Faith and Begorrah! An Irish Tale

Just got back from Ireland last night, and the pics will be edited and uploaded in due time. It was a fun 4 days and even though it can be pricey, we'd recommend Dublin to everybody (it's a compact enough city where you can comfortably see all the sights in 3 days without exerting yourself), and we got to spend some all-too-brief time with our friends from Portland.

But... the holiday ended with a deafening thud. The Dublin airport showed itself to be an overcrowded and chaotic facility that clearly hasn't kept pace with the explosive growth and popularity of the city. The connecting Frankfurt airport was its usual rabbit warren of bureaucracy, long lines and even longer distances between gates (we easily had to do a half-mile jog to get onto our homeward flight in time). And we received some disheartening news whilst in Frankfurt to top things off: The apartment flooded. Again. For the second time in 6 weeks. But this time there was nobody there to bail the water.

We came home looking much like Batman's Chief O'Hara in the picture. Standing water everywhere, our nice oriental wool carpets destroyed, living & dining room furniture ruined or severely damaged, and some of our electronics took the hit too. We spent the better part of the early AM trying to clean up, and I'm taking a break from wet-vacuuming right now. B has been working the phones with her company's HR/relocation team, the insurance company, our building super and the actual property owners (all of whom are engaging in a game of finger pointing and responsibility-dodging). Due to the vagaries of the German laws and the contracts and agreements we did (and did not) sign, it is entirely conceivable that the costs of reparing all of this damage-- ALL OF IT will come out of our pocket, but it's too early to tell, and this process will no doubt drag on for a long, long time.

Um, could we go back to Ireland? It was nice there.

Stay tuned...

Ireland Bound

Another month, another foreign country it seems. We're off for a whirlwind (why did we make this trip so darn short?) jaunt to Dublin, Ireland to soak in the scene, recharge our batteries, and most importantly meet up with our good friend KS from Portland. Should be a blast. Watch this space for news and pictures upon our return!

Let Me Get this Straight: You Want What You Ordered?!?

We were warned about this, even by our German friends who spent some time abroad-- German customer service can be an elusive beast. Overall, we've been treated with what I'll call "benign indifference" for the most part-- we're not exactly high maintenance folks, and it's not like we ask anybody to go above and beyond their job description. Plus, we knew what to expect before moving over here-- so the bar is set rather low. But today was one of those bizarro culture clashes that really falls outside the lines.

I've written about the regional bakery chain Der Beck before-- they are as commonplace in Nuremberg as, say Dunkin Donuts (for this blog's USA east coast readers) or Starbucks (west coast), and they make a decent, if unspectacular group of products, as well as some of the better coffee in town. We were there to buy bottled jam of all things (Der Beck is very big on local sourcing and no preservatives), and that's when the fun began. I asked for strawberry jam in German, the person at the counter repeated my request back to me, handed me a jar from behind the counter, took my money, and gave me change. It was then that I noticed that I was given "Strawberry-Lime" jam. When B protested, the lady got a tad snotty, and indicated that they are sold out of strawberry, and all they have is Strawberry-Lime. OK then... we'll come back some other time, no big deal, give us our €1.95 back. She then told us that there are NO REFUNDS at Der Beck, so tough luck, try another flavor. Um, the item I ordered and you confirmed back to me was out, you knowingly slipped us the wrong flavor, refuse to refund my money and this is somehow MY fault? Ay Curamba! We were saved from any further blowups when the counter lady searched one more time and found one remaining bottle of strawberry-- you know, the flavor I ordered. Sheesh. This is almost precisely the behavior I was warned about.

This isn't to say that all CS stinks here-- far from it; a lot of it is quite good. I've come to find out that it's all about building relationships with the shopkeepers. So when we left Der Beck to go to the fruit and vegetable stand where I'm a regular (they put up with my lousy German and practice their English on me) to get fresh cherries, the dude behind the deli counter waves me over and cuts me a slice of salami and fresh camembert to snack on. Schmeckt Gut (tastes good)! Regarding the cherries, I'm having some right now and they sadly don't even come close to the fabulousity that is the Rainier Cherry.

Random Shots: Fun With The City Crest

Recently spotted the logo on the left at a (closed) music club. I like it for any number of aesthetic reasons-- very distinct, the colors pop, etc.-- but I also like it because it is clearly meant to mimic the ancient Nuremberg Coat Of Arms on the right. Not sure how many people picked up on that, but there it is.

Blue Night: High Art Meets Public Drunkeness

This is a bit old and out of sequence, but I managed to salvage a couple shots off of my camera phone from "Die Blaue Nacht," The Blue Night in English. Every May all of downtown Nuremberg has the public streetlight bulbs replaced or covered with illumination that bathes the city an eerie blue glow. Beyond the public displays of art everywhere, all city museums, churches, art galleries, pubs and some stores are open until the wee hours (in some cases 4:00 or 5:00am), and everyone basically lets their hair down. You see, it's been my observation that Germans really don't go completely bonkers unless it's been cleared and OK'd by some official (city, state, countrywide) decree. Talk about your pent-up emotions! The crowds at Blue Night made the annual downtown Christmas celebration (which draws upwards of 2 million visitors over the course of a month) look like a kiddie parade-- I've NEVER seen the city this packed, and it comes about as close to population density as Times square at New Year's Eve-- the city itself predicted a crowd size of 125,000-- more than 25% of the entire city population-- in attendance. Plus, everybody was roaring drunk. Funny at times sure, but occasionally uncomfortable too. Anyways, B was in China on her business trip so I walked around with our German friend, and we had ourselves a look. Overall, it was certainly impressive but I've never been a fan of mobs and I'm glad we found ourselves a couple of quiet rest stops along the way. Would I do it again? Ask me next May.

Free Bavaria!

It's election time here in Germany and I honestly haven't been keeping up on it-- far a start, I believe the actual voting begins in September, and being an American expat I cannot vote anyways. Like many European countries, Germany enjoys a healthy number of "third parties," usually single-issue campaigns whose candidates ultimately hope to influence the large parties into taking their position.

So here we have the poster of the Bayernpartei (Bavaria Party), a gang of loose nuts who want to secede from Germany. I can sort of see their tortured logic-- as a geographic area, Bavaria has uniquely distinct culture and traditions, its own dialect and the healthiest economy in all of Germany, yet tends to be treated by the high-falutin' northern German intelligentsia (Berliners and folks from Cologne) as a bunch of country bumpkins. Still, this is an idea and political party that is dead on arrival, though it's interesting to see the general reaction the party is receiving-- Northern Germans' attitude tends to be a "yeah whatever-- don't forget to take your horrible accent with you, ya hicks," while the locals view this with a sense of bemusement. The party does tap into Bavarian's inferiority complex, and maybe that's the idea. But just as Quebec finally got enough momentum to try and split from Canada some 15 years ago in a national referendum (defeated by the rest of that country by a fairly narrow vote as I recall) after decades of behind-the-scenes work and stirring up the population, this party and its ideas will likely be around for a while.

Ask And Ye Shall Receive

In response to a comment and question from reader "W" (I think I know who this person is...) regarding the previous post leads us to this entry, more info and pics from the Bergkirchweih beer festival in Erlangen, Germany. See folks-- we do read your comments!! Anyhoozle, to answer the question at hand, we were drinking something called "festbier," which is strictly for events like this, and not bottled. This is a stronger take (e.g. more alcohol) on the traditional Helles or Landbier varieties. all I know is, is was very smooth, with a hint of citrus on the palate, and a touch of floral nose. Oh yes, and it was cold, and got the job done. For the record, we each had exactly 3 mugs of beer during the 7 or so hours we were there-- and believe me, that was enough.

Apologies in advance for the lousy photos-- these were all taken on my cell phone and about half of the shots had the "night" setting on, which made the photos appear foggy. Also, we really didn't move a whole lot-- we were lucky enough to get seats, it was unbelieveably crowded, we liked our table companions, and we weren't about to wander. Oddly enough, Nuremberg is about to launch its own beer festival this coming week (starting on Wednesday), and that is walking distance from our place. I'm not a huge beer guy mind you, but when in Rome...

You can view the photos from the Bergkirchweih HERE, or click on the link on the right hand margin. Prost!

Put On Your Drinking Pants: Checking Out The Beer Festival

A couple towns over from Nuremberg is the university town of Erlangen, home to the Bergkirchweih (aka the Berg)-- an annual, 12-day long outdoor beer festival that dates to 1755. This fest is well-known to Germans, but not so much to foreigners, making it distinctly more "German"-- and Bavarian-- than Munich's internationally renowned Oktoberfest.

The photos I did manage to take don't quite spell out the enormity of the event-- the dedicated Berg grounds are over a half-mile in size, multi-tiered on a hillside and include amusemment park rides. Multiple breweries set up shop in their dedicated "kellers," basically concrete bunkers, and all they do is pump out a special festival beer-- a high-alcohol brew served exclusively in one liter (over 1 quart) mugs. Even though our group of 4 (an English couple invited us) got there fairly early in the day, we were still lucky to find seats, and we set to the task at hand-- drinking some fine beer at a leisurely pace on a nice sunny day.

This was our first-ever beer fest, anywhere, and I was seriously impressed-- for a start, the Bavarians have a beer-fest uniform, and I'd guess that maybe 20% of the crowd were wearing theirs-- checkered shirts and suede leather knickers (lederhosen), socks and special shoes for the guys (after a time, we started calling them "drinking pants"), and a tradtitional, usually colorful dress for the ladies. Our English friends were blown away at the mellow vibe-- they told us that if you got this many British or Irish folks in one place and added beer, there would be brawls everywhere. With live bands playing every couple hundred feet (usually stationed above the concrete bier kellers, playing everything from American hard rock to German drinking songs), the place was jumping, and the sense of camaraderie was palpable-- everybody was high-fiving, toasting (saying "Prost!" while clinking glasses and maintaining eye-contact with your fellow toaster), linking up arms and singing and swaying to the music. Pretty cool stuff. The experience really felt like walking into a bear hug from some sweaty, besotted stranger, and it was oddly comforting-- imagine being at a party with 15,000 of your closest friends you don't know. As day progressed into night, the crowds only got bigger, and there were easily 20,000 people looking to sit down in the roughly 11,000 seats (Berg festival attendance averages 1 million visitors over the 12 days, and it seemed like all of them came on that night). We slipped out of there at 9:30 and took the train home, pleasantly buzzed and feeling a little more at home here in Germany.