Arrival
Well, I made it. I landed in Germany late Wednesday night, and after one night in a hotel near the airport, I arrived in Augsburg Thursday afternoon. It has been such a whirlwind, with so many conflicting emotions.
I guess the easiest emotion to predict is, well, sadness. I was sad when we drove away from the house (after saying goodbye to the kitties) and sad at the airport when SP finally left me at the security gate. I cried a lot. I didn't want to but there was no controlling it. It was finally real and I was really going. Since then the sadness has come and gone, which I'm sure it will do more as the newness of arriving here wears off.
The trip itself wasn't too eventful. I slept most of the flight to London (thank you Tylenol PM) and just chilled out on the short hop to Munich. I was glad no one was there to meet me in Munich because I looked terrible -- all my makeup had been cried off, my hair was all over the place, and I was sweating and exhausted. I went through customs okay, entering as a tourist only. I decided not to try to get my Aufenthaltserlaubnis, or residence permit, at that point because the customs guy looked mean and I didn't realistically see him extending himself much beyond stamping my passport. So I figured I'd just go in as a tourist, and then play dumb when I got to Augsburg ("Oh really, I should have gotten my Aufenthaltserlaubnis at the airport? But I didn't know!"). My luggage presented itself right on schedule, and once I saw it I remembered how much of it there was and decided not to try to figure out how to use the S-Bahn (Munich's light rail train system) to get to the hotel, and instead found a taxi.
The airport in Munich is in the middle of nowhere, north of the city. I didn't really realize I was in Germany until the taxi driver got on the Autobahn and the spedometer hit 160kms. He was a nice enough guy after the initial misunderstanding about the name of the hotel and where it was, and complimented me on my German. I guess that's a good sign, but how well could he really discern considering he was from Turkey or Lebanon or somewhere and spoke with a heavy accent himself? But it was still nice to get around in German without too many hassles in the first hour on the ground.
The hotel stay was pretty uneventful, except when I tried to use the exercise room. It was more like an exercise corridor in the basement with apparatuses lined up along the wall that must have been popular in the early 1970's. Some of them had been repaired with duct tape (!). I got on this thing which must have been the precursor to the elliptical trainer (called a "walker") and did my best to get my heart rate up, but it was really just a non-starter. So I decided to put on my coat and walk around outside instead. The first thing that struck me was how COLD it was. I was neither prepared nor dressed for it in my lightweight exercise pants. Oh well, once I got going I warmed up. The area around the hotel was nothing so special -- a small suburb in north Munich. I realized at the time that it's unfair to arrive in March and gather a first impression of anywhere that has a serious winter. There was still a bit of dirty snow left on the ground, the trees were bare, and the lawns were brown. All the people also look like they'd give their eyeteeth to be on the Canary Islands right at the moment. So my first impression of Germany this time around was not generally favorable -- it's dirty, it's gray, and it's cold, and the people look like they've been beaten by life.
My German friend SR (also an Augsburg student, she studied at my law school last semester through the exchange program) met me at the hotel, and we schlepped my massively heavy luggage on the train to Augsburg from Munich. We came over on the ICE (Germany's high speed train) that was totally full and we had to stand near the smoking car. For those of us in California where it will likely soon be the law that you will be arrested and jailed if you light a cigarette anywhere outside your tiny bedroom closet, actually being in a train car that is full of people smoking is a very strange sensation. I happen to love the smell of secondhand smoke (but don't much like actually smoking myself), so I wasn't really BOTHERED -- "disoriented" is a better word. We were actually standing in the passage between a smoking car and a non-smoking car, and our location made it difficult to prevent the automatic door to the non-smoking car from opening and staying open. This old German lady was obviously very bothered by this, and yelled at us for standing there because the door didn't close. I'm sorry -- if you don't like smelling the smoke, then don't sit directly next to the door of the non-smoking car that is directly next to the door of the smoking car. Oh yes, I forgot, it's Germany. Those anal old ladies are everywhere over here, best handled by a roll of the eyes and a "ja, ja" in their direction.
We arrived in Augsburg and I dropped my stuff in my friend JS's apartment, where I will be staying for a week until I can move into my place (it is empty because he is doing an internship in Stuttgart at the moment). Hmmm. It's spare and small, in a rickety old building. He doesn't have a TV and there are no sheets on his bed. He also turned off his phone because he didn't want to pay the bill anymore. Great. At least it's free.
After SR and I walked around the Uni a bit (good first impression, more later), ate a pizza, and went shopping (bought a few groceries and sheets), I was alone in the apartment. By then I was really needing to talk to SP. There was a LAN cable, so I tried to plug it in to my computer -- no luck. The computer found a wireless LAN but it said it needed a network key. D'oh. So I took my Onesuite PIN # downstairs and tried to call him through the pay phone. Onesuite's toll free access # didn't work, and I hadn't bought a German phone card (and the phone didn't take coins). Double d'oh. I was pretty desperate and upset at that point. So I decided to dig through JS's desk drawers (sorry JS) and see if I could find, well, anything that would help me connect to the internet. Pay dirt -- I found instructions for connecting to the LAN, and managed to figure them out even though they were in German. Within 5 minutes I was online and IMing with SP. What a relief! I was very proud of myself because even though I was upset I didn't panic to the point of weeping incapacity, and I took care of business for myself.
That leads me to one of my goals for my time over here. I used to be fairly independent, but now when I'm home SP takes care of a lot of things for me, especially things that are really hard or that I don't want to do. It's not his fault -- he is a generous person who just wants to help, and I just let it happen. But it has made me soft, I think. I think it's okay to be mutually dependent, but it's also good when each person can take care of him/herself. While I'm hear my goal is to gain some of that back. I think it will help everything in the long run.
So I am doing better now. Of course, I am awake at 2am after sleeping less than 2 hours. My body clock is all thrown off. But adjusting takes time, and I have the time (no real pressing engagements at the moment).
I guess the easiest emotion to predict is, well, sadness. I was sad when we drove away from the house (after saying goodbye to the kitties) and sad at the airport when SP finally left me at the security gate. I cried a lot. I didn't want to but there was no controlling it. It was finally real and I was really going. Since then the sadness has come and gone, which I'm sure it will do more as the newness of arriving here wears off.
The trip itself wasn't too eventful. I slept most of the flight to London (thank you Tylenol PM) and just chilled out on the short hop to Munich. I was glad no one was there to meet me in Munich because I looked terrible -- all my makeup had been cried off, my hair was all over the place, and I was sweating and exhausted. I went through customs okay, entering as a tourist only. I decided not to try to get my Aufenthaltserlaubnis, or residence permit, at that point because the customs guy looked mean and I didn't realistically see him extending himself much beyond stamping my passport. So I figured I'd just go in as a tourist, and then play dumb when I got to Augsburg ("Oh really, I should have gotten my Aufenthaltserlaubnis at the airport? But I didn't know!"). My luggage presented itself right on schedule, and once I saw it I remembered how much of it there was and decided not to try to figure out how to use the S-Bahn (Munich's light rail train system) to get to the hotel, and instead found a taxi.
The airport in Munich is in the middle of nowhere, north of the city. I didn't really realize I was in Germany until the taxi driver got on the Autobahn and the spedometer hit 160kms. He was a nice enough guy after the initial misunderstanding about the name of the hotel and where it was, and complimented me on my German. I guess that's a good sign, but how well could he really discern considering he was from Turkey or Lebanon or somewhere and spoke with a heavy accent himself? But it was still nice to get around in German without too many hassles in the first hour on the ground.
The hotel stay was pretty uneventful, except when I tried to use the exercise room. It was more like an exercise corridor in the basement with apparatuses lined up along the wall that must have been popular in the early 1970's. Some of them had been repaired with duct tape (!). I got on this thing which must have been the precursor to the elliptical trainer (called a "walker") and did my best to get my heart rate up, but it was really just a non-starter. So I decided to put on my coat and walk around outside instead. The first thing that struck me was how COLD it was. I was neither prepared nor dressed for it in my lightweight exercise pants. Oh well, once I got going I warmed up. The area around the hotel was nothing so special -- a small suburb in north Munich. I realized at the time that it's unfair to arrive in March and gather a first impression of anywhere that has a serious winter. There was still a bit of dirty snow left on the ground, the trees were bare, and the lawns were brown. All the people also look like they'd give their eyeteeth to be on the Canary Islands right at the moment. So my first impression of Germany this time around was not generally favorable -- it's dirty, it's gray, and it's cold, and the people look like they've been beaten by life.
My German friend SR (also an Augsburg student, she studied at my law school last semester through the exchange program) met me at the hotel, and we schlepped my massively heavy luggage on the train to Augsburg from Munich. We came over on the ICE (Germany's high speed train) that was totally full and we had to stand near the smoking car. For those of us in California where it will likely soon be the law that you will be arrested and jailed if you light a cigarette anywhere outside your tiny bedroom closet, actually being in a train car that is full of people smoking is a very strange sensation. I happen to love the smell of secondhand smoke (but don't much like actually smoking myself), so I wasn't really BOTHERED -- "disoriented" is a better word. We were actually standing in the passage between a smoking car and a non-smoking car, and our location made it difficult to prevent the automatic door to the non-smoking car from opening and staying open. This old German lady was obviously very bothered by this, and yelled at us for standing there because the door didn't close. I'm sorry -- if you don't like smelling the smoke, then don't sit directly next to the door of the non-smoking car that is directly next to the door of the smoking car. Oh yes, I forgot, it's Germany. Those anal old ladies are everywhere over here, best handled by a roll of the eyes and a "ja, ja" in their direction.
We arrived in Augsburg and I dropped my stuff in my friend JS's apartment, where I will be staying for a week until I can move into my place (it is empty because he is doing an internship in Stuttgart at the moment). Hmmm. It's spare and small, in a rickety old building. He doesn't have a TV and there are no sheets on his bed. He also turned off his phone because he didn't want to pay the bill anymore. Great. At least it's free.
After SR and I walked around the Uni a bit (good first impression, more later), ate a pizza, and went shopping (bought a few groceries and sheets), I was alone in the apartment. By then I was really needing to talk to SP. There was a LAN cable, so I tried to plug it in to my computer -- no luck. The computer found a wireless LAN but it said it needed a network key. D'oh. So I took my Onesuite PIN # downstairs and tried to call him through the pay phone. Onesuite's toll free access # didn't work, and I hadn't bought a German phone card (and the phone didn't take coins). Double d'oh. I was pretty desperate and upset at that point. So I decided to dig through JS's desk drawers (sorry JS) and see if I could find, well, anything that would help me connect to the internet. Pay dirt -- I found instructions for connecting to the LAN, and managed to figure them out even though they were in German. Within 5 minutes I was online and IMing with SP. What a relief! I was very proud of myself because even though I was upset I didn't panic to the point of weeping incapacity, and I took care of business for myself.
That leads me to one of my goals for my time over here. I used to be fairly independent, but now when I'm home SP takes care of a lot of things for me, especially things that are really hard or that I don't want to do. It's not his fault -- he is a generous person who just wants to help, and I just let it happen. But it has made me soft, I think. I think it's okay to be mutually dependent, but it's also good when each person can take care of him/herself. While I'm hear my goal is to gain some of that back. I think it will help everything in the long run.
So I am doing better now. Of course, I am awake at 2am after sleeping less than 2 hours. My body clock is all thrown off. But adjusting takes time, and I have the time (no real pressing engagements at the moment).
posted by Jennifer at 15:59
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home