The Finer Points of the German Transportation System

There are a number of things that I find very entertaining/interesting about the German transportation system.

1.) The Bus Driver Nod.
The Bus Driver Nod (BDN) is something that I witnessed early on in my exchange, and have continued to see on an almost daily basis, if I'm lucky. One of my first days here I was on the bus going to the train station when our bus was put into the prime situation for the BDN to occur, although I didn't know it at the time. This happens when our bus is waiting to turn left at an intersection and another bus, coming at a ninety degree angle from our left side, turns towards the right, therefore giving the two drivers a second of relative closeness. THIS is when the BDN goes down: the drivers make eye contact, smile slightly, and nod, as if to say, "Yes, I see you, brother, fellow member of the Bus Driving Fraternity." I LOVE THIS. In fact, every morning, I do my best to get a forward-facing seat on the left side of the bus just to be able to witness this event.

2.) The Coveted S-Bahn Seat
There is undoubtedly the one seat on the S-Bahn that anyone picks if they have the option. I like to call it the "coveted seat." To explain, I have made a diagram.

As you can see, the train consists of two sets of four-seat pods, which repeats up and down the car. The coveted seat, hands down, will always be seat #1: forward facing and next to the window (a good place if you are tired and want to sleep). If I were still in Honors Bio and had to analyze this situation, I'd say that since it replicates the drivers seat in a car, people are naturally inclined to take it. The second best seat is therefore #8, which I call "shotty," obviously, and then comes either 2 or 7. Seats 3,4,5 and 6 are always the last to be taken. This is a fact. The only other situation that would happen is that seat #1 is occupied, and someone takes #3 because they don't want to sit next you/ across from you and then have to make eye contact. You can walk into a train on a fairly slow time, and even if there are only 5 people in the whole car, they will be in the coveted seats. I might consider publishing a study on this subject.

3. Dogs
The constant presence of dogs has definitely been a main difference that I've noticed between the US and Germany. By that, I mean that dogs in Germany probably have more rights than women did before the gained the right to vote in the 20th century.
Dogs are welcome literally everywhere. I have dined next to dogs, I have shopped next to dogs, and, in the spirit of this post, I have ridden the S-Bahn next to many dogs. Nobody blinks an eye when a person walks Fido onto the train.

4. Swangin' Bottles
It is an everyday event to see a person drinking either from a bottle or a liquor bottle in the train system. Odds of seeing this obviously go up the closer you get to the Reeperbahn on a Saturday night, but that's not to say that I haven't seen somebody sipping a Becks at two p.m. on a weekday. I actually saw the most fascinating thing two days ago: I was on the train (indeed, I was in the Coveted Seat), and as we pulled up to a station, I saw a man on the platform with a designated beer pocket in his coat. I witnessed, no lie, him drink from his bottle, open his coat, tuck his bottle into an inside pocket, close his coat, and continue his conversation with another person without breaking eye contact. To say that I was extremely impressed with this is an understatement.

Ridin' Sola

SOO when I first arrived in Germany, I saw that Jason Derulo was going to come to Hamburg on Sept. 15th. I held off on buying a ticket, because realistically, how popular could he be in Germany? Not very, right? WRONG. When I went to buy a ticket two weeks ago I found out his concert was sold out. WELL. So the ticket guy, Jan (that's not his full name, but he simplified it for me since the German version is, well, German, and therefore above my brain ability), very nicely offered to put me on a waiting list in case any ticket became available. So I didn't hear anything, and then it was September 15th, so I was like, all right, no concert for Sierra. Aha, wrong again. So it's 12 o'clock on the 15th, I'm trying to learn German in class, and lo and behold, Jan calls me, saying that he had two tickets available! (Lance, the other American, had said he'd go with me). Buttt he was sick, so I was left with the dilemma of whether or not to go by myself. Going to a movie by oneself is lonely enough, and I haven't even done that, but a concert is on a whole other level, eh? I started walking down to the ticket office, and I was planning on walking in and turning down the tickets, but as I approached I thought to myself, you know what? Screw this, I'm going to be spontaneous! So I went and bought myself the ticket.

Well, the concert was at this place called the Docks, which I knew to be located on the Reeperbahn. All I knew, though, was that I had to get off at that stop on the S-Bahn, and then I was lost from there. So I got on the train, and there were a bunch of girls next to me, all dressed up and such. Now, it was only 6 o'clock in the evening, and it is true that Germans drink at all times during the day and go out all days of the week, but I hedged a bet that they were going to the concert too, and not clubbing on a Wednesday night. Sure enough, two of them whipped out their tickets and I was like, muahahehe. So I tapped the girl next to me on the shoulder and I said, "Sprechen Sie Englisch?" She did, and I explained that I really didn't know where I was going, and it ended up that they didn't either, but she very kindly invited me to wander along with them until we stumbled upon the concert.

When we got out of the subway and were trying to figure out which direction to go in, I saw a group of girls similarly dressed and had the brilliant idea of following them to the concert, because they surely must know where to go. As it happens, they had the same brilliant idea as I had. In the end, though, we got there, that is the most important part.

Now, the cool place about this venue was that it was only for 1,500 people, so even if you were in the back, you would still be relatively close to Jason. This was not like when I went to the State Fair to see the Jonas Brothers and could have used a spy satellite to focus in on the stage, I was so far back, no. So we waited through the opening acts (BTW one girl came on, she's Danish and her name is Nabiha, REALLY GOOD, so if anybody wants to check her out I recommend it...) and two other girls heard me speaking English and asked me where I was from. I'll cut to the chase and tell you that in the end, we figured out that I'm going to their old high school, and I actually live literally one minute away from them. This was super cool because I was an hour away from my house, in a city of almost 2 million people, and I met my neighbors. ANYWAYS they were vairr vair nice and even gave me a ride home at the end of the concert. Howeverrr the point I'm slowly getting to is that Mr. Derulo was awesomeee in concert, his shoes were BALLIN' (I want a pair soooo bad), he could dance like Usher, and his abs were CUT. Let me share with you the highlight of surely mine, if not every girl's, night:


I realize that his head is not visible, but in reality that's actually not important, and that was not what I was aiming for when I took the pic.

So, all in all, I was very happy I decided to Ride Solo (hahaha get it?!) to the concert, as I met some very nice Germans, and I even got a Ridin' Solo bracelet to top it all off. Beauuuutious.
The other thing I want to share happened last weekend, when I was out with my friends from Colón. We went to the workplace of this other kid that goes to Colón, a bar/lounge/dancefloor place called the Indochine, where he bartends. It's right on the harbor, which is beautifully lit up at night, and a classy place. I knew that not knowing German at some point would pay off, and this is when it happened.
Adam had put us on the list so we could get in for free (VIP much?) and as we were going in the bouncer dude started talking at me in German, which, as I have mentioned previously, I don't understand. I looked at him with what I can only imagine was a blank face, and said my #1 catchphrase: "Ich spreche kein Deutsch." [I don't speak German]. He said something again (because I would understand it the second time? I mean, really?) and again I just looked at him, so he gave up and waved me through. Viola! My friend Stéfanie informed me that he was asking if I was over 21, because for some reason it was a 21 and older night. This is strange, because in Germany, at 18 you are a full adult, and that includes any and all drinking privileges, UNLIKE a certain country I'm familiar with... nevertheless, I was happy that I didn't have to lie, because I would of.
ANYWAYS we got in and it was salsa night, so on our way to the bar area it was necessary to make like a dodgeball player and dodge all the couples swinging around. The people were maddd good at salsa-ing, and as it happened one of our friends is Columbian, so he tried to teach us some of his moves... ahem. Needless to say, we collectively decided we want to take salsa lessons. I'm telling you, these people were LEGIT. The club even brought in two professionals from Cuba who absolutely broke it down.

Okay this is not the important part, however. Adam took us aside, and was like, "I'm going to bring you guys to the ice bar." So I'm standing there thinking, sweet, we're getting ice cream! Explanation: in German, ice cream is "Eis," pronounced "ice," so naturally, being in Germany, I thought in German and thought he was bringing us to an ice cream bar. WRONG AGAIN. Honestly, I try and I try to learn German, and when I think I've finally understood something, they're talking in ENGLISH. Will I ever win here? No, that's the answer you're looking for.

So we go into this room where there are tons of jackets, coats, mittens, hats, etc lying about, and then I started to put two and two together and realized we were really going into a bar made of ICE. Indeed, we suited up and walked in, where everyyything was totally iced out. The seats, the walls, the bar, even the shotglasses were made of ice! Of course I didn't bring my camera because I didn't think I'd be taking pictures of an ice cream cone, and I can't even rob any pictures from my friends' Facebooks because they're not up yet :( Basicallyyyy it was mad cool and I thought to myself, this is the cool thing about being an exchange student; doing stuff like this!

Lastly, the Fischmarkt. What is the Fischmarkt, you ask? Ah, well. It is and isn't what it sounds like: a fish market starting at 5 o'clock Sunday mornings. Why would I wake up to go to a fish market at 5 a.m. on a Sunday morning, you are dying to know? It's because, actually, I never went to sleep Saturday night! So, the other part of the Fischmarkt: the so-called "last party" after at night out on the Reeperbahn. Here, in the wee hours of the morning, is probably the only place in the world that you can find girls dressed in stilettos and miniskirts at a fish market at 5 a.m., ever. I am willing to bet money on that. It is also one of only places in the world where you will find a rather large group of people drinking beer at seven in the morning. All week my friends and I planned on going, because the Fischmarkt is THE place to be in Hamburg if you're not on the Reeperbahn. Seriously. Today, at school, my teacher asked me,
"Have you been to the Reeperbahn?"
-Yes, oh yes I have.
"Okay, have you been to the second destination in Hamburg, the Fischmarkt?"
-Aha, oh, haven't I.
"Ach so. Have you been to the third destination, the ____?"
-Could you spell that please?
I wasn't able to read his writing. I'll let you guys know when I hit up the #3 spot.
ANYWAYS I took a power nap Saturday evening in preparation, which was a good thing, because I strolled in the door at 7.15 Sunday morning. I had just dined on a nice breakfast of currywurst and hot chocolate (I'm not German enough for a beer at 5.30; needless to say, one of my friends was, although I shall not name names :)), and fell asleep on the subway home, therefore almost missing my stop, had it not been for my friend (and also American Rotary Exchange Student) Amy's timely wake up.

Schokolade & the Zombie Crutch Fire Dance

First off, I finally got pictures of the floating man!! During some solo sailing I made Sam sail us over to the far side of the lake where the guy chills. After performing a stunning stopping maneuver, we had a lil' photoshoot. All photo credit goes to Samuel Martinez, sailing buddy extraordinaire...


So now we see how I got a little confused, yes?



The bird scheisse wasn't so apparent from a distance...



It is possible that I stole this from Samuel's Fb... danke Sam :) This was from when we were sailing a few weeks ago.

So it has been about two weeks since my last post and there are two main things that I want to report about: chocolate covered fruit and the meadow!

a.) Chocolate fruit: Now, the question might come up of why chocolate fruit merits coverage in the blog. It's because it's DEEEEELIIIIIIIIICIIIOOOOOOUSSSSSSS. So, the first time I tasted this German miracle was when I was at what I like to call the German version of the New York State Fair, and by that I mean junk food stands, rides, and creepy carnies. [Note; Carnies are equally strange all over the world, that's a fact]. It's called the Dom, and I went the other week with my host bro Samir and Sumit, the Indian roomer. We were walking around looking at the food and at first I was eyeing a candy apple, but thanks to baby Jesus, I made a life changing decision and chose the chocolate covered mixed-fruit stick. If nothing more ever comes out of this exchange to Germany, I will not complain. That's how good it was. We're talking kiwi, grapes, strawberries, pineapple, banana, and apple covered in world class German chocolate.

(picture from Google Images) THIS IS WHERE IT'S AT. These are strictly strawberry and banana sticks, but they'll do.

The next week, which was last week, I was on my way to school one morning and I noticed lots of little tents being set up, which turned into a fair along the lake. Lo and behold... MORE CHOCOLATE FRUIT! Not only was this a fair, but it was a three day fair, and yes, that means three days of chocolate covered fruit! This is what one of the fruit stands looks like:



They also sell cookie hearts, which can be seen hanging up, that say "Ich Liebe Dich," or "I love you." ...cute. Two Germans demonstrated the proper use of these to me, which is as a necklace. Actually I don't know if that's true, but I saw two people wearing them so one can only assume.
Anyways, the rest of the festival was nice, and I went with some Colón Language School friends at night, and there were fireworks and the whole shebang.
The great thing about Colón is that everybody is from all over the world, and also everybody is slightly crazy since we're all attempting to learn German. WHAT A FRUSTRATING LANGUAGE holy momma. But the point is, I've met some great people, and I've had a good time going out with my current friends (I only say current because people tend to leave after a month). I've met only one other American here, HEY LANCE! if you're reading this, and also Rebecca from England/Spain, and Stéf and Fabien from Switzerland. In my first group of friends I had a bunch of people from Spain, and also Edward/Eddy/Eduardo, from Australia, who imparted on me one of the best sayings I've heard yet: "A German joke is no laughing matter." HAHAHAHA. I can't explain how much I love that. So far that is soo true haha. Today I was at lunch with some Colón people and our German teacher and he tried a joke out on us... well, it was actually morbid. Crickets were chirping until I pulled out Edward's line and everybody was like "Yeahhh true hahaha." Ed was really full of great lines: "London's nice, but it has too many English."
Anyways, us current people went out to the Altona Fest last weekend to see the "fire show." We ended up seeing a rather disturbing interpretive dance show, which involved a little bit of fire at the end. I was expecting a fire dance such as the ones at the Blue Parrot in Mexico, for example, but instead we got this:



What is it? I wish I knew. At first I thought they were supposed to be zombies, but then they started to dance with crutches. Soooo. HOWEVER we diddd find CHURROS!!! I mean, they weren't exactly Spanish quality, but who can complain when you find churros in Germany? Not I.

Fabien eating some churros.
The "Altona Fest," though, did not qualify in my book as a true, legitimate German festival, as I found no trace of chocolate fruit.

b.) The Meadow: Two Sundays ago I was bored so I decided to go out for a run. My host mom had told me that there was "nature" about five minutes from my house, so I was like hey, I'ma go find me some nature! SECOND BEST CHOICE AFTER AVOIDING THE CANDY APPLE. What I found after a bit of running in the wrong direction was a B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L. nature preserve that is now one of my favorite places in Germany. After the chocolate fruit festivals, that is. I was running through a path in the woods when all of the sudden it opened up into this huge rolling meadow full of some sort of purple-flower plant. I'll stop trying to explain, picture time:




So I kept running around like hey, this is sweet, and I finally got to this one part that opened up into a mini valley (top picture) and I found a tree stump and sat there for a good hour just relaxing in the sun and listening to some Dave Matthews. Needless to say, that was one of the best hours that I've spent here, and I've gone back a few times when the weather has been good.

Lastly, I can't leave out these pictures, which gave me a good laugh and at the same time may possibly explain why some Europeans look down on Americans:


Is that an American riding (or, attempting to) a mechanical bull? Why, yes it is! Way to rep, bud!

Sailing Amidst Sausages

So the other day I woke up, and was quickly confused. I looked out the window, and knew I must be mistaken, because I thought that what I was seeing was the...what's it called again...ah yes, the sun. The large yellow thing in sky, yes? Well, I couldn't be completely sure, because I hadn't seen the aforementioned object in a week. For those of you that don't know: it rains every day in Hamburg. EVERY DAY. Jeden tag, if you want it in German. At that point, I knew it was going to have to be a good day, because surely God himself was smiling down on Hamburg.
I was on the train on the way to school when we crossed over a river. I happened to be looking out the window and upon doing a double take I realized that I had indeed seen a man standing, with his hands on his hips, on the top of a buoy in the middle of the river. He was dressed in black pants and a white button down shirt. Of course, it was 8 in the morning, and sunny, so my brain was already hazy, but I knew it probably wouldn't have made much sense to me even if it was mid afternoon and cloudy. Was this a form of German pre-workday meditation, perhaps? Was this his preferred way to get to work? Floating downstream to the office building? Whatever it was, it was too much heavy thinking for the crack of dawn and I promptly returned to snoozing.
Later that day, I went back to the city to my sailing lesson. On the way from the Hauptbahnhof (the main station) I have to pass the Atlantic Hotel, which, judging by its proximity to the lake and external appearance, is quite classy- too classy for a poor exchange student, like myself. Anyways, I was walking up to it when I saw two stretch limos waiting outside, with a photographer. I started calculating my chances of getting into a German tabloid (I'd call that an accomplishment, if done within the first week in the country) if I were to cross the street, lay low until famous person A and B emerged from the hotel, and quickly hop into the background of the pictures. However, thanks to a helpful year in AP Calc, I figured I wouldn't have enough time to complete Operation Tabloid within the five minutes I had to get to the sailing club. Next time. So I continued on my way and proceeded to my lesson.
It was about 7:30 in the evening, close to the point where the lake merged into a second lake, when it happened: THE FLOATING MAN ARRIVED! Yes, there he was! I was in the middle of pulling the front sail taut when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the floating man from 12 hours earlier. I understandably grew extremely excited, promptly dropped the rope, and turned to wave. But something was wrong...there was a pigeon sitting on him. Surely he wasn't that deep in his meditation... even a Buddhist monk would realize that a bird was relieving itself on him in the middle of his meditation, no? And then came a rather depressing moment when, upon closer inspection, I realized that the man was actually...wooden. Booorrringgg. A real let down. I mean, a real man floating on a buoy is much more entertaining than a wooden man floating on a buoy, at least in my book. I'll try to get a pic during my next lesson to show you all.
I digress. Now, I get to the main point of this post, for which it is named. After this disappointing encounter with the wooden man, we continued sailing. Now, to explain the lake on which I sail. In the middle of Hamburg there are two lakes that I know about; there may definitely be more, but with my limited knowledge of public transportation I tend to stick to the same areas in a valiant effort not to get lost. Nevertheless, the lake I sail on is connected by a little waterway, crossed by a bridge, to another lake, where I eat lunch. Both lakes are small, but my lake is extremely crowded, as there are at least three sailing clubs and numerous rowing clubs. Whilst sailing, it is common to hear the boom-boom-boom of the drummer counting time for rowing teams. Also, there are at least 30 sailing boats out at all times. My professor, Moma, informed me that motorboats are illegal on the lake, and it is used only for sailing practice and regattas and rowers. My sailing prof, Moma.
So Moma, Samuel (my fellow Mexican sailing student) and I are sailing on our merry way when the smell of German sausages starts to permeate the lake. Like I said, it's not that big, and with sailing AND rowing clubs on all sides, we were quickly overtaken by the smell of grilling. By this time it's 8:15, we haven't had dinner, and our resolve to sail is quickly diminishing. It's soon completely destroyed when Moma tells Samuel and me that our own club is having a cook out. We run through a few more drills and head back to the Pieper Club, where we find that Moma was not lying. Moma buys Samuel and I a round of Becks and Samuel buys us a round of sausages. So there I sit on a dock in the middle of Hamburg, drinking a girly beer (I prefer Becks Ice, beer mixed with lemonade) and eating a sausage, and I think to myself, this is really a German moment, you know? It doesn't get much more German than beer and sausage.
This post is getting a tad long and I want to sleep, but I'll push through so I can tell you about last night: my first glimpse of the real German culture. And when I say that, I mean the Reeperbahn. What is the Reeperbahn, you ask? Well, well, well. The Reeperbahn is a rather famous road of clubs, bars, strip clubs, and whorehouses. After going out for drinks with some of my friends from my language class, I and my Spanish friends split off to take a look at this oh-so-famous road. We started by taking the metro. I knew we were on the right line when I looked around and saw drunks stumbling around, girls dressed in miniskirts and swinging bottles, and heard raucous laughter. In the train, a girl next to me very kindly offered me a swig of her Jagermeister. I politely refused, don't worry, Mom. In the car behind us, I heard what I can best describe as a frat party, although I couldn't quite see what was going on due to the amount of people in the car. We exited the metro into craziness; on a Saturday night, the Reeperbahn's at its peak. I got my first glimpse of
a.) a grandma pole dancing (see background of picture)
b.) a man dressed in a bunny suit

and c.) a whorehouse
My Spanish friends weren't as impressed as I was at seeing the prostitutes, but for a girl from a town as small as Skaneateles, that was quite the moment.

First Few Days in the Germ

I know that some people (ahemm, Kim) are waiting with bated breath for my first post, so wait no longer. To start, I'm Sierra from Skaneateles, New York, and I'm living in Hamburg, Germany as a Rotary exchange student for the 2010-2011 school year. More specifically, I live in Harburg, which was a small city outside of Hamburg that got swallowed up by the main city. My host mom's name is Sabine, my host brother's name is Samir, and they're really nice.
Boring stuff aside, I arrived on Sunday, August 15th to the Hamburg airport where Sabine, Samir, and the family dog awaited me. I'm not sure how to spell the dog's name so I won't even try, but it starts with an F and ends with an ER and reminds me a lil bit of a certain English word...anyways, it is actually from the streets of Spain, so I've decided that I will use it to keep up with my Spanish. When we got back to the house, I met Tibu, Samir's French friend, and his parents, and also an Indian boy who rents a room (my room) in the house. Once he's gone, I move in. For now, I get Sabine's master bedroom. Hehe. Anyways, the French rents brought us out to dinner at an Italian restaurant, where I heard my first bit of drunken German singing. I anticipate much more to come. While at dinner, I asked Samir, was the hamburger invented in Hamburg? Well, that had him stumped, and he replied, "I don't think so...didn't McDonalds invent it?" Hahahahaha. Who knew the Germans were such a humorous bunch?!
Yesterday, Sabine brought me into Hamburg, trying to teach me how to use public transportion (I'm screwed) whilst pointing out different odds and ends. Hamburg is really a beautiful city, with lots of canals and water all over the place. Starting tomorrow, I'm attending Colon Language School in the city for a month to improve my German (not so hot) and I'm also going to take sailing lessons. In the words of Sabine, "When you told me you wanted to sail yesterday, I thought it was brilliant. You have nothing to do and you have no friends, so it will give you something to do." Marveyy.
Germans seem to be very ecologically conscious, too. Everywhere there are people riding bikes, and there are actually certain areas of the sidewalk which are supposed to be just for bikers. I walk in that part just to spice up life a little. It makes for a fun game, Avoid the Angry German on the Bike. Also, in the grocery store, plastic bags aren't free: they cost 9 cents a bag, so everybody brings their own reusable bag when shopping. Here at home, there are four different garbages: one for fruit and vegetables and other compost-able things, one for regular garbages, one for paper and one for metal and plastic.

My address here is
Sierra Prochna
Fam. Roisch
Daerstorfer Weg 8b
21145 Hamburg
Germany
postage is welcome!


The host fam