Hamburg and Hamburgers

Three weeks ago today I arrived in Bremen, quite nervous and flustered about speaking in German for the next year.  Not that I wasn't excited, but reality had sunk in.  Since that critical moment when my life in Bremen began, I have been quite busy.  I have visited Bremerhaven, which is a port city to the north of Bremen.  Bremen and Bremerhaven make up the only two cities of the Bremen Bundesland (province) and are very proud of their independent history.  The purpose of the visit to Bremerhaven was to go to the Auswandererhaus (Emigration House), which is a museum that commemorate the 7.7 million Europeans that emigrated through Bremerhaven, one of the largest ports in Europe.  

A more eventful day was the excursion to Hamburg.  Hamburg is Germany's second biggest city behind Berlin with 1.8 million people (however, 4.3 million live in its suburbs).  Along with Bremerhaven, Hamburg also shares the distinction of being one the largest ports in Europe--Hamburg is the third largest.  Bremen, Bremerhaven and Hamburg all share other important history:  All three cities, along with several others, were all historically apart of the Hanseatic League.  The Hanseatic League was a free, independent trading and merchant guild in Northern Europe to help preserve and protect the member citys' trading interests.  Anyway, to move on from the history lesson...

The day in Hamburg was a totally different feel from my days in Bremen.  For a start, the sun came out and stayed out all day.  Besides that, though, being a major city, Hamburg felt much different than Bremen.  Bremen is a decent sized city, but while walking around, it certainly doesn't feel like that.  Hamburg, though, had the energy and bussle of a big, important city.  The river that flows through Hamburg is the Elba and our day started with a river boat tour and a walk through the underground tunnel that connects the two sides of the city--All of which we did with hundreds of other tourists.  Later that day we tried to reconnect with our developing German side and partook in the lovely German tradition of "Kaffee and Kuchen" (coffee and cake) in the afternoon.  I felt that Hamburg had a international and fairly large feel, but the lake that sits in the middle of the city and by which we had our coffee (Actually, I didn't have coffee because if you know me well, you know that I hate coffee, but I do love cake.) oozed serenity and charm.  Hamburg was a lovely mix of charm and energy with fun and youthful things to do.  I am also fond of Hamburg for one simple reason:  It is the first place I've been since leaving the US that had public water fountains...Three cheers for non-carbonated water that I didn't have to pay for!

Now on the to hamburger...I must confess, I actually have not had any hamburgers since coming to Germany.  I have been to a "barbeque" though, where we "grilled," and yet I have had no hamburgers.  In place of hamburgers, I have been served bratwursts....and lots of them in a multitude of varieties.  The assumption that Germans loves their brats is no misconception--it is 100 percent accurate.  I've always been one to enjoy mushed-up and mixed-up meats thrown together and squeezed through a machine to create a casing, so I'm OK with the wursts.  At the grocery store I have the option of at least 10 different flavors, sizes and meat-origin.  Our/my love of hamburgers is definitely equal to their love of wursts.  

My first Friday in Bremen I had the opportunity to eat a mixed-up, mashed-up meat sans casing in a dish called "Knippe."  Knippe is a very traditional (and actually delicious) Bremen dish, which is ground pork, mixed with oats and spices and then lightly fried.  The menu described the "mischung" (German word for mix and also the best way to describe Knippe) as "haggis-like," so my decision to spend a whole 10 Euros on this was quite a leap of faith.  I was very pleasantly surprised, though, especially with the apple compote (or in other words, applesauce), that was served as a topping.  My meal sure was better than another PPPler's meat and cheese dish that was served with raw ground pork....Ew. 

To paint a more complete, and less traditional, picture of the food in Germany I will move on from the ground and reformed foods.  As many of you may know, the majority of Germans believe the largest meal of the day should be lunch.  At lunch the meal could really be anything, but Germans do favor lots of potatoes and pork.  In the four large meals my host family has served me since my arrival, one has had chicken, three have had pork and one had fish.  All had potatoes....Good thing this blog, unlike my Ireland blog, is not entitled "No Potatoes Please." 

 For the other meals the Germans gravitate towards deli meats, butter, cream, honey, more butter, more cream and cheese (they want to make sure their dairy farmers stay busy).  Oh--and beer.  I kind of hate to say it, but Germans aren't really disproving any food stereotypes here.  My average bread consumption has never been low, considering I count bread as one of my favorite foods, but it has now reached new proportions, which I think, if you ask my family, is saying something.  If I ever feel like I should eat multiple German things at once, I can easily find a bratwurst stand, order one for a couple of Euros, and also receive a small, horizontally sliced white bread roll (the beloved German brötchen) that looks foolishly small as it "holds" the wurst in a manner similar to the more proportional American hotdog rolls. 

There is German word "komish" that means funny, comical or strange.  I love food and I am enjoying all the food I eat here in Germany, but sometimes I just laugh because it is so komish and different from much American food.  Though, sometime between Hamburg, my seventh bratwurst and finding hummus at the grocery store this afternoon, I realized my life here is far from komish--In fact, it has already been full of new and wonderful sights, sounds, smells and tastes, each of which belong in this one year adventure.  

Wie bitte??

It is highly possibly that my brain is going to explode into a pile of German-sauce/mush.  Sometimes it feels almost unfathomable how someone can master a foreign language.  When I approach someone on the street for directions, or need to talk to a sales associate in a store, I often introduce myself not with my name, but instead the disclaimer "Ich lerne Deutsch,"  which means "I'm learning German."  In my head I also add, "Please be nice to me."

The last week of German speaking, learning and living has really been quite incredible and despite what I just said, I do feel like it is going well.  However, there are frequently times when I also am totally "verwirrt" (confused).  (Small German lesson:  "V" is pronounced liked our "f" and "w" is pronounced like our "v."  So, verwirrt should sound like "fair-veert.")  Just ten minutes ago is a great example of being "verwirrt," and also why German can be so "verwirrend" (confusing).  While my host parents watched television, I sat at the table reviewing some grammar.  My host father, Jörg, came up to me and said something about me calling it a day.  What he said, though, was an expression for "closing up shop," which also, ironically, is the same word as partying (feiren).  I recently learned the word for partying and am usually quite pleased with myself when I remember to (correctly) use it, so naturally, I thought he was making a comment about my relativly unremarkable social life.  The confusion went on for a few moments until I finally asked him to spell the word and I quickly looked it up when he stepped out of the room.  Naturally, these misunderstanding ("Missverständnis" auf Deutsch) are bound to come up, especially with homonyms.  This past week has given me a much, much greater appreciation for everyone else who goes through this experience, and especially for those who try to learn English, the king/queen of homonyms.

Anyway, besides learning the language, I've noticed the act of learning a language is a very strange, yet also exciting, process.  In just a couple of hours I can fluctuate from confidence and enthusiasm to being overwhelmed and totally jumbled.  I was riding the tram home this afternoon and I was thinking about different scenarios and how I'd say them in German and I suddenly felt oddly bad for Germans who have to have complicated conversations in German!  Almost immediately I felt silly and also amused--I find that I forget that for other people German is totally no work at all.  I also think about conversations I had before I left the States and try to re-play them in mind, in German.  I don't do this because I'm trying to practice, but because I forget that those conversations were in English!  It is so strange, but it seems sometime in the last week a part of me forgot that expressing myself was once (and not so long ago) an extremely easy task.  For the first time in my memory, I feel like an inalienable ability has been taken away and it sometimes makes me feel plain dumb or even impolite because I can't think quickly enough how to respond, wish someone luck, or whatever.

In these moments I forget that speaking is not just easy for the Germans, but for me too--of course, in English, though.  I then try to reflect back on this week and see how much I've already learned and how much more confident I've already become.  I also remind myself that I will not always be afraid of someone coming up to me and asking me directions to somewhere (usually to a place I couldn't even get to myself).

Yesterday was such a good example of the language roller coaster.   In one day, I went from going on a Mercedes plant tour (Side note:  the Mercedes factory in Bremen is the second biggest in the world, behind Stuttgart.) where I understand maybe 10 percent, then at night visited (auf Deutsch: quatschen...probably one of my favorite German words) with my family and neighbors and felt almost half-way intelligent.  Despite the border-line misery of not understanding the Mercedes tour, I still went to bed feeling proud of myself because I made it through the evening, understood some stuff and even spoke some German (some of which was grammatically correct).

 I never expected learning German to be easy or simple, but I also don't think I fully understood how deep the language-ice berg can go.  Even so, I want to know this language and that is why I embarked (auf Deutsch--einsteigen...another awesome word) on this journey.  At the end of the year, Radio Bremen 4 said they want to interview me again to see how the year went, and I'm looking forward to impressing them with my German (German-mush brain or not). :)

A Whole New World

Well, I asked for adventure and that's what I have received.  It has almost been a complete week since I left the US and set out for Germany with 74 other eager young Americans.  After being awake from 34 hours (interspersed with moments of spontaneous sleep), I finally got to have my first nightäs sleep in Germany and the next day me and 13 other CBYXers (AKA PPPlers in Germany) were bused up to Bremen.  When we got off the bus in front of our language school it suddenly hit me what we were all doing.  In a matter of moments, we would be leaving the comfort of our American group and spreading out throughout the city with our new-German speaking host families.  That was pretty intimidating, but also quite exciting.  My host family is really great.  I live with the Ulla and Jörg Englemann in a very nice area of Bremen.  They have very generously open their house to me and seem very interested in helping me improve my German.

Speaking of speaking in German....It's hard.  It really is a sink or swim situation though, and in that sort of pressure-cooker, one learns quickly.  I am stunned by how many new words I'm learning every day and how much more I can already absorb.  I think a huge part of learning a new language is having the courage to speak it, and while I'm here it doesn't matter if I have the courage or not, I kind of have to speak it. Before I came here it was hard to accurately predict what sort of difficulties would arise when dealing with things in another language, but my group is very fortunate to have a really amazing tutor, Anna, and lots of other support from our language school, CASA.

Every day since I've arrived something has happened that makes me laugh or makes me shake my head. Here are a few highlights from the last 6 days.

On Wednesday, after only being in Bremen for 1 day, Bremen flooded.  During the night it rained so hard and so much that the drainage system overflowed and tons of water pooled on the streets and many basements flooded.  Two people in my group were living in their family's basement and had to move because of how much water there was.  My basement is fine, but getting to school that day was interesting.  I was on the tram and already half way to school (the total distance is about 4 miles) when the tram driver made an announcement that I could not understand.  What I did understand, though, was when everyone got off the tram and started walking.  So I did too.  With my broken German I tried to figure out how to get to school and why we could no longer take the tram.  About twenty minutes of walking later I made it to an underpass and immediately understood:  The underpass (through which the trams pass) had about two to three feet of water in it.  The other pedestrians all paused and looked at the water then suddenly took off their shoes, rolled up their pants and waded through the most shallow part.  Seeing no other option, I did the same.  Eventually I made it to school--wet, but on time.

This week I learned that German buses can take vacations--and my bus is.  Bus number 33 is on vacation, so that means I have to get up earlier to catch another one.  Lucky for the buses, they get to take very long vacations.  In fact, they get longer vacations than people--my bus has been on vacation since July 7th and doesn't return to full time work until August 17th.  Then, and only then, will it come at a slightly more convenient time.  On the plus side, though, the public transportation in Bremen is wonderful and I can get almost anywhere I need to go.

My final adventure for the week (thus far!) was being interviewed by Radio Bremen Vier (the name of the station--vier means 4).  My program, organized by the German business GIZ, needs to find host families for the 5 other people that will be in Bremen with me starting in October.  GIZ contacted Bremen Vier about running advertisements, but instead Bremen Vier wanted to do an interview!  Because I will be here the whole year the honor was given to me (a fairly intimidating honor!).  Earlier today I had the interview and was broadcasted around 6pm.  Radio Vier is similar to our Top 40 stations and it was a cool and unique exercise for my German.   My host mother apparently told her sons so they also listened...I was a little embarrassed, but it was also a pretty cool experience.

Every Sunday my Jörg and Ulla have dinner with their two sons, Kai and Sven, both of whom live out of the house.  I have been invited to eat with them and Ulla asked me to help her with the cooking.  Ulla and Jörg also invited me to live with them all year instead of switching host families, so it looks like I know my home for the next 12 months!

Bis später! (See you later, or until later!)

The Bremen Altstadt (Old City)