In which there are various Vergnügungen.

I can’t believe it—Germany is still here! And so am I! Pretty internetless thanks to a hopefully-soon-to-be-fixed modem, but here all the same. I’ve written this post in several installments while searching for a café with free wireless that actually works. The place that finally came through after three days on the case: Starbucks. (I went to Germany for this?)

The transatlantic hip-hop (featuring such artists as Lil’ Seatback and Dr. Dre-Table) hipped and hopped precisely as choreographed. I arrived at my apartment exactly on time to meet my apartment mate. Cha-ching! My favorite moment of the journey was when I looked out the window as we began the take-off roll down the runway: there was a lone duck swimming in a flooded area of field directly across from me, splishsplashing and happily warming its hilarious duckbutt in the evening shine. Ducks, my favorite of the feathered beasts, always give me such pleasure with their general silliness. I don’t usually go for the Omen-Spewing, but I took this sign as a very good omen for things to come.

Another favorite moment happened while zooming through the time zones. I was hoping to get my snooze on during the long night flight, but The Loquacious Dutch Woman with the Turquoise Bling behind me disabled that function by deciding to quatsch with the man sitting behind her throughout the duration of the trip. (: What’s up with Dutch? It’s not English, it’s not German, but it pretends that it is just enough to confuse me. I mean, it’s got some similarities which lead me into a false perception of understanding, but then all these random bodily noises come about that throw me off track. Something like, “Once we arrived at the police station, we huk’gresplehdhr grandmother oefreh’ehk pizza and ploogrffam all the cheese!” I want to learn it. ) Blah blah blah sooo I glanced out the window and was quietly slammed with a facefulla stars. The big dipper looked chipper as it tipped over a soft, flat platter of clouds. Fluff fer dinner.

Eventually the sun arrived, peeping and creeping, and looking for all the skies like a radioactive blood orange. It stealthed slowly over the great Fluff platter, which had morphed into a vast, snowy tundra in the predawn hour.

I knew I was in Europe upon arrival in Amsterdam not by what I saw, but rather by the smell. American airports all have the same kind of airporty smell—one that is reminiscent (ha!) of long hallways, grey plastic chairs, and waiting. I found the smell in Amsterdam to be a lot more chic, in a way, almost perfumed. Perhaps it was more noticeable because the majority of the travelers at 8am were newly freshened for their journeys. Perhaps it was because there were more shops selling such fragrances. Perhaps the salespeople who work in such shops get bored when there are no customers and thus pass the time by squirting aromatic testers into the main corridor. Makes sense, right? Or perhaps you don’t give a damn about airport smells. I digress.

It was somewhat disconcerting to get through customs, print my boarding pass to Hamburg, and see the word “standby” written cheerily upon it. It was a little more disconcerting to watch the entire crowd waiting at gate B22 to file onto the plane in front of me… buuuut I only like to write happy stories, so I’ll continue to say that I did eventually get a seat and arrived in Hamburg right on time. From there it was a straight shot on the S-Bahn to my apartment, which I found with no trouble. My wonderful apartmentmate, a friend of a friend, was there to welcome me and show me the ropes. Hurra!

We’re in a nice spot, we are. A cozy apartment on the 4^th floor of an old building within very easy reach of the city center. Lovely high ceilings, wooden floors, and today I even managed to get the shower exactly at the temperature I wanted without scalding or freezing myself first. (This is a big victory.) My room is the biggest I’ve had in a long time. It’s got a couch that pulls out into an intensely comfortable bed, happy plants, my own balcony, and a whole wall full of Apartmentmate’s books—great books. Most of them are books that I would have in my own library, had I a library. She’s got everything from theater history and a huge selection of plays to psychology books to a whole section of French novels (!) and dictionaries(!!), to German pre- and postwar classics, to David Sederis auf deutsch, to maps and travel books, to Tolkien, Orwell, and other such English classics, to art books, to the entire Rilke anthology, to fairytales from around the world, to books I’ve never heard of, to—finally, the breadwinner, Der Kleine Prinz in print and on CD. Win. I also really enjoy the part where Buddha is chillin’ wit’ Nietzsche.

I slept for 14.5 hours my first night. In the history of me and sleeping, I think that’s a first. My first couple days were spent tangled up in the bureaucratic mess of the university and the public transportation systems. That basically meant a lot of waiting in lines and conversations with both pleasant and grumpy officials, none of whom felt particularly inclined to help me. These dealings did a good job of reminding me that I am no longer a native speaker in my country of residence. I’m understanding everything pretty fluently, but am still having some trouble communicating as smoothly as I would like. I’m plenty understandable, just not smooth. (Come on, vocabulary! I know you’re in there!) It’ll get better for sure, but it’s very humbling in the meantime.

My evenings so far have been spent in quite a splendid fashion. Apartmentmate invited me to a cute wine place to meet up with our Mutual Friend on my second night. Another friend of hers was opening an art exhibit there that night, so the place was hoppin’. I was very grateful to be with them, getting to know Apartmentmate better while catching up with Mutual Friend. They’re both very warm and friendly people and I feel they really respect me for who I am, which is not a feeling I always get being a foreigner. Last night Apartmentmate invited me and another friend of hers to see a play in the theater where she works. I was delighted when she greeted me there with a big hug. Another thing that I am very grateful for is that when she introduces me to people, it’s as “the person that just moved in with me” and not “the American that just moved in with me.” It’s not something I’d really thought about before, but I think it makes a huge difference when getting to know new people. So often I’ve been introduced as my nationality, which immediately leads the person to consciously or subconsciously form judgments about me according to whatever stereotypes they have about Americans. They immediately look for my accent and expect me to speak poorly. When my nationality is left out of the picture, the new acquaintance forms their first impression of me around what I say and do. I’ve sometimes been able to get pretty far without them noticing that I’m not German, which makes them pleasantly surprised when I do make a language error and they realize I’m not a native speaker. This often comes with a compliment about my language ability, which is much more gratifying than the alternative. Keep that in mind next time you’re introducing a foreign friend to people, ja?

After the theater, I walked around the Binnenalster (lake in the middle of the city) for a while to take in the sights and sounds of the Alstervergnügung—basically a four day party in celebration of how cool it is to have this body of water. There is classic fair food and beverage, lights, people of all ages, six stages with live music and dancing, fireworks, and a lot of drunken merriment. I first arrived in Hamburg during this festival two years ago and give it a lot of credit for my initial head-over-heels love for the city.

Now that that’s done, I’m off to find a giant pasta maker put my body through and thus rid it of these travel aches once and for all. Ta!