call or email him anytime and he’d be happy to show us around. So far people have been awfully kind and more than happy to help us. It is nice since everything is definitely very foreign to us.

After successfully setting up our new German bank account, we were off in search of the location of my office as well as a store where we could buy some things like one might buy at Target or Fred Meyer, although no such type of store exists here. We did find my office and it is a neat old building perched on a hill with what looks like a pretty nice view of the town and the lake. The store was strange and was some sort of continually changing store that only sold “monthly deals” and would change again in a month. I didn’t quite understand it but it was a place that only sold things at supposedly cheap prices at a rotating schedule and you never really knew what you’d find there. There seems to be an area most grocery stores that do this type of thing as well, but on a weekly basis. What I don’t understand is though…where do they get these things to sell at such “deals”?  Where is the original store and why do we only have access to the second store in the food chain here?

images (c) Lisa Town

After running around with Wolfgang, we came back to the apartment around noon and pretty much crashed again. It’s a horrible routine that we’ve gotten into of taking a nap for a few hours in the afternoon. Hopefully tomorrow we will be able to make it through a day without napping so that I can actually make it through my first day of work on Wednesday. After the nap we were faced with eating dinner a little early or taking a walk and then eating dinner a bit late. We ended up eating a snack and then taking a long walk around town before coming back to have a big dinner.

In our walks around town we’ve been trying to take different routes and explore different roads, paths and areas of town. It continues to amaze us at how walkable this town is. And judging by the amount of people that are out walking, especially in the dark like we’ve been doing, it’s definitely easy to see why they make so many nice areas to walk and connecting trails that wind through the residential area. We walked all the way down the hill to my office, then over to the main part of town and located the areas we needed to hit tomorrow for more errand running and then came back to the apartment. It ended up being like 2+ hours worth of walking with lots of hills and stairs. The town is definitely very hilly on the lakeside which will have us in good shape in no time.

For dinner we had to ask Wolfgang to get the frozen brocolli and carrots out of his freezer because we don’t have a freezer in the apartment, just a tiny little mini fridge that is smaller than the one I had during college. I sure hope that’s not normal for Germans and is just that way because of this being more of a place people stay when on vacation. When I go to work on Wednesday I will be able to talk to people there about more apartment opportunities and I’ll get a better idea of what to expect. We’ve got some ideas on the horizon so we’ll see how those look on Wednesday.

It’s very early here in Überlingen. It’s 4:30 in the morning. I thought that after a good nights sleep the first night that I would be able to get into the normal German routine easily. Unfortunately, I’ve been awake and sleepy at all the wrong times ever since then. I’m almost afraid that by getting up this early I’m getting even further from a normal routine but I also got pretty tired of just laying there listening to the bed squeak everytime I moved. Jet lag sucks.

Yesterday was an interesting day of mostly sleeping throughout the day, which I’m sure is not helping the whole getting into the German routine thing. Although we did take a nice walk through the town for a couple hours and it was really amazing how many people were out. There were little white lights on the trees and an ice skating rink was set up down by the lake with a tent set up for people to eat, drink and hang out. There was a disco ball and music even. It was a really neat scene, like something out of a movie, except it seemed like there should’ve been snow on the ground. I really miss the snow.