In which we arrive in Ireland and head west. (Ireland part I)

A Very Special Thing happened in June, being that Freund and I flew to Ireland and spent many a day oohing its greeny spleandours with my parentals. Family vacations don't tend to happen very often when the family in question lives on very separate continents (only 8 little time zones between ABQ and the Schland), which is what gives the Specialness of this happening its capital S. 'Course it would have been even more GRAND if the brother+wifkin part of the family had also been present, but, alas, not this time.

Coincidentally, I have this Wonderful Wonderful friend in Dublin who, during my visit last December, casually mentioned having a family holiday home in County Kerry, which would potentially be able to host my family should my family ever find themselves inside it. As there were already plans in the works for my parents to be in that general part of the world in the spring for a choral adventure, I looked into how to turn this dreamy thing into a reality. As it turned out, all it took was a lot of planning, an airport house key tradeoff, and someone courageous enough to drive across the country on the wrong side of the road, sitting on the wrong side in the car, shifting gears with the wrong hand (Dad, your brain/hand-eye coordination is genius genius). Okay, not "wrong" this and that, but certainly strange and unknown for those of us accustomed to doing such things the "right" way. (And this is coming from someone from one of the few countries in the world that sillily doesn't do metric, so I'm not complaining, Ireland.)

It takes a little under two hours to fly directly from HAM to DUB, and, once I made it through the NON-EU PASSPORTS line with a shocking number of other Americans (was totally not expecting to be surrounded by so much America immediately upon arriving in a country that is not America), I was delighted DELIGHTED to be met by not one, but TWO welcoming parties. One of which being MORE Americans (but the same-DNA/changed-my-diapers-and-stuff kind of Americans), and the other being a Wonderful Wonderful friend. There have been so many times when I've arrived in airports and walked through the arrivals gate to a crowd of people staring at me expectantly with the hope that I will be their friend/family/lover/casual acquaintance/business partner, etc. and I casually walk through the exit gate with a distanced, determined "No, no one's waiting for me and I'll just get on my way now, whatev's"-kind of expression, even though I am a little sad that no one is there, because big reunions at the arrivals gate is what Margarets like best. But to continue where I meant to take the story, this was much better than that.

After aeroport hugs and a holiday kick-off scone, we scurried through the holiday kick-off drizzle, packed into the automobile and headed west, destined for one of the many little Irish towns with "castle" in the name.

We drove through sun and rain, the clouds doing creative things above endless fields growing ever greener. About halfway through the journey, we pulled off at an old cemetery for the driver to do a little dozing. The rest of us wandered around the gravestones and old ruins. A colorful array of courageous flowers were climbing their way out of crannies in the old stone walls -- a sight that became common after the first day or two in this part of the world. The multitude of graves for babies and small children was disconcerting, as were the many "Margaret"s engraved onto the tombstones.

The road continued through many more fields and little towns. Roofless stone ruins of homes, churches, castles were surprisingly common, most of them overgrown and abandoned.

The sky cleared up as we neared the west coast and the evening sun made an appearance over the water, draping the huge, barren hills in gold. The road narrowed more and more until we eventually reached our destination. Thrilled with our accommodations, we went to have a look around and came across many brightly colored homes, a courtyard hopping with lambs, and a gorgeous lake bordered on one side by mountains. A huge moon was rising white in the falling blue, matching a family of swans gathering in the distance. It was wonderfully still there, except for the mosquitoes that quickly drove us back home, annoyed but excited for the next week of exploring in this beautiful place.

In which YOU get a goal! And YOU get a goal! (But only if you're German.)

It's just after midnight and it looks and sounds a whole lot like New Year's Eve from the fireworks exploding over the city, and the honking, and the cheering, and the whatever else is making booms and Krach out there. Shortly after the Brazil vs. Germany semifinal started, there was an almost-goal by the Germans that brought cheers and the first fireworks from the other neighbors on the block. I thought they were overdoing things a bit because, hello, no goal, but sure enough, two minutes later, goal #1. When the same thing happened again about two minutes before goal #2, I realized that, duh, the internet livestream was probably behind the live TV. The neighbors thus alerted me to the 3rd-7th goals before they happened on my end, and now the city is going nutso. I admittedly only follow football every two years (if I am in Germany, which I have been for the last couple of 2 yearses), and of course I'm all for the Schland (unless they're playing the USA, in which I am also all for the USA)((or Belgium, gotta cheer for les belges, too)), but.. what? It's hard to celebrate getting to the finals when they did so by beating Brazil, so hard, in Brazil, after aaaall the drama and protests and displacements and corruption and money and then the team playing with all that pressure on them to not let down their country (make all that rubbish worth while!) and then also playing for their star player after he was way injured in the last game -- that's rough. All the close-ups of sobbing fans and players sure did make the winning... awkward ...to say the least. (And, hah, looks like the last 30 or so people currently featured on my book of faces newsfeed agree.) Even the German commentator sounded like he started wincing with every new goal after the 4th or 5th.

There were a couple of things that happened at the end of the game that upped the ole spirits, however. One was that I got to see how the Brazilian coach hugged and congratulated all the German players and looked like he meant it, and also the general good-sportsmanship between the other players on both sides. Everyone was gracious. Put a little humanity back in it.
The other great thing was that a female commentator interviewed Jogi Löw after the match. Before this, I don't think I'd seen a single woman involved with the big interviews and commentating in the German broadcasts.

A closer match would have been more morally satisfying, but then again, the guilt will probably be gone by the time Sunday rolls around. And until then, I'm happy to do my part in supporting both Jogis Jungs and local bakers, one tasty pastry at a time.

In which there is a room with a view.

One of the biggest positives of living on in the top corner of a large building is the delicious array of cloudscapes that come awafting by everyday. Today was particularly savory and I had to keep the windows closed to stop the wind from slamming them around.

Recently returned from a very picturesque adventure in Ireland. Getting back into Internetmode has been slow and, well, not particularly desired after so much green and fresh sea air. More on that later.

In which the wheels on the bus go omg-did-he-just-say-that and round.

One of the joys and mini-miseries of being a daily frequenter of public transportation is being dropped into someone else’s world for a certain span of time, sometimes via dropping a few harmless eaves, sometimes via having to cram yourself into a train full of enthusiastically drunken and singrunting football fans. You’re there, I’m there, you talk, and my left earbud snapped off last week. You say something amusing or abgefallen, I scribble it down nonchalantly in my little notebook between Borchert quotes and a borscht recipe (I kid you not).    

The best situations are, of course, overhearing adorable or hilarious things. And sometimes the things are funny and awkward.    

For example, I give you Awkward Things Americans Say: 
- Young woman on the U-Bahn, talking on the phone, loudly: “I was dripping all over myself – a big pile of mucus and crap.” 
- On the S-Bahn, two young women (not American but about America): “If you go to the States, don’t eat the jell-o. It’s so sweet and waxy!”    
- Two young guys waiting for a train, the speaker looking confused: “…sexual connotation intended?”  

Though there are also awkward things that are not hilarious, just awkward and sometimes prone to squeam. 
- Train station entrance: An old man is sneakily taking pictures of a pretty young thing handing out free newspapers to the passers-by, his face not so sneaky. 
- S-Bahn: A couple of young, French-speaking girls gang up on one of their amies and dare her to pole dance around the center handle pole near the door. They play music on a cell phone. She doesn’t want to and motions to the other passengers in the half-full train, to which one girl retorts, “Ugh, ils s’en foutent!” Basically, they don’t give an eff. She caves and does a couple of spins until the electrowaves of awkward being emitted from the other passengers win out.      

And then there are the moments when you witness the worst of a person coming up to surface. 
- S-Bahn: A little boy is standing at the door, happily “holding it open” for people and playing soul music on what’s probably a nearby parental unit’s cell phone. An old man yells at him to turn it off. 
- Last week I was on the bus, sitting behind the bus driver. A black man and his two little girls run up to the bus and hop on just as the old, white bus driver is shutting the door. The black man flashes his ID card just like everyone else and heads to the back of the bus, but is summoned back by the driver saying, “Hey, hey come back! Not so fast! Not so fast!” He insists on closely examining the ID card, apparently sees that it’s valid, but then asks how old the girls are. Neither the bus driver nor the man speaks German very well and it takes a minute to get the question across. The youngest understands first and says they’re ages six and seven, leading the driver to demand the father to pay for them, saying you have to pay once they’re that old. He does, they go sit down.
On one hand, the bus driver is supposed to make sure people have paid for their ride. That’s just doing his job. On the other hand, I have not once in the 2+ years that it’s been required to show your ID on the bus seen a driver thoroughly scrutinize a card, nor ask the age of cute children who are obviously young. Additionally, this bus driver hardly glanced at any of the cards presented by the other passengers on the bus, all of whom, dare I say it, looked German.    

Sometimes the passive observations turn into situations that require not-so-passive reactions, like the people who spend their days riding the trains and begging for money. Each of them has a script that they've written for themselves and use to address the passengers in each car – I've become familiar with some of them after chance put us in the same car several times. Some are friendly, genuine-sounding and polite people, while others are clearly angry at the world, go and shake their paper cups in front of everyone's noses and then curse everyone out when no one gives. Either way, it's very conflicting. Then there are buskers who do the same thing, except their script is a song that they play over and over as they go from car to car. With my busker brother in mind, my wallet always opens up when a talented musician comes by with their cup. More rarely but not unheard of, people strike up conversations with strangers. I know the Germans (Northern Germans/Hamburgers) are (in)famous for their obvious stares and anti-mingling tendencies, but as with all stereotypes, plenty of people are just the opposite.
- U-Bahn: A wealthy-looking couple sits across the aisle from a rough-looking older man with a yellow lab. The woman comments on how handsome the dog is and starts asking questions about it. Well, it's my daughter's and I was just picking it up from blah blah blah. She comments again on how cute it is, looking at her husband and ending every comment with "right?" Then she notices that the dog has a small cut on it's leg and her attitude changes completely, telling the man with great authority that he should go the the pharmacy to get something for the cut, right away, it won't take any time. The dog grandpa hadn't noticed it and takes a closer look, making disconcerted faces that look a little forced to me – it's just a little cut. The woman continues to tell her husband how the man should go to the Apotheke to get some ointment for it, now talking about her fellow passenger in the third person. The husband looks a little embarrassed and quietly squeaks out, "You know dear, it doesn't looks that bad". She shushes, but keeps watching the dog, her face shifting back and forth between adoring smile and extreme concern/grump. Husband looks out the window.
- U-Bahn: I was reading a book on the way home from work when two teenage girls got on and sat next to and across from me, continuing their conversation loudly enough so that all could hear. One of them, clearly the alpha female, turns to me and says (in German), "Did you know that we're flying to London the day after tomorrow?" Uh, um, no? She asks me about London and I tell her I don't know it that well and haven't been there since I was 12. I thought she had asked me about London because she saw that my book was in English, but then she turned and asked the woman across from her the same thing, then the woman next to her. They were both polite but clearly taken aback. The older of the two women was in London recently and was happy to tell her the places they should visit when asked. This girl was pretty fearless (and pretty full of herself, I think), going against all social rules telling you to mind your business and not to annoy strangers. However, what struck me the most was how the dynamic of our little pod of seats suddenly changed. We'd gone from a group of unknowns, each of us purposely ensconced in our own private worlds via books, smartphones, whatever, to a new mini-community of strangers recently united by a common inquiry. We listened to one another's responses and smiled accordingly, said goodbye when getting up to leave. Part of me was annoyed with the girl for having invaded my sleepy, post-work, private, anti-social mode, while another, bigger part wanted to cheer her on and congratulate her excellent networking skills. A mind opener on many levels.

The adorable things usually involve small people, especially babies with giant eyes secretly playing peek-a-boo with you or trading grins when mama and papa are busy on their phones. Or a mother reading a chapter book out loud to her son while he rests his head on her shoulder, all the surrounding passengers quiet, listening in. My recent favorite favorite, however, was this: 
- On the S-Bahn, father and daughter sitting behind me are playing the classic memory game “I’m going on a trip to xxx and I’m going to bring…” By the time they started having memory problems, they had packed:
1 Fahrradreife (bicycle tire)
1 lila Mandarine (purple mandarin orange, but so much cooler as it rhymes in German) 
1 S-Bahn Haltestelle (S-Bahn station) 
1 schlecht gelaunter Bär (bear in a bad mood – not something I would want with me in a confined space over long distances) 
1 Kuschelautomat (vending machine for cuddles)
1 Flamme (flame) 
1 Stück Grass (blade of grass)    

In case there are any inventors out there with inventor’s block, might I suggest a Kuschelautomat?

In which we spring on the springtime train.

The bright burst of springtime at its prime and looking for a change of scenery, I grabbed some good company and hopped on a train to Lüneburg for the first time in many a month. It’s common knowledge that this adorably slanted town is always game for a stroll on a sunny Sunday, and indeed there were many two-, four-, and wheel-footed creatures and contraptions clopping over its cobblestones. All eateries and drinkeries lining the Ilmenau hit the sunny day jackpot, their outdoor seatings packed with persons seeking the biggest, tastiest, dastardliest ice cream sundaes in town. Everyone else just went to Eiscafés, fiercely determined and undaunted by the comically long lines. New forsythia brightened up old, old walls, the air bloomy with plant poppings of all sorts. A favorite moment was crossing paths with a chocolate lab puppy on the Kalkberg – I cranked up my dog magnet to the max and puppylove bounded right over and wrapped my muffin-scented hand in its fresh, soft tongue before bounding back to its hyoomanns. And then there was the ad for a 3 kg, 23 EUR Monsterburger. And the busking harpist with husky. And the cool stillness of an old, pink church. And the sitting, standing, strolling, and soaking up this particularly beautiful day.  

 

In which we have a heyday of May Day and segues.

In much of Europe, May 1st is a national holiday supporting workers and rights, etc. (It took longer than anticipated to get this post going because of getting lost in the maze of Wikipedia vs. Vikipehdia histories:) As my Wikinlightenment (not to be confused with Wiccan enlightenment) informs me, Labor Day in the US stems back to the Haymarket Affair of early May 1886, where a peaceful “labor demonstration”/strike supporting an 8-hour workday limit ended with the deaths of workers and policemen alike. Labor Day as we know it was established the next year, but in September rather than May to avoid commemorating the event (…maybe I would have remembered it had it been commemorated), and is now celebrated by parading, BBQs, and people in the retail industry working overtime to support one of the hottest sales weekends in the US of A (because you, yes YOU, have the right to spend those hardworked dollars on stuff you had no idea you needed! Yeah!).     

The Haymarket Affair certainly played a part in labor movements worldwide. In Germany, a national workers’ day didn’t successfully come into being until May 1, 1933, ironically under the Nazi regime. Any celebrations sponsored by non-gov parties or groups were forbidden, with all labor unions banned and their headquarters raided the next day. Today the official name varies by state and country, ranging from the all-encompassing “Tag der Arbeit” (Labor Day) to the also-broad-but-much-longer-winded “Tag des Bekenntnisses zu Freiheit und Frieden, sozialer Gerechtigkeit, Völkerversöhnung und Menschenwürde” (Day of the Declaration of Freedom and Peace, Social Justice, Reconciliation of Peoples, and Human Dignity). Mostly, however, the day just goes by, well, the day – Erster Mai. Like in the States, this generally work-free holiday has somewhat morphed into a BBQ-fest, though unlike in the States, everyone has to rush to get their charcoal and Grillgut the day before, as all stores are closed for the holiday. Protests are also far more likely to be seen than parades, as extreme left-swinging groups have been using the day for demonstrations for the last few decades, often ending in violence (par exemple). In Hamburg, it’s public knowledge that some sort of demonstration will go down in the Schanze and the riot police arrive in helmets and shields even before the protesters. The bank located in the center of the action had its windows shattered so many times that they invested in steel shuttering. Not really a hip thing in one of Hamburg’s hippest neighborhoods, otherwise known for its graffiti, ample outdoor bar seating, and the best falafel in town, etc.

This year I avoided all that and instead hit the Alster with a sailor friend, off into the gray. The winds were pretty easy on me (the newbie), only throwing in a mighty gust now and again when I looked too comfortable.

We headed back to shore when the cold started settling in and came across something adorable on the walk back downtown. I’d remembered a waterfowl perch at the edge of the lake where puffball chicks can usually be spotted in springtime. I look a peek and spotted a mountain of tiny fluffy bodies. 

My first reaction was of horror, thinking for whatever reason that some terrible person had taken their bad day out on the little poofs and then piled up their remains. It was then with much relief (and teeheeing) that I noticed the squirming and funny little legs popping out here and there. They were just cold, I guess, which reminded me of – SEGUE –

A slight obsession with the BBC Planet Earth series recently led to watching March of the Penguins for the first time. The flowerdy spoken penguintalk was often sappy enough for syrup (alas, no Morgen Freeman on the German version), but GOOD LORD, THE WORLD IS SO COOL, PENGUINS ARE SO, SO AMAZING! I knew the basics already – hundreds of miles traveled to breeding grounds, the singingsqwacking, the males’ egg-warming balancing act maintained through the ferocity of Antarctic winter, the females going back the hundreds of miles to fill up on (but not digest! HOW DO THEY DO THAT?!) fish to regurgitate for hilarious poof chickies hundreds of miles later – but this incredible footage and later-learned infos just made the whole thing even more wowzalike, such as how they are able fill their feathers with air to make them zoom underwater or create a bubblescreen when sneaky and terrifyingly ginormous (hah – my spellcheck wants to correct that to “gunrooms”) leopard seals want to munch on – SEGUE –

The leopard seals seen on film looked particularly gunrooms when seen next to a penguin, at least based on my idea of how big an emperor penguin was. As it turns out, emperor penguins aren’t quite as big as I thought, but the seals are still ginormous. My quest to find leopard seal stats brought up this amaaazing story, which taught me that a leopard seal could also be a mensch, whiiich then made me want to check out the website of the photographer in question, which –

(just looked out the window – RAIN! UNTIL THE END OF TIME!)

– displays what are probably some of if not the most incredible swimming penguin photos on the planet, as well as fascinating info blurbs. Check it out. Really. And stop polluting the planet and causing climate change that is hurting the Antarctic+ environment, dwindling fishes for hilarious poof chickies, etc.

What I’m getting at here is that the pile of fluffy goslingalings squirming about reminded me of the male emperors bracing together in a giant, ice-frosted cinnamon roll of protection against the darkness, wind, and cold cold cold, constantly in motion as each penguin tries to work its way toward the warm center of the colony.

Ah, the wonders of marine life and associative thinking.

…Which reminds me of this photo from a zoo trip a few years back:

Oh, and back to the Labor Day topic, let’s not forget that there’s still a long way to go. Should the day ever come when people are paid equally for the same work, when all people are paid decent living wages instead of a few with voluptuous economy-eating wages, when everyone gets the benefits and securities they need and time off for families, when all is generally well and good in the world – then, we’ll rock the BBQ.

In which, here in the Baumhaus, tea is taken very seriously.

If only they had the power to make the neighbors below stop blasting Backstreet Boys directly under my bed well past I-wanna-go-to-sleep-already-midnight-o'clock.