Blythe Spirit

Sunburn

Calm down, everyone. Though Jeff’s parents were in town earlier this month, I can confirm for you that my father-in-law is not a nudist. This must have been someone else’s father-in-law:

Naked U.S. tourist shocks German city

BERLIN (Reuters) – A naked American tourist raised eyebrows when he went for a walk through a German city and told police he thought this was acceptable behavior in Germany.

“We have been having unusually hot weather here lately but, all the same, we can’t have this,” a spokesman for police in the southern city of Nuremberg said on Tuesday. “The man said he thought walking around naked was tolerated in Germany.”

Those of you who were planning a visit for later in the summer, consider yourselves warned.

Strumpfhosen Redux

Bek, an Austrian who lives in the USA with her American husband, has started a new blog. Its topic is cultural differences, and she has kindly used her first post to respond to my post about Strumpfhosen. She points out that the American practice of wearing shorts and t-shirts in the middle of winter seems just as crazy to her as woolen tights in warm weather seemed to me. I look forward to seeing what else she has to say. And she gets extra blogger brownie points for writing everything on her blog in both German and English. Wow.

Eis, Eis, Baby*

Our weekend weather was utterly fabulous. Since my memories of last summer consist mainly of feeling nauseous, sitting in a tank top on my couch and sweating while counting down the days until I got to visit the States, the glory of a summery weekend in Bavaria took me by surprise. Low expectations have their reward.

German EisCafes unfurl their umbrellas as soon as the sun appears each spring. Most of them are run by Italians who lay out an array of tempting gelato bins – everything from Pistachio to Stracciatella – and hand out colorful menus displaying a gleaming array of concoctions. I thoroughly appreciate the German embrace of ice cream, and not just a simple cone. On any sunny day, the umbrella tables outside the EisCafes are packed with people who sit in front of incredible towers of ice cream, chocolatey syrup, whipped cream, fruit, and straws. These masterpieces look exactly like the menu photos. No meager scoops of vanilla here. The philosophy seems to be that if you’re going to take the time to sit down at an ice cream parlor, you’d better go the whole hog. In the US, no one ever actually orders the banana split. A hot fudge sundae is as thrilling as it gets. I would wager that many American ice cream purveyors don’t even know how to make half the fancy offerings pictured so temptingly on their menus, because no one orders them.

Yesterday, I ate the whole thing – whipped cream, syrup, and all – from a colorful goblet under a striped umbrella. Maybe if I eat enough ice cream, I’ll keep cool enough that I won’t pine so heavily for air conditioning this year.

*(This might be my worst post title ever. But I am unable to resist the opportunity to pay tribute to Vanilla Ice. He is an icon.)

The Heat is On

I never expected that one of the most difficult adjustments to living in Germany would be the temperature change. I expected to have a hard time with the language, with being far away from familiar people and food, even with driving. But I thought since I was moving to a climate so close to the ones I’ve lived in before, that the temperature wouldn’t be a big deal.

However, I’ve come to realize that it’s part of German culture to exist in a slightly warmer state than I’m used to. Thus, the thick jackets, the abundance of headcoverings, and the infernal lack of air conditioning anywhere. (Have I mentioned that before? I have? Just making sure.)

This obsession with keeping warm extends especially to children. It’s important to bundle a baby from head to toe when going outside, including down-filled stroller covers and mittens, and socks and hats in any kind of weather. I also noticed recently that most of the toddlers I saw this winter wore thick woolen tights beneath their clothes – over their diapers but under their jeans or skirts, like long underwear. And then I read this article explaining the practice of dressing a child in tights all winter long, whatever the temperature.

Who knew that the thermostat could be a source of culture shock? Now, I do. And I’m concerned about those July nights when our fifth-floor bedroom is still ninety degrees at midnight. I’ve found myself dreading the sunshine this summer. And that’s a sad, sad, thing.

Love it/Hate it

Expat Meme courtesy of Heidelbergerin.

5) Name five things you love in your new country:

1. The amazing selection of fresh-baked bread and pastries

2. Efficient public transportation, within urban areas and throughout Europe

3. Learning about new cultures (not just German, but Turkish, Italian, etc)

4. Good social service programs including parental leave, and universal and (mostly) smooth-running health care

5. Easy access to interesting travel destinations that I can enjoy without jet lag.

4) Name four things that you miss from your native country:

1. Mexican food and fresh salads and sandwiches with lots of veggies

2. Friends and family (notice that they’re #2 after the Mexican food – sorry guys, but I swore I’d tell the truth when I started this blog)

3. Easy parking – plentiful and large parking spaces. Or maybe that’s because I have a panic attack every time I try to back out of my scary garage.

4. Participating in the nuances of my surroundings – understanding posters and signs, eavesdropping on strangers, ordering food just the way I like it, reading a daily newspaper

3) Name three things that annoy you a bit (or much) in your new country:

1. Dead Sundays. When everything is closed on Sundays, we choose between a blur of errands or a sightseeing trip on Saturdays when businesses are open, then sit around on Sunday wishing we could have spread the activity out over the weekend.

2. Absence of air conditioning. Anywhere. Including hospitals.

3. Smoking. Everywhere.

2) Name two things that surprise you (or surprised you in the beginning) in your new country:

1. How cautious many Germans are when it comes to expressing national pride. This was especially evident during the World Cup, when everyone kept commenting on how unusual it was to see German flags flying.

2. So many smokers in such an environmentally aware and health-conscious population

1) Name one thing that you would miss terribly in your new country, if you had to leave it.

1. Cheap flights to cool, new-to-me destinations. Also, Haribo gummi bears.

I tag B, Mausi, Maria, Christina, and Isabelle.

Commentary

I started blogging because I like to write, and when we moved to Germany I thought the blog would be a place to share photos and stories about our new life without bombarding my loved ones with email. I kept blogging because it gives me an audience that expects me to write regularly, a practice that felt silly when it was just for me. I still blog for those reasons, and because some days it’s the only thing I feel like I’ve accomplished. Besides hoisting myself out of bed.

Bloggers, like most people, love to hear how great they are, and to see proof that the words they’ve tossed out into the world are hitting someone. That’s part of what De-Lurking Week is about. Thanks for the comments below; they remind me that I should continue using spellcheck since a few people read this thing now and then. I do my best to present a balanced view, to point out what I like about living here, what’s admirable about this culture that I see from an outside perspective, and what just makes no sense to me at all. I’ve stopped trying to hide the difficulties of living outside the familiar, and I don’t feel bad about it. I just hope I’m doing it in a way that values what exists here, and makes it clear that the tradeoffs for living far, far away from the nearest Target store can be simultaneously awful and wonderful.

You might have noticed some comments on older posts, all from my old friend Anonymous, that take me firmly to task for my American-ness and my negative thoughts about living in Germany. It’s nice that there are readers who love Germany so much that they feel compelled to defend her, but she’s no more perfect than the great and terrible USA, or any other country you see as you spin the globe. And, yes, I know I am a culturally insensitive oaf who should learn German because then life would be a hundred times easier. I’ll take responsibility for that, though I am tempted to pass the buck to my country’s education system and its lack of language training. I really do hope to raise a bilingual child, if that makes you any happier. I delete the trolls (the one that threatened to stage some kind of protest at Jeff’s workplace, for example) but it’s hard to ignore even those; and it’s especially tough to take the ones that say I’m lazy and self-centered and ask why I moved here in the first place. I’m lucky that I don’t receive too many of these (a benefit of toiling in obscurity), but the ones that show up still sting. Because on my worst days, I make those accusations of myself.

I’m not going to start hiding out on the rough days, pretending that I understand the burgundy hair dye trend here that persists from the 1980′s. When you read those posts, I hope you keep in mind that I also write about beauty and interesting lessons I’ve learned while living here. Thanks for reading. And keep those comments coming.

A Good Day

It doesn’t take much to make me happy. Today, it was:
a) An appointment with the doctor where she seemed to have a vague idea who I was (not always the case, sadly), and took the time to answer some questions instead of rushing out the door before I could open my mouth. All is well with Baby.
b) A helpful clerk at the post office who didn’t frown at my German, and who gave me a whole roll of Luftpost stickers when I asked for some extras.
c) Smooth interaction through the intercom at McDonald’s, with no shouting or scowling on either side. And the expected food appeared at the end of the transaction.
d) Oprah is back on television, after disappearing for several months.

Tis the Season

It’s a birthday tradition here for the birthday girl/boy to bring treats to share with coworkers. This seems slightly unfair to me – more work on your birthday? – but it also results in getting to eat what you want on your big day, no picking through carrot cake when you don’t eat carrot cake or politely digging the raisins out of the cookies. A control freak like me appreciates these things.

Jeff turned 36 on Monday, so he brought the cranberry bars to work yesterday, along with some fruit and sparkling wine and orange juice. He says his coworkers wandered in and out of his office all day long, saying “Congratulations!” That’s not an American birthday sentiment. It’s probably due to the subtle reference to death (“Congratulations for living this long!”) and the American aversion to admitting we’re not all going to live forever that causes us to just say “Have a happy day!”

I think Jeff had a happy day, and I definitely did. I find that his birthday makes me happier even than my own (and I’m all about being happy on my annual Day of Moi). I spend it thinking about the first cake I baked for him (bday #22 – a 4-layer chocolate beauty, from scratch, that I was worried about being devoured by ants in my college apartment), the birthdays we spent on opposite sides of the USA (#24 and #25, we probably argued over the phone as was our habit at the time), the traditional hourly phone calls to sing the birthday song on his voicemail all day long, and even last year’s birthday which I spent at the U2 concert in Portland while he hung around here in the slush, working. I remember how thankful I am for all the years he’s been in the world, all the years he has been in my world, and all the laughter we still share. He takes great care of me and I can’t even express in words what a superb dad he is going to be. Which is fortunate, because someone is going to have to watch the kid during U2′s next tour.

We need a little Christmas

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Every Christmas is different. While my family had its traditions, they always varied slightly depending on where we lived, who was home, whether I was in the country or not, my grandparents’ ages, my parents’ marital status, and whether or not my uncle demanded that everyone go to church. After college, I alternated holidays between my family and my husband’s, and since my parents have moved around a few times since then and my husband’s family has almost doubled in size thanks to the addition of numerous offspring, we never seem to do it the same way twice.

All this should have prepared me for this holiday season, which will be the most unique of my life so far. Jeff and I will celebrate far away from anyone but each other. Since our baby is due to enter the world just a couple of weeks into the new year, there will be no travel for us, not even a few hours to a bustling European capital where we can order room service cheeseburgers. So we’ll hang out at home and forge some new traditions. The first of which will probably involve a discussion about whether we are officially a Christmas Eve family (like mine) or a Christmas Day family (like his).

Though I like to believe I’m flexible, I think I may have reached my threshold for change. We’re certainly not lacking in the Christmas spirit around here. We spent the weekend in Munich, taking in their Christmas market and eating nachos at the Hard Rock Cafe. We were surrounded by hand-carved ornaments, choirs singing carols, numerous Kris Kringles, and gingerbread houses in every hotel and restaurant lobby. I live in a city where the Christmas season is practically its reason for existence these days. But it’s the personal celebrations that I already miss – putting on a sparkly outfit and drinking fancy cocktails with friends; seeing my coworkers’ spouses for that once-a-year gathering; handfuls of shopping bags to show for the workout I’ve given my credit card. But this year, between the distance from family and old friends, my lack of a sparkly maternity outfit or anywhere to wear it, my self-control against fancy cocktails, the absence of co-workers, and my credit card’s devotion to amazon.com, Christmas is so different that it almost doesn’t feel like the same holiday I’ve celebrated for the past 34 years.

While wandering around outside Munich’s historic Rathaus (town hall) on Friday night, we were surrounded by American voices, many of whom extolled the “Christmasiness” of Germany. In the next breath, they discussed their plans to board a plane back home and finish their shopping before the stores closed on the 24th. Jeff and I will cook our Christmas meal without the jet lag, without the crowded checkout line at Target, and without the feeling of being dragged from one supposedly festive event to another. We feel so lucky to have the chance to create our own family and our own traditions. But if we were ever lulled into the idea that the fabled holiday spirit was about the “stuff” – the music, the decorations, the lights, the parties, the shopping – we now know that those animatronic holiday TV shows were right. What we’ve been celebrating for the past three decades was more about our good fortune in being surrounded by people who made us laugh and included us in their celebrations, and made time to enjoy a once-a-year tradition with us.

To Market To Market

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Nürnberg’s big Christmas market opened on Friday, so we made a trip into town yesterday to take in the festivities. You might recall last year, when all that kept us from freezing to death in the Hauptmarkt was the heat generated by thousands of shivering bodies, half of whom were fortified by strangely spiced wine, drunk from small green boot-shaped mugs.

This year, I wore my spring jacket, put on some gloves because they matched my scarf, and Jeff walked around with his coat unzipped. Is this the winter we were promised last year? I’m not sure. I’m still hoping for some snow before the holidays but I must admit it was more pleasant to shop for holiday goodies under a blue sky and sunshine than fighting the wind and feeling the snot freeze around my nose.

I was so cheerful that I even allowed Jeff to snap my photo. You might have noticed that I’m exuding an anti-camera sentiment lately. I tried to explain to my snap-happy husband yesterday that it’s not that I feel ugly or ungainly (except when I try to get out of bed in the morning, it’s too bad you aren’t here to witness the spectacle), it’s simply that I am rarely inspired to put together a presentable appearance that I’d like preserved for posterity. I’ve never had an eyeliner pencil last so long, nor have my hair accessories ever lived in such a pristine environment (ie never touching my head). And you already know about the rise of the sweatsuit in my wardrobe.

The good news is that I’ll spend a few afternoons this month volunteering at the American/German sister-city stand at that market, so I’ll probably be forced to wear actual clothing, and (gasp) brush my hair. Perhaps this turn of events will result in some photographic evidence.