Notes from Germany
I am an American expat living in Germany. It's a far away land on the other side of the ocean. It's interesting and often weird here. If you read this and want to comment then email me at nate(the at symbol)chillmost.com. If you find any spelling or grammar mistakes, you can keep them.
Thursday, August 28, 2003
That Eazy-E can really rap his ass off!
I ran into Wesley Willis at a Kinkos in Wicker Park, Chicago. To be honest I smelled him as soon as I walked in the door. We were both making flyers for our bands. The clerk was trying to kiss his ass saying, "Wow, Wesley, I love your stuff. Do you have any tour/album plans, blah, blah, blah?" Wesely told the guy to fuck off and and get out of his way. As I busted out laughing he started lunging at me trying to head butt me I think. At the time I didn't know that was his schtick. Then he told me to get the fuck out of his way, which I did due to the fact that Wesley was a very large man. Anyway he died last Thursday. Here's a link to the the story. Here is another. I was hanging out at Heiko's apartment in Lehrte a few months back and he had the Wesley Willis album with Rock and Roll McDonalds on it. It was a new experience for my friend Jens. We sat around and laughed. The refrain was in our heads for the remainder of the weekend.Update: Here is a great interview with Wesley from April 19, 1996.
Damn. Still sick. One week of vacation and one week of being sick. Vacation being the best week natch. I need DSL so I can upload those photos.
Tuesday, August 26, 2003
I'll have some pictures up soon from the trip. For now though, a recap...
Getting to New York was a little problematic due to the blackouts. I was packing on Thursday night and was about to go to bed and I decided to check the news on last time before hitting the sack. I knew there would be some problems and in the back of my mind I thought I would be staying in Germany. On Friday, the day of my flight, Meike tried calling the Air France customer service line and it ended in a shouting match. The only way to find out what was going on would be to go out to the airport and take my chances.
The cute little French lady at the counter was most helpful and instead of sending me through Paris to JFK, sent me through Prague to Newark on Czech Airlines. Czech Airlines was pretty cool but very laid back. It wasn't really clear that the flight was boarding. They just threw open the doors and let the word spread that we could board.
Got to Newark and was picked up by sister and a friend. Due to the blackout induced panic traffic, a normal 1 hour trip to the airport took about 3.5 hours. The trip back to CT was much quicker.
I stayed up to about 1:30 am that night which means I was awake for about 24 hours. I was in it to win it.
On Saturday I chilled and had dinner at my sisters place and saw Pirates of the Caribbean. I thought it was a good film. My only gripe is the dialogue of the British soldiers. They always had something witty, profound, and grammatically impressive to say. I know lots of Britons. They don't talk like that at all.
On Sunday I surprised my mom when she came back from a short trip with my dad. I tried to keep it a surprise between just me and my sister but keeping a secret under wraps in my family is like trying to drink water with a fork. So everyone knew except my mom but she probably knew something was going on.
During the week I went into NYC and saw my friend Bob, who I haven't seen in years. It was so awesome to see him. Equally awesome to see was my friend Kim. I had a really good time visiting them both.
There were some other people I tried to see but it just didn't pan out. It sucks but that is the way it is. It is really hard to cram everything into one week. I mostly just wanted to spend time with my family.
Being in America was very surreal. I felt like a foreigner most of the time gawking at all the big stores and cars and streets. Very few people talked about the war in Iraq. In Germany and in most of the rest of the world it is the topic of the day. It's one of the first things on everybody's lips. In America people hardly talk about it. There was hardly anything about it on the news. It was present in the New York Times but still not discussed. It seemed that people just wanted to avoid conflict and argument so they just didn't discuss it. Anybody that I did talk to about it was generally against the Bush regime as a whole and was not in favor of the war. Hmm, go figure.
I had a really good time and I wish I could have stayed longer but the ticket was so expensive just to stay an extra week. My advice is to book way in advance.
On Saturday night after a birthday/BBQ I went to the airport and took off. I missed my connection in Paris and had to take a flight 3 hours later. When I got to the terminal it was still 20 minutes till the connecting flight was to take off but they wouldn't tell me what gate it was at and wouldn't let me on the plane. Those fucks. Seriously, you never know what kind of surprises are in store when you fly with Air Chance.
To make things worse the altitude fucked up my ears and gave me a real bad cold/ear infection. Lame. I won't be back to work till the earliest Thursday. Not so lame.
Monday, August 25, 2003
I'm back in Germany. The flight on "Air Chance" was about as expected. Now I am so sick. The altitude didn't help. I went to the doctor today and I have infections of the middle ear on both sides. Rad. But my vacation has been extended due to the wonderful health care system here. I'm forbidden to work til Thursday. I'll have updates and pictures soon.
