PS

PS: I made the tennis team! The woman in charge of the league aptly said: "You're not the new number one, but you fit in quite well." I'll take it.

Field Trip

Class today consisted of a field trip to the Museum fuer Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg and a short visit to the Hamburger Kunsthalle's plaza to see the black cube by Gregor Schneiders. Rather than bore you with a posting about abstract art or drawings from a Hamburger couple from the 1960s to the 1990s, I'll post some pictures of my classmates.

Leo and Yogi (real name Joachim) joking around at the Museum for Arts and Crafts. Dennis in the background.


Wandering to the cube.

In front of the cube, where everyone promptly sat down....facing the opposite direction!

Family Ties

My mom and I took a 1.5 hour train ride to Berlin to visit Nins Beans, who was in town for work, and other family members. To occupy ourselves on the trip eastward, we took some pictures of us gazing out the window:

Here 's me, pretty tired after a night on the town and the time change, but still smiling.

And here's mom in the identical pose. See the resemblance? :)

Once in Berlin, Mom, Nins, and I spent the afternoon with our cousin Marc and his lovely, small family. Five year old Frederick was pretty sick with a fever that required a cold, wet washcloth be applied to his forehead.But he soon felt better after a good story about farming read by his two second cousins. (Is that what we are?)
So good, in fact, that he took us to the park and showed us around the cool playground.

It was a beautiful day -- weather was great, spending a few hours with Nina was really nice (just too short!), and our cousin and his family were wonderful hosts. Get better soon, Freddie!

Misc. & Etc.

• I was at the Hauptbahnhof on Thursday when someone tapped me on the shoulder. Who could it be in this big city where I hardly know anyone? Turned out it was my cousin, Eno, and we enjoyed a nice lunch together. What a pleasant surprise.

• Friday night two people in my class -- Nina and Jessi -- and I went to the Hamburger Dom (kind of like a state fair -- lots of rides, bad but oh so good food, games, prizes, etc.). One of my favorite games was "Mouse Roulette," which is, well, pretty much what it sounds like. Roulette. With a mouse. There's a wooden "ring" about four feet in diameter with little houses around the perimeter. You place your Euro on the house you think the mouse will run into. The master of ceremonies releases the mouse in the middle of the ring and, voila. If the mouse runs into your house, you win! To warm us up at the Dom we had gluwein (mulled, or spiced, wine), which we followed up with a Berliner Weisse mit Schuss (beer with a shot of strawberry syrup). (I usually don't like beer too much, but with strawberry syrup -- what's not to like?).
  
  
• I'm excited to see Nina on Sunday. She's in Berlin for work and it'll be a fun day trip.
  
  
• And I'm excited to see Krystal on Wednesday. It'll be great to explore Hamburg and Prague together. (Yep, we're going to Prague for a long weekend. Doesn't this make you want to come visit? :)).
  
  
• Someone from Turkey came across my blog by doing a Google search with the key words -- now get this -- "picture of hot dog, hamburg." You have to admit, this pretty much hits the nail on the head:
  
  
  

Ready, Play, Score.

Today was a busy and quite successful day. I went to Berlin (roughly 1.5 hours by train) for an informational interview of sorts with a design firm I've been admiring since my early days at the NBM. The partner there was really generous with his time, discussing his background, the design field, design education, and generally sharing his knowledge and expertise with me. And it ended with a quick project -- I'll be writing the foreword for a little publication their producing. It's nothing major, but it's a nice side piece and a way to get connected with the firm. Score!

After arriving home and taking a quick nap, I played tennis with a women's leaugue I'd like to join. There were three other young women there who all played tremendously well. Berry, these are people you would play with! The coach was extremely nice and a good instructor, leading us in several drills and providing quick pointers. I guess it was a try out of sorts...I'd really like to play with them, so keep your fingers crossed that I'll be able to "score" a spot on the team.

Comment Box

Some people have said that my blog is “cryptic” because of my use of initials and “obscure” acronyms. To NN and JG I say – you are SOL. Just kidding. Since we are all friends here, I will use first names so that Nina and Jamie and the other 80 percent of my readership will know what’s going on and with who. If you don’t want your first name to be used, just let me know.

While we are on the topic of blog feedback, the other day Johanna said that I should try to “pep up” my blog. I will take this suggestion into consideration within the constraints of ethical journalism -- i.e. no fabricating, lying, gathering false witnesses, etc. Otherwise, for uninterrupted and continual pep, please click here (warning: this pep has got volume, so turn it down if you don’t want your colleagues to hear).

Nothing Compares to You

A guy in my class had a party this weekend, so I went. (Is this great writing or what?) It was mostly his friends from marching band and otherwise, but three of us from school showed up:

Frenchman Maxim and the youngest one in the class, Lara.

Now Maxim with the oldest one in the class.
And here's me with the host, Nils.

During the course of the evening, the question about my age arose and I sheepishly let the cat out of the bag. Meow! Otherwise, it was a good first party -- mostly just hanging out, talking, drinking (not me, I was driving), smoking (cigarettes. And no, people (aka Kim and Rudd), I do not smoke! :)), and listening to Jack Johnson.

Morning Math

Some basic math that helps me get through the day. Try this early in the morning:

Celsius/Farenheit
F = C*1.8 + 32
C = (F - 32) / 1.8
(Today the radio DJ announced it was 13 degrees Celsius. Since this has practically no meaning to me, I could either do the above equation -- which, in this case, results in roughly 55 degrees Farenheit -- OR I could step outside and take it from there. Because seriously, who wants to do math early in the morning?)

Kilometers/Miles
1 km =.62 miles
(That 5K race you run is 3.1 miles. So, if someone tells me that the place I need to go to is 7 km from the train station, well, this conversion helps me gauge the distance a bit better.)

Kilos/Pounds
1 kg = 2.2 lbs.
(So if I'm at the gym and am supposed to be using 15 lb weights, I grab the 7 kg dumbbells...or the 6 kg, depending on how ambitious I am. :) Boys, no laughing.)

J-Ho!

I'd like to give a public shout out to my friend in Georgia and faithful reader (or bored employee! :)), J-Ho. How's it going, J-Ho? Are you still tan and gorgeous? How are the free dawgs? Germany is waiting for your visit so you can rekindle childhood memories. Miss you!

Goethe, Inspiring. Reality, Sobering.

If Goethe is inspiring, reality can be just as sobering. A few things have happened lately -- including just this afternoon -- where I'm simply SOL. I've missed opportunities that would have altered, supported, or changed my next few years by literally days or in today's case about three weeks. In some instances I could have been better informed, better prepared. In others, it really was just bad luck. My mom, the eternal optimist that she is, encourages me by saying it all has a purpose, it's working out this way for a reason. I'm guilty of giving the same encouragement to others and now I try to believe her. Perhaps I have to. We have a tendency (a survival mechanism, I suggest) to counter negative events or circumstances with positive interpretations, claiming that eternal silver lining that surely must exist. But does it? Is there a positive to counter every negative? Is it really working out this way for a reason or could it be that things aren't working out as ideally as they could. Maybe I am just SOL. Maybe it's just cloudy, no silver lining. Inspiring? Not so much. Sobering? Most definitely.

Quote of the Day

"Whatever you can do or dream to do, begin it. Boldness occupies genius, power, and magical strength. Begin it now."
-Johann Wolfgang Goethe

Congratulations to MK for boldness. Congratulations to MS for beginning it -- and with such success. Congratulations to K-Bean for dreaming it and making it a reality. And congratulations and kudos to everyone else who is dreaming it, beginning it, doing it -- I want to hear about it!

Drawing 101

It was the official first day of classes today, with a solid four hours of drawing. We had to take a black and white photocopy (see below; I'm guessing it was a photo of the Jewish Memorial in Berlin copied multiple times to a somewhat abstract level, though I could be wrong).

And then interpret/translate it into a black and white drawing. Here was one of my results:


It's not bad, but it's certainly not good either. I've never been particularly good at freehand drawing. My drawings always have this elementary quality to them. Hopefully with these classes, I'll improve and graduate to at least secondary school. The idea is to practice "seeing" and then accurately translating that to paper -- considering proportions, capturing light and shadow, depicting forms and relationships, and so forth. Day 2 tomorrow!

"My" First House

Okay, so enough with the whining. It's cool to be here and visit places that are familiar, but unfamiliar at the same time. Like this house -- my first home. Okay, so not really "mine," but the first house I lived in after I was born. I remember it like it was yesterday. Just kidding. Anyway, this was the first house my parents bought. It's just outside Hamburg in a little town called Siek, about five minutes away from where my grandparents (mom's side) used to live. It's a duplex and we lived on the left. We moved to London a short while later, but it's cool to imagine my first year and a half of life in this house, together with the little Nins and mom and dad. Nins used to play with the neighbor down the street, Sveny (he now goes by the more adult "Sven") -- remember, Nins? :) I don't know what I did. Whatever infants do.

I drove by this house today with my mom, as we were in the neighborhood visiting a close family friend (Tante Reni). It was a nice morning in Reni's second-floor kitchen, listening to her stories, enjoying a late breakfast, and sharing in life. It's good to be here. It really is. (See, I just needed to get the negativity out of my system.)

Positivity, Motivation, Perspective, Blah, Blah, Blah

Yeah, so it's been a rough week, and I've had enough of this positivity, motivation, perspective, attitude crap that I've been forcing myself to swallow. Who am I kidding? It's not freakin' fun to buy shampoo and wonder "how much will it cost?, how fast can I pull out the euros?" It's freakin' annoying is what it is! It's like my brain is moving through molasses and it can't get to the other side fast enough. I can't do anything quick enough or smart enough. It takes me forever to spit out a sentence and by then it's all wrong and sounds like it's been composed by a third grader. I've been cranky, annoyed, irritable. Not fun. Poor mom.

I had orientation yesterday and I'm definitely the squarest person there (oh, and the oldest). One classmate asked me point blank how old I was...I coyly deflected the question. I don't need the entire class of students (there are about 20 of them, I'd say most are around 20 yrs. old and the typical alternative, art student type -- think punked out hair, piercings, hooded sweatshirts, ripped jeans -- do you think I'll fit in?) knowing that I'm freakin' 30! Geez.

Anyway, it'll get better. This is why I'm here. To learn things. To improve my German. To study graphic design. To spend time with family. Yep, I know these things. And I'll jump back on the positivity, motivation, perspective, and attitude bandwagon soon. Just please not today. I just need a day to be honest with how I feel, to accept that it's not all fun and games, and to acknowledge that there's a learning curve.

Mundane No More

Everything is new to me here. Even though I've visited here for 10 to 14 days at a time over the last 10 years at least, it's mostly been around holidays, when days were filled with family dinners, Christmas services, taking a break, and festive cheer. It's a lot different when it's a string of "ordinary" days, with errands to do, tasks to complete, and a life to build. And it's been hard. Everything is a bit more of a challenge. I need to get used to stores closing for lunch and planning errands accordingly; how the school systems work (classes start tomorrow, by the way); names of streets and how to get places; new products staring me in the face at the grocery store; familiarizing myself better with the currency (so I can grab a one euro coin more quickly rather than having to sift around the whole lot); how banking/money works (they don't use checks; credit cards are instead linked to a bank account, from which they pull the full amount due); etc., etc. And all in a language that I haven't regularly used since...um, ever. I've been finding that even the mundane tasks are challenging. I don't know exactly where to go or what to say or how to say it. I have to think about how I would tell the gym that I haven't received my membership card yet. It's not that I can't, but I just have to make that extra step of thinking about it beforehand. I have to think more about what I want to say and how. I have to listen more closely, read more slowly. It's actually been quite discouraging. I feel lost and like I'm not good at anything. I make tons of mistakes every day. Am I doing this right? Am I doing that wrong?

I have to change my perspective, though. It's all about perspective. I need to take this on as the adventure that it is. Everything is new! Everything is exciting! It's fun and exciting to do even mundane tasks, things I might have deplored to do in Washington. When I go buy shampoo, how much will it cost? What kind will be available? How fast can I pull out the currency? What kind of small talk can I make with the cashier? And that's just a minor thing in this new life. Bigger things and bigger tasks would beget even bigger rewards. So, I need to enjoy being "lost," enjoy the sense of discovery, enjoy learning and growing, find joy in the mundane, take the challenges head on. Perspective. It's all about perspective.

Oscar Worthy

On Sunday evening I saw the 2007 Oscar-winning movie, this year’s Best Foreign Language Film, “Das Leben der Anderen” or “The Lives of Others.” If you have a chance, go see it. Maybe it’s playing in DC at the Goethe Institut or at E Street Cinema. Otherwise, rent it on DVD.

It's a superbly-done film, with a script and visual and musical tone that hauntingly reveals the mistrust, corruption, and struggles of life in communist Germany. Set in the 1980s, the film follows an east German secret police agent -- a Stasi -- as he spies on a playwright and his actress girlfriend. Ulrich Muehe as Gerd Wiesler is genius in this lead role, beginning as a cold and sharp-edged spy and developing into a sympathetic character. Christa-Maria Sieland (played by Martina Gedeck) most vividly struggles with self preservation, self interest, career, love, loyalty, ethics, and the entanglements of each that don’t allow them to co-exist. The movie made me think about what it means to be a “good” person. Is it black and white or what are the shades of grey? And it made me think about opportunity – how much we have of it! It’s hard to imagine life in the GDR where people were blackmailed, blacklisted, or forced into an existence they couldn’t choose (and this was not too long ago – the wall only fell in 1989 – and there are people around the world still fighting for rights, freedom, and opportunity). It’s a thought-provoking film and definitely worth seeing. Hey, don’t take it from me, take it from Oscar!

All in the Family

It was my uncle's birthday today (my dad's brother) and I had a wonderful and full afternoon with family -- the younger kids, who belong to my cousins, were especially lively and fun. Today was a perfect demonstration of one of the main reasons I moved here.