Eating, Food shopping, Drinking with undergrads, etc

I now understand survival as a vegetarian in Germany: really really good bread.  The bread here eats like a meal, a really satisfying one.  I picked up some loaf on my way home last night with ‘baguette’ in the name, although it was a good 5 inches in diameter and only about a foot long.  Both the doughy inside and crusty rind were loaded with seeds, flax seeds, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, poppy seeds, and they added just the right amount of chewy texture and toasty taste.  I was deliciously surprised, considering I picked up one of the remnants of the day at 7:30pm, close to closing time, 8pm. 

I pass two supermarkets, nearly side-by-side on my way to and from campus every day.  That allows by to stop at Aldi, the cheap one (think K-mart, but with decent groceries) one day, and Edeka, the slightly classier one (think Kroger for Houston, Wegman’s if you’ve been in the northeast), the next, and pick up whatever I fancy when I’m there: tea, wine, chocolates, sometimes things to make a meal.  Each one also has its own neighboring bakery, opening 8am-8pm.  Shops close early here.  24 hr grocery stores are not a thing here, neither are grocery stores and mainstream shops open on Sundays.  Sundays are for eating, exercising, enjoying life.  About half of the restaurants, most museums, and most recreational facilities, especially public pools, stay open on Sundays.  A limited number of buses run then too, compared to the weekdays.  The Australian postdoc in my lab calls it ‘rubbish’.  As my brother would quote the army, it’s ‘mandatory fun day’.

My next door neighbor knocked on my door in the early evening one day last week.  After realizing I didn’t understand what he was saying to me, he said ‘Ok, I’ll try in English.  Hi, I am your neighbor.  I want to do some sport in my room.  It might make some noise, like on the bike.  I want to see if you mind.’  I assured him I didn’t mind as long as it wasn’t late at night or early in the morning.  We exchanged names and said Tschüss.  On Wednesday night he knocked on my door 9pm, asked me if I had plans.  I said I would probably go to the bar night in our basement bar, as advertised to start at 9pm, but maybe in half an hour.  I said ‘ciao’, then thought ‘wow, they are really on time about the parties here’.  When I arrived, I realized he was the DJ and one of two bartenders, he had to start the party. 

I got to know my neighbor, some other building mates, their friends, and some really fruity beers.  I saw ‘Radler’ on the drink list and thought, hey, that’s the name of the computer that runs our microscope (in the Link lab), then I thought, duh, we named those after beers, and the first ones were all German or Russian.  Radler is like a beer and lemonade mix.  It’s like lemon candy, in beer form (distinct from Mike’s Hard Lemonade, if you’re wondering that), on the sweet side for me, but tolerable.  Two weeks ago I tried a brew from Bit, that was infused with the same plant that cachaca (the booze in caipirinhas) comes from.  It was quite nice, I tried it following the recommendation from a lady friend, who then said her guy friends say it’s not really beer.  Other beer options that don’t taste like beer include Schoefferhoffer weizen with grapefruit juice, and Mixery, a beer and cola mix. 

Youth culture in Germany is not different from the states.  A 20 year old guy gets too drunk and pisses off his girlfriend to the extent of inducing crying, then a slightly less tipsy buddy has to calm down the girlfriend and keep the drunk guy in line without pressing the belligerent button.  16 year old girls wear too much eye-liner and not enough clothes and look 10 years older.  This was the crowd at the free open air music festival hosted by RPR (Rheinland-Pfalz Radio).  Many bands popular in Germany were there, including Die Atzen (literally, 'The Dudes'), Alphaville (yes, ALPHAVILLE), Juli, Milow, and Ich und Ich (literally, 'I and I').  My friend who fetched me from the airport invited me to tag along with her and her friends.  Of course, beer was expensive and it was not BYOB, they check your bags at the entrance, so pregaming commenced beforehand.  The oldest guy in the group was 24 and had just started his Ph.D..... 

Some dudes

The rain began shortly after we arrived, as Alphaville was setting up.  During the Juli's perfomance, it poured, and my Birkenstock clad feet sank into the mud as it got softer.  We stayed 6 hours, the rain continued on and off like this.  At the heaviest times, I would contribute to the collective umbrella cover in the crowd.  We were within 40 meters of the stage, rocking out and dancing with soaking wet feet, trying hard not to fall over by slipping in the mud or getting run over by bigger people (ok, I speak for myself).  I am now a fan of Juli, Milow, and Ich und Ich.  Milow writes humorous songs, in English too.  I don't have the necessary language skills to discern whether or not the others are humorous as well.  

Alphaville!

Alphaville!

See how close we were to the stage!  

Note: Alphaville was not the only band I photographed, the other ones were taken either in pouring rain or in the dark/bad lighting, and don't have much to see.

Coming soon: food from my tiny kitchen as promised, things you can win at the amusement park called Ikea, etc etc

Moonrise from my apartment

I'm an officially registered resident of Germany now, and have been for almost two weeks.  I reside in student housing, a building with more than 400 efficiency apartments.  Mine has approximately 20 square meters to enclose my bed, a kitchenette, a bathroom, a closet about 2.5 feet wide, large windows, a book case, a large table, and a small table.  It costs me 317 Euro a month.  It's well worth the view of the rising moon from my fourth floor window facing the city by the river Rhein.  

This caught my attention when I should have been practicing my talk for the following morning's group meeting...

...and I kept watching her as she rose above the town.

Earlier that day, I wondered into town after writing the presentation for a couple hours at the university.  I hoped to attend Spektrale, a heavily acclaimed exhibition about the aesthetic and scientific aspects of color.  I mapped the location, about a 45 minute walk to the hall just next to the river.  Google gave me some walking instructions. Of course, I'd left my map at home, so I just jotted down the turn by turn directions.  I set out around 3:30pm, knowing that at best I would arrive just in time to enough of the exhibition that closed at 6.  But Mainz was a Medieval town, and the inner city is still full of narrow stone paths, stairways, and paved bus roads weaving among each other and around major plazas, churches, state buildings, etc.  My impulse for exploring new paths and ascending hills as I come upon them quickly led me off the earlier charted path, not to my dismay though.  I found myself at the Zitadel as rain began to sprinkle down.

The front of the Zitadel

View of the town from the Zitadel

The rain lasted only a few minutes and never truly intensified.  I passed this sundial, 

then wondered around the buildings, then looked out onto the town for the second time, and was treated to my own color exhibit!

First days in Deustchland

My first day was about two weeks ago, but I hadn't created this blog yet.  Nonetheless, here's how I described it to some family:

My flight landed even earlier than scheduled on Wednesday morning, before 6am.  I was actually quite impressed by the comfort, service, and quality of the food on a US Air flight.  First I passed through 'passport control'.  The line was moving relatively efficiently, and I went to the next seemingly available counter in front of me, drowsy with passport in hand.  'NEIN!' the chubby bearded man with thick glasses scowled at me.  He spurted something else out, and then 'you have to vait!'.  So I backed up to the line and then the guy next to him called me up and said quietly 'his system is down, he's waiting for it to start-up again'.  Now I felt a little less drowsy.  After nearly doubling my body weight with luggage, I waited in the airport for about 45 minutes for my new friend from the international office who was planning to pick me up before trying to make a phone call from a pay phone.  Having been given the entire international phone number with codes and everything, I couldn't distinguish where the phone number should start for a more local call.  Fortunately a seemingly nice man started talking to me and I asked for help and then he dialed the number for me on his iPhone.  Turns out she thought I was arriving on Thursday morning.  I had about 90 minutes to wait for her.  Another young lad from PA was visiting his brother on vacation, and also had about 90 min to wait since the bro couldn't quite get out of bed that early.  He taught me some useful phrases with a heavy American accent until my friend from the university arrived.

She was actually extremely helpful with everything on Wednesday and Thursday.  Since they thought I was arriving Thursday, the apartment wasn't quite ready, but fortunately the housekeeper was in the building and we just had to wait for him to finish repairing some things.  I received a starting package that included dishes, silverware, three pots and a small fry pan, three wooden cooking utensils, a fitted sheet, squishy amorphous foam piece to be used as a pillow, foam blanket, and covers for the last two things for 35 €.  My apartment is quite comfortable actually.

Since I couldn't stay and sleep while the housekeeper was still fixing up the place, we went grocery shopping.  The supermarket is less than 10 min walking from my place.  We loaded up on more stuff than I could carry, but fortunately my friend is an iron woman (I would have downsized on the heavy liquids if she hadn't offered to carry them).  On our way out, we saw a bus and ran for it.  As I was running, both handles of the reusable shopping bag I had brought with me broke, and the bag dropped and strawberries landed upside down and the cream cheese (packaged like our yogurt, in a plastic container with sealed cellophane on top) partially exploded onto the sidewalk.  A biker was kind enough to not run over it and the bus driver was kind enough to watch me gather it all up and then haul it onto the bus.  'It's quite good' said my friend as she tasted the leaking cream cheese she wiped off the top.

We made it back to my apartment, I passed out until 7pm, stayed awake to unpack for about 3 hrs, then passed out again until 3am, then cooked spaetzle at 4am, then met her again at 9am to do other important stuff, like register as a resident in Germany and open a bank account.  What an exciting first day!