In which the facts come out to play.

As one may have gleamed from a recent slowage in posts, some things have been happening to involve my life in other ways than say, writing about my life. For one thing, I've fully delved into the research component of this year-- you know, the reason I'm here in the first place. That's been a gratifying kick to the brain, so to speak. After a very helpful meeting with my adviser, I've started reading history books on the last few centuries of Hamburg's cultural life and taking notes on the notable bits. It was a surprisingly slow beginning-- though my conversational German has gotten its groove back, scholarly German is another thing. It's taken a good week or so to be able wrap my mind around the written text in such a way as to process the information into long-term storage areas. However! I've been feeling much more confident in the past few days as the pages have started turning themselves more quickly. Something else I realized while getting started is that it's going to take a mountain of motivation to keep this project going-- and go it will! I'm figuring out the best places and times to work. So far my kitchen in the morning is the best way to go when I'm home, and alternatively I've found a great-vibed cafe with Wifi near the Uni for days when I have other engagements in the area.

It will also help when my university class starts (FINALLY) on Thursday. It's an active seminar all about theater and its cultural implications in Hamburg... Cha-CHING.

In other news, I figured that one good way to counterbalance hours spent sitting and reading about art/devastation would be to take SALSA LESSONS, and I don't mean the kind you'd find in a recipe post. Two weeks down and I'm already sure that salsa dancing could cure pretty much any ailment, except maybe tendonitis. (Still workin' on that.) Someday, I hope to be this good. (You really can find everything on Youtube!) I'll also be taking a photography course focusing on different creative techniques. Choir started tonight and shall continue to fill my Tuesday evenings with Verdi's Requiem. The English-speaking theater group at the University will get going with Hamlet at the end of the month. I'm planning on signing up for a French-speaking tandem partner to keep my français from feeling too neglected. And. I suddenly have a job.

Or rather, a "Minijob." I happened to come across a page with local job listings on the Uni website, one of which was for a swanky travel company looking for a native English-speaker to translate their website and other materials from German into Englisch. I sent them an email and Germanified resume, scored a job interview in their swanky office in the most swankified part of the city, aaand found out yesterday that I was hired. It felt totally outlandish to be conducting my first legitimate job interview in German, buuut everything worked out. It'll only be a few hours a week because of my F-bright and residence permit restrictions, and that is so fine with me. I'm excited to have this opportunity to gain some experience in the translation world before I decide on whether or not I want to spend lots of moolah to go into it professionally, though mostly I am feeling overwhelmed by the impact of all of this good luck.

Now for something a little more photogenic, here are some scenes from a stroll I took around the Alster on a beautiful day in the not-so-distant past:

...Speaking of photogenic, have you been introduced to the shiny, new www.margaretmetzler.com?

And finally, a recent observation: Perhaps the truest sign of adulthood is when you start buying toilet paper for yourself.

That is all.

In which Hamburg is occupied.

Everyone loves a good protest, especially when they have the charming atmosphere of a Sunday afternoon picnic in the park. I was curious as to whether or not Hamburg was participating in the occupying frenzy this afternoon, so I put the question out to the world wide web and instantly discovered that the Occupy Hamburg event did exist and was officially starting in two minutes. Despite the fact that I'd already spent my morning frolicking in the sunshine and had intended to get some bookwork done, my shoes found their way back to my feet and twenty minutes later they were strolling across the Rathausmarkt toward a mighty swarm of merry protesters. The square in front of city hall is the perfect place for a protest with its convenient public transportation locations, lots of space to crowd without disrupting traffic, ample gastronomical possibilities, and a scenic backdrop.

I must say, the whole thing was positively pleasant. There were many, many bodies, and though I'm sure some of these bodies were wearing Polizei uniforms, I didn't see any. Young people were there embracing the opportunity to don Guy Fawkes masks, parents were skipping along pushing a stroller with one hand and hoisting a protest sign with the other, elderly folks were out and about with signs of their own, well-trained dogs meandered with great agility through the labyrinth of protesting legs, and everyone listened politely to each speaker as they expressed their discontent with the banks, with the rich, with the Euro crisis, with the life in general. A couple people even sang protest songs, for old times' sake.

"Occupy the world":

Sniper photographer aims for the 99%:

I particularly enjoy the shadow of the photographer's head in this one:

"Laziness for all":

And, of course, the all-purpose protest slogan:

This pessimistic umbrella sees no help for the euro. (Though I would also be pessimistic if my sole purpose in life was to get rained on.)

On the other side of the Rathausmarkt, life continued as normal. The sun shone brightly (...abnormal), the tourists nourished the Alster's most arrogant feathered creatures, buses bussed, bakers baked, bankers banked, and I went home and occupied myself with this blog post.

In which there are balding heads & dancing bellies.

Talk about a cross-cultural experience. It doesn't get much more crossed than cute-little-old Germans observing a foxy lady do the belly roll on a Friday night. And, judging by their expressions above, they were having a whale of a time.

This particular Friday night, as you might imagine, was a special one in the cute-little-old town where German Family lives. One Fachhäuser-bedecked street was throwing its annual cultural festival, during which all the shops remained open late into the night and hosted much merry culturing and festing. The theme of the evening was "Krimi," which translates into "detective story," "crime thriller," or "whodunnit," among other fine phrases. A stroll over the cobblestones would lead you to scenes in which shop owners drew chalk outlines of children on poster paper (which the thrilled zombie children could then take home and hang on the refrigerator and thus delightedly show all the neighbors what their bodies would look like dead on the ground behind police tape), a local photography shop taking mug shots of the passers-by, an ever-slinking tango stage, various crime-themed store windows with televisions playing classic black & white thriller flicks, a choir made up of mostly graying-haired persons singing jazz renditions of popular Beatles tunes-- complete with scatting and thick with endearingly dear German accents, a doctor's office turned art gallery for local artists, dancing bellies, food, beverage, and everywhere people of all ages having a ball.

I really enjoy the chaos in this shot.

 

Other adventures during my days with German Family included napping on the patio in the sunshine with comforting canine company, an evening of beautiful sushi rolling and ingesting, lots of family and homemade Kuchen time, and a couple very interesting discussions with people about American-German cultural differences. The first of these conversations took place at a family birthday party with a woman that I found myself sitting next to at a table. She'd overheard me talking with someone else about being an exchange student and after mentioning that I was the first American she'd ever met that could speak German, told me that her son was about to spend a couple weeks in California with an exchange program. I asked her if her son was interested in a longer-term exchange, with invoked a sudden almost-disdainful facial expression, saying that no, they weren't interested. "We won't let him, at least not until he finishes high school. It's not good for his development at his age, and the culture in America is too free." This caught me by surprise, especially considering certain freedoms in Germany (ie. sexual openness, younger drinking age, etc.) that American culture does not possess, and I politely asked her to explain this to me. She fumbled with her words for a few minutes and ended up retracting her statement, which was a little disappointing as I had become very curious. I then wagered a question about why studying abroad would be harmful to her son's teenage development. She replied saying that it would be harmful to change his school and family environment, and to be away from home for so long. She then went on to say how she'd been shocked to hear of how some exchange students call their host parents "Mom" and "Dad" instead of by their real names. She thought this was unhealthy as well. By this point in the conversation I'd gathered that all she really knew of Americans was what she'd seen on TV or heard in the media and I was excited to lightly pounce upon this opportunity for cross-cultural exchange. I told her about how I had studied abroad for a year as a teenager and about how my family had hosted three teenage exchange students for a year at a time each. I explained how calling my host mother "Maman" was important because I think it helped me feel more like part of the family on a psychological level, even if we had no blood relation. Although the word "Maman" in French translates into "Mom," the fact that it was a different word didn't impede in any way on my relationship with my mother. At this point Sabine (Mother-figure in German Family) came and backed me up, mentioning that Jonas had always called my parents "Mom" and "Dad" during his year with us and was perfectly happy being part of our family. As far as being detrimental to teenage development, ehh, maybe for some people. It's damn hard sometimes, sure, but I'm confident that my struggles during that year were incredibly beneficial for my development. I wasn't really trying to change this woman's opinions (okay, maybe a little), and I don't think I did, but at least I left her with some nuggets of a more even perspective to chew on if she gets hungry. 

The other discussion happened the next day with a lovely woman whose daughters have or are currently spending a year of high school in America. She asked me if I'd noticed that Germans were too blunt in the way they spoke, saying that she'd heard Americans tend to hold back what they're really thinking in order not to offend anyone. She was very anxious for my answer because she was afraid of offending her daughters' host parents by saying something we would consider impolite. I think there is some truth in that, though not in an extreme sense. How many times have you complimented someone on their haircut when you weren't actually impressed? We tend to sugarcoat our words for the sake of nicety more than Germans, which may have something to do with the stereotype of American friendly superficiality that I've heard referred to several times in the last month. I said this to my new friend, to which she replied, aghast, "You mean you never actually say what you're thinking?" Oops, too far. No, that's not what I mean. We just use white lies to help people have a better day. That's not so bad, is it?

That certainly gave me something to chew on all the way back to Hamburg. These conversations are intellectually thrilling. Who knows what I'll learn about my culture next!

In which there is pastoral perambulating.

A particularly pleasurable part of passing time in my German home-away-from-home (ie. with the family of my family's exchange student many a year ago) was partaking in perambulations in city-free places. Perhaps you'd like to take a peek?

There are baby animals involved.

In which accidental re-americanization plays a role.

Last week I attended a gathering of charming, intelligent, over-privileged individuals to celebrate the F-bright New Year and get orienteered into German bureaucracy and society. We convened in the anciently prominent university town of Göttingen, where we sat in an American chain hotel and conversed in American English and thus proceeded to befuddle my brain and location sensory devices. As nice as it was to have arrived long before the start of orientation, I was almost relieved to need to be somewhere and do something official. It was wonderful to find myself amongst all of these interesting, friendly, fully bright people after two weeks of little human interaction. The ease of getting to know someone with a shared mother language is not to be underrated.

There was also the additional perk of boisterously reuniting with one of my Smith friends who also has a research grant and will be located not so far from Home Sweet Hamburg. Having someone there with four years of shared experiences, including our previous year together in Germany, was very comforting. Other perks included being very well fed, a lovely city tour, and free evenings to do whatever. In addition to all of the important grant-related information overload, I was both happy and disconcerted by a discussion we had about social matters, more specifically about how hard it can be to make friends in Germany. I was comforted to learn that I wasn't the only person who had struggled in this realm, and was then discomforted by the fact that I would probably still have some trouble this time around. One of the leaders of the discussion compared German and American social interactions like this: Americans have a soft shell and hard core. Germans have a hard shell and soft core. (Peaches and coconuts, if you will.) Americans are friendly and easy to chat with, though it's hard to get beneath the surface of pleasantries and make true, lifelong friends. Germans are hard to befriend initially, particularly later on in life when friend groups have long been made and they're not looking for more, though once you get through the shell, they are more open emotionally and more committed to you as a friend than Americans tend to be. Gross generalizations, I know. Don't shoot the messenger.

We were half-jokingly encouraged to visit Italy and Greece and help support their economies. I was amused. Maybe I will. Maybe they should finance our trips there-- oh, wait. The German government is already on that.

Here are some pictures taken in the city and down rural back streets. The weather was simply delicious.

I had several hours to spare before my train on departure day, so I stuck my bags in a locker in the train station and set to strolling. I hadn't gone ten minutes before running into a couple of my fellow Fellows who were doing the same thing, so we teamed up and partook in some co-wandering. The climax of our adventure came about via a pumpkin festival that we stumbled upon downtown. We each indulged in a great splotch of totally yum pumpkin soup while sitting in the sun amidst the hustle and bustle of the city square while a couple of well-dressed people cranked out everything from traditional German classics to Simon & Garfunkel to ABBA's "Money, Money, Money" on their xylophoney machines. There was much grinning contentedness in my face. The fact that I was heading to my favorite German home directly afterward only helped to further light my delight.