Boldog Új Évet Kivánok, Ath Bhliain Faoi Mhaise, Bonne Année, Felice Anno Nuovo, Gutes Neues Jahr, and Happy New Year

It's 12:45am on January 1st as I write this, but for my friends back in the States, festivities are just getting underway and Dick Clark is likely being awakened from his cryogenic slumber right about now so he can host another New Year's Rockin' Eve. The curious German Silvester (New Year's) tradition of lighting semi-professional level fireworks can still be heard and seen through the windows, and we're just winding down our evening here.

The header/title is "Happy New Year" in all the languages of the places we visited in 2009: Hungarian, Irish (Celtic), French, Italian, and German (Austrian). It's been a wild ride here, our first full year on the ground in Europe. Based on what we already know, this new year looks to be both more settled and more hectic at the same time. We wish all of our readers (and all you lurkers too, ya creeps) a very good 2010!

The Rome Report

We returned from our Christmas holiday in Rome (St. Peter's Basilica pictured) last night, and we're still playing catch-up, restocking the pantry, reading the mail and doing the laundry. Despite some so-so weather (though we thankfully missed the blizzards spanking most of Europe and northern Italy), we had a blast, and Rome really is a great city with so much to see and do no matter where your interests lie, be it art, architecture, history, food or general people watching. While the Paris photos from October still need to be posted (getting close), there were more -- a LOT more-- Rome shots that need to be sorted, edited, cleaned up, etc. Suffice it to say it was a fine time, and we couldn't complain too much about Christmas day either-- 60 degrees and sunny! More impressions and photos coming soon, but for now, it's good to be back in dreary, grey Germany. OK, maybe not, but we're giving our wallets a rest-- for all its positives, Rome was pretty expensive!

Arrivederci e Buon Natale!

In our attempt to flee the bitter cold and snowy climes of our adopted hometown (it was 1 degree last night-- I'm talking Fahrenheit folks, not Celsius), and gift ourselves with a little something to celebrate our first full year in Europe, we're off to celebrate Christmas with a week in Rome, Italy. We figure half the population of northern Italy is currently here in Nuremberg at the famous Christkindlesmarkt, so it's time to return the favor. Wandering, museums, great food, and soaking in the history and atmosphere of the Eternal City are on tap, and after the, um, dynamic year we've had, a little RnR is most definitely in order. Merry Christmas-- or as they say in Italy-- Buon Natale everybody!

I'm Sure This Means Something Different In German... Well Maybe Not in This Case

Not a photoshop trick people, this place really is named Assmann (Seinfeld fans unite!). Far as I can tell, this is a temp agency-- "Zeitarbeit" is a combination of two words (Germans love to do this, and the grammatical rules are a complete mystery to me-- just ram two or more words together and you get a new one, like coffeetablebook or something) meaning "Time" and "Work," and I believe Assmann is an actual German surname, not a nickname or predilection. Of course, I would be most remiss in my juvenile attempts at humor if I didn't mention a wonderful resort town right on the Rhine River: Assmannshausen, or to use corrupted (and therefore incorrect) German, house of the Assmann.

Cultural Collision Course

With the downtown Altstadt packed with holiday shoppers, it seems like some basic underpinnings of German culture really come to the fore. One of my pet peeves and something I never could understand about the locals has to do with their interpretation of "personal space" and the never-ending subtle game of chicken you always play when you're in a crowd. Germans really think nothing about walking 3 or 4 abreast on a sidewalk or crowded area, seemingly daring anybody to break up the line. Then there's this weird "intercept" thing, where I swear somebody figures out where you're going to be in 3 steps and deliberately alters their course to be in that spot at the same time. Lines? Forget about it-- we saw one guy last night who muscled past a good 10 people to stand in front of a popular tourist attraction (Nuremberg's famous Schöner Brunnen fountain) and get his picture taken-- and nobody batted an eye. From an outsider's perspective, it's exactly this sort of behavior that gives Germans their reputation for being rude-- they don't see it that way of course, but then again, they don't get torqued when some middle-aged lady jumps the deli line when you're up next... like me.

I'm Sure This Means Something Different In German (An Occasional Series)

The joke sort of writes itself, doesn't it?

A "Metzgerei" is a sort of butcher shop/deli combo, but this particular store is a play-on words, as it specializes in animal food. So... instead of a doggie bag, I guess you ask for a barf bag? Cheap joke, but appropriate-- that dog looks crazed.

Paris photos... soon! Maybe! Eventually!!

It's The Hoff's World; We Just Live in It

Spied on the back window of a van on my way to the post office. As we were heading over to Germany, we were advised that actor/singer/talent judge and hamburger enthusiast David Hasselhoff was (is?) a minor music star here, but this is the first sign of fan-dom I've seen. Obviously, it's an oldie from his Knight Rider days, and looks to be some sort of freebie sticker from a Hot Wheels car-- translated, it means "The Hottest of Wheels." The MTV European Music Awards show (which took place in Berlin) was broadcast last month, and "the Hoff" was there, looking sweaty, bloated, with a little too much plastic surgery work done... and obviously quite drunk. There are several videos around of this goofus at the show-- the backstage stuff shows him to be even more blotto-- but his 90 second presentation (he walked out to his song "Looking for Freedom," which charted in Germany around the same time the Berlin Wall came down, which he referenced, sort of) is plenty enough for me. That awards show was a trainwreck from start to finish by the way.

Landlocked Booze Cruise

Taken this weekend. Behold, an original, old skool Nuremberg trolley that predates the current modern trams that circumnavigate this fine city. The city and public transit department haul these old trolleys out from time-to-time, including flat-bedding them downtown to make for teeny tiny stores/info booths. This time however, the public transit department was offering folks the opportunity to buy a ticket and ride the rails in style, complete with German Christmas markets' signature drink, the truly icky Glühwein (take the cheapest nastiest red wine you can find, dump sugar, cloves and other low-rent liquor into it, heat it up to simmer and presto, a sickly sweet hangover-inducer. Suffice it to say, the stuff sells like gangbusters here), and Christmas sweets, like the Nuremberg specialty known as Lebkuchen cookies.

Apparently, one can rent out a trolley for an afternoon as well-- we saw a wedding party in one earlier this summer and they did not follow the "standard" tram routes. This Christmas tour looks neato enough, but those wooden seats and no heat (other than the booze) and these cool temps would make me think twice. I do love me some lebkuchen though...