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.
Friday, November 14, 2003
Today before work i stopped at this little bakery to get a Brötchen and other goodies like I do every morning. We stopped behing this car that had 2 little ankle-biting dogs in it and they were of course barking like their asses were on fire. One put its ferocious little snout through the crack in the window and barked to which I replied, "woof woof woof". This of course made the little shit even happier to see me. Suddenly the female owner of the dogs comes out of the bakery across the street and yells, "Muss das sein?", which kinda means, "Do you have to do that?". My co-worker, with whom I carpool with, asks what the hell is she talking about? She huffs and says the German equivalant of "Whatever, I am lacking the words to describe my emotions". --She'd be a good guest on Sprockets with your host Dieter-- I know how she feels because I was lacking the words in German to adequately say, "What the fuck is your problem bitch? I didn't train the fucking dogs and apparently neither did you. I feel sorry for you and your sad-ass pathetic life. Now fuck off before I shove a breadroll down your overactive gaping maw."
Isn't the English language a treasure?
If I was living in America right now I would be doing this: www.freewayblogger.com
Thursday, November 13, 2003
Nein Danke
All kinds o crazy hell been bustin out here in Loonyburg. The castor has come and gone. I've never seen such a huge waste of taxpayer money in all of my life. Oh wait yes I have. Anyway, the castor rolled through on Tuesday morning. It lurched through really cuz 140 protestors in LG bumrushed the trainstation and sat on and chained themselved to the tracks so the train couldn't get through. Dude, German protestors don't fuck around. Unfortunately neither do the police. My friend's street was blocked off cuz he lives right next to the tracks. They had the whole thing lined with police and barbed wire and whenever he left his crib to get a döner or something, they checked his ID in front of his door and at the end of the street. And then the same in reverse order on his way back.
The official derogatory term for a police officer in German is Bulle translated:bull, thing with horns that chases matadors. Repeat after me; "Hey Bulle, Du kannst mich mal am Arsch lecken!!" You just told a police officer to have a very nice day.
Anyway, when my friend try to return home on Monday the road crossing the river and leading to his street was blocked off with a wall of green police uniforms. He asked to get through, they said no, he said "PLease I live here", and proceeded to show his ID, where upon he was beaten in the back with a night stick. He went to complain to the precinct whatever the fuck they call it in German building and the guy says something like, "Ah these young recruits, they all scared". And that was that. Yeah whatever. They're scared? Law-abiding citizens who want to get the fuck out of the cold and into their houses are all scared of being beaten by cops with night sticks.
I'm not really sure how I stand on the whole transporting atomic waste issue. They gotta put it somewhere. Just not in my backyard beeyotch. Nuclear power is by far more efficient and reliable than coal-burning power plants. But the waste is so dangerous. Half-life of 40,000 years. No thanks. But the best way to solve the problem is to not produce nuclear waste in the first place and use some sort of renewable energy resource. Something like say the light, heat and radiation that comes off of a big ball of gas floating in outer space. Or wide open space where disturbances in the atmosphere cause molecules to all move very quickly in one direction causing some kind of propeller-like device attached to a generator-like contraption to turn. Its a crazy idea I know, but it just might work. In fact I provided an artists rendition of such a device in a previous posting (scroll down the page).
I think the whole point of the protests is to make the costs of providing police protection, train delays, traffic rerouting, etc so high that it makes transporting the castors economically stupid. In this past week they transported 12 castors from northern France to Gorleben in northern Germany. Total cost: around 30 Million Euros. Thats a whole lotta power-generating windmills that could've been built.
Monday, November 10, 2003
Jessica Lynch is angry
The 20-year-old said "it hurt" for the Pentagon to make claims about the rescue operation that were not true.
And she said it was "wrong" for the US government to use her as a "symbol" for the war.
-snip-
"They used me as a way to symbolise all this stuff," she told the ABC network.
"Ever get the feelin' you've been cheated?" --Johnny Rotten
Sunday, November 09, 2003
Who da bombs? Me, that's who.
If there is one thing I hate more than anything it is moving. Yesterday I helped my friend Robert and his family move into their first house. Moving somebody else's crap is not as bad as moving your own crap. You show up, move everything into the truck, take it to the new place, unload and your done with it. If it is not my place I don't have to worry about unpacking and setting up the kitchen, bedrooms and bathrooms. No Siree, just drop off the stuff and get out. Damn he has so much stuff. I'm so sore today because of the schlepping.
I had one problem though. I didn't know what a Hauswirtschaftsraum was. I kinda know now, but in English it can have different names depending on where you come from. You know the room that you may have off of the kitchen, in which you may or may not have the washer and dryer? Or maybe a spare fridge? Or just shelves to have cleaning supplies or food or a sink or the dog's dish? That room in German is called a Hauswirtschaftsraum. When you separate the words it means House Economy Room. If you're like me you're thinking what the hell does that mean? But if you are a real German you'd know that Hauswirtschaft could also mean something like household or housekeeping. See? A solid form comes out of the fog. German is weird like that. There are always these so obvious words that, when you analyse them, are silly and sometimes cute.
Example:
Gloves = Handschue= hand shoes
Trunk (in a car) = Kofferraum = Suitcase room
flashlight = Taschenlampe = Pocket lamp
We have words like that in English too but I'm too lazy to give examples.
Robert's old apartment (the coolest apartment in Lüneburg) was next to Clamart park near the city center. Yesterday was a demonstration against the Castor. The Castor is a huge container used to transfer nuclear waste from various power plants in Europe to Gorleben, a city not far from here. There the waste is processed and dropped into a bottomless pit where future generations of archeologists can worry about it whenever they stumble across it, or it is sent somewhere else for some other reason. Anyway, every time the Castor rolls through there are protests and people chaining themselves to the train tracks and all kinds of civil disobedience. The Castor didn't come through yet but there are cops all over the place. We were expecting there to be trouble yesterday as we were moving stuff but the cops left us alone.
Last I heard The Castor was expected to come through on Wednesday. Sometimes when busses and police cars drive past my apartment we can pick up their radios on the TV. Strange I know, but a few hours ago we heard suddenly a police announcement blasting through our TV that the castor was coming through early tomorrow morning. So that means, if it is true of course, that they are trying to sneak the castor through without bringing attention to it. Hmmm.
