a place in line

I have sitting here talking with people online since I got home a couple of hours ago, waiting for some sort of inspiration to write. It just sort of isn't hitting me. It might be because I've been writing a lot of J. Joyce-esque-ness to myself, lately. The earliest I am going to be getting into bed is 4am, and that seems somewhat early to me, so you can tell what kind of a schedule I've been on. I tried to rectify that last night by getting into bed 1ish, but I just ended up lying for there hours thinking about how my jaw was hurting, trying to rearrange my skull in such a way that there wouldn't be any pressure or pull anywhere (isn't possible).

The hot water pipes somehow got wiped out around this past Friday. I went in and complained to the Hausveranstaltung today, and got an email later in the day saying that someone is coming in to fix them tomorrow morning. Hopefully this is the last night I have to make my way to the kitchen to boil water just to wipe off the grime of other people's cigarettes.

Today I woke up at a record-breaking 11am (but don't feel jealous, I having been feeling pretty crummy as of late due to the terrible sleeping habits) to get to the arabische-asiatische Laden to buy materials for tonight's dinner, and get the Kischererbsen in water to soak for the appropriate length of time. Tonight Jacky and I were promised an evening of falafel by our friend Fadi, her Palestinian floormate. He was one of the first people I met way back when, upon my arrival in Germany; I think I mentioned him in entries back in August, if anyone cares to slog their way back that far. Back then he was in the "too good for me" grouping, now you can find him filed under "closer but for [no-comment reasons] unattainable." He and I have hung out a lot the past month and to leave out the yards of other emotions, its nice to feel better friends with someone who comes outside of the euro-american sensibility.

After the trip to the arabian/asian market and before the falafel (which did not disappoint, I will add), Jacky and I spent a good portion of the afternoon in town. We looked for shoes for our trip, though due to Goettingen's absolute lack of quality-for-the-price "walking/not silly, girl shoes", I will probably be wearing the same beat of pair of Asics I brought with me here. I bought them from a store on Pacific in Santa Cruz my first year of college, and now they've seen nine European countries, so... what's a few more? Recently Jacky and my "days in town" have consisted of attempting errands but just ending up at H&M, me convincing Jacky that she needs another coat, her convincing me that I will be able to find enough things to layer over that dress to make it winter-wearable. It is a cute dress, though. When the weather is warmer and you can actually see that is what I am wearing under my coat, I will post some pictures.

I recently learned (relearned?) how to play Gin Rummy. After a marathon evening of cards, tea and hookah I feel fairly confident I can give at least some of you a run for your money. I can even shuffle (mischen) almost unawkwardly now. Tea has been a big part of my life the past couple of months. I think black tea continues to be my brother in arms, but due to my inability to find a decaffeinated (koffeinfrei) version, and after a week of way too many jittery afternoons, I became acquainted with Kammillien mit Honig (chammomile, chamomille? I don't know how to spell it in English anymore). Both kinds with soy milk, of course. Third place is rose bush tea, which I was first introduced to at the home of an elderly German couple. I thought I had been invited for dinner, but three cruel hours later I realized it had all just been a 26.2 mile race for hot flavored water and assorted cookies.

I've also been watching a good number of movies. Tonight I was supposed to watch Walk the Line with Matthias, Andi, Jacky, Franzika (Andi's coworker) and her boyfriend, but it ended up stopping in different parts of the same scene on two different people's computers, so we ended up watching the other movie burned on that disk. Lord of War was significantly more depressing than I was in the mood for, but its one of those pieces of media that you feel like more people should see, so I'd recommend it. That said, it was, like every movie here, in German, so I can't be held accountable for everything.

Making dinner at Jacky's place with assorted people (with or without Jacky) has also been a nice addition as of late. Thats probably mostly because it gets me out of my building, which has proven to be a difficult task for pretty much everyone I know here, but also that most foreigners cook better and more interesting things than I do. Ah winter.

And now I am going to get myself to the kitchen to get ready for bed. Tomorrow I will allow myself a bit more sleep, perhaps. I just need to get into town to pick up a book from the bookstore while Andi is still working. I'd asked him and Matthias last week for some recommendations of some good German lit to take with me on my trip, and Andi told me a couple of days ago they'd gotten something good that he'd set aside for me.

we are nowhere and its now

Its nearing five am and I feeling too jolty for sleep. I spent a good portion of the day working on the paper which I only moments ago emailed to my professor. Its not very good, and I should have spent more of the past MONTH working on it instead of sleeping, watching The West Wing, or just generally not paying attention to remaining academic duties. I knew this would happen, but I wanted to think that I could actually stay on top of things for once. The paper is an interpretation of a poem by Bertolt Brecht, and then my own shining imitation of said poem. Apart from the cliches I actually like my poem, if only because I was able to successfully rhyme in German. But the whole paper I am confused about- I am not sure if what I wrote was too long or not long enough, and so I finally decided to just send it in and be done with it. I will have to call her tomorrow to let her know I emailed it instead of giving it to her in person- so hopefully that flies. I'll probably have to pick it up from her and get it to my program director in time to make it in time for the (what I think is the) March 2nd grade deadlines. Sigh. Its so hard to tell what I should be worrying more about and what I should be worrying less about.

As aforementioned it is completely my fault for procrastinating with every other possible thing I could do before I actually got to work on this. What was annoying, however, was once I finally got to work, I was interupted early evening by one of my floormates. The conversation went somewhat as follows:
Knock.
(ugh, go away, I am working.)
Knock.
Hello?
Hi Meri, do you have some time?
Actually no, not right now. I am working on a paper that is due tomorrow.
Oh. (stands there)
What do you need?
Well, I have something that I would like you to look over for me. (English not being his native language)
Well okay, I can do that after I finish my paper... when do you need it by?
Tomorrow.
Oh, okay... well, I am going to a friend's concert tonight, but I can try to work on it after that. How long is it?
Oh, only THIRTY PAGES

Sigh. Since I felt like I have been giving him the shaft all year, and because its his THESIS for his DOCTORATE (glad you waited till the last minute, eh?) I spent the hours of 1am - 3am trying to unscramble my brain to figure out how to state this guy's biological experiment in correct wording. Its actually something I do gladly because I have forced a number of Germans do it for me, and I always feel terrible not only for making them take the time, but for allowing any native to see how messed up my writing actually is. In a sick way its kind of fun, though I have to be careful not to laugh out loud at how awesome English can sound when its thrown in a blender. It also gave me an unnatural sense of power, and for once I was the one getting to explain things. At least I wasn't haughty about it- every German loves to sigh at your confused countenace and say, yeah, German is really difficult, isn't it?

Earlier tonight I was at Cafe Kreuzberg, the closest thing to Santa Cruz here in Goettingen. Emily, one of the Americans studying here, was playing a concert there, and I was amazed at how much I liked her performance. She came here for the spring program last year and then extended to the entire year, so she is leaving in a couple of weeks. She amazed me not only with the skillset necessary to carry a guitar and a tune in front of a mass of people, but that her German is so good. Eventhough I'm a good foot taller I feel like a toddler next to her. I saw a few Amis there, and so if there is any way I am waking up within the next nine hours I am going to try to head to Sam's going away "breakfast" (noon) at Villa Cuba. This is such a strange period of time: its the first most of us have had any real break while living in Germany, and so most people are off traveling, or otherwise holed up in their respective enclosures. I saw Tony for the first time in weeks, and beyond Jacky I haven't seen any Californians on a regular basis since the start of this month.

Last night Jacky and I caved into Stalker #2's week-long pleas and had a cooking night. For safety Jacky had the fortitude to invite Tony to come over, so the awkward-level was lessened considerably. The three of us (me) cooked pasta and vegetables, and Bona (Stalker #2) made chicken. Poor German Hallmate of Jacky's Johanna was somehow roped into talking with Bona, so she sat and ate with us too. It was weird because Bona is from the Republic of Benin (West Africa) so his first language is French, and saying he can speak English seems to be often a little of a stretch, so the five of us sat and spoke slow English while two of Jacky's other hallmates sat farther off in the room and listened. It was weird and so when the wine was almost empty we were able to make a break for it. Tony, Jacky and I rode to the Dorf where Droescher, Beilein & friends were watching a movie and later some British TV series. "German humor" was what the movie was explained to us as as we walked in about an hour in. Needless to say now I know why I don't have that many friends here. The British TV series (League of Gentlemen, I think) proved to be one of the weirdest things I think I've ever seen. As far as my experiences with British people and in Britain go, I find the humor really dry and therefore pleasurable. But as far as what they put on TV- just really out there. After the marathon of weird viewing Andreas (Droescher) invited us to his place, where Matthias, Andreas, Jacky and I sat around in Andreas' tiny roof apartment drinking white russians and listening to Johnny Cash. Both Andreas and Matthias live in these little apartments overflowing with books, stuck away at the very top of old buildings. It all seems very romantic and academic until you realize you'd be showering in your kitchen.

We hadn't seen them for awhile though, so it was nice to hang out and talk again. Tomorrow (today) night we are all going to see Broken Flowers (IN ENGLISH) at Cinema (a little indie theater reminiscent of the Nickolodeon, if anyone from Santa Cruz still reads this). I feel like I have something else planned for this weekend/upcoming week, but I don't think I actually do. If everything goes well with this paper getting turned in, and my grades turned in, all I need to be doing is starting to pack and prepare myself to leave Germany for over a month. The Californians are slowly trickling out of Germany, but honestly I feel like I haven't talked to anyone in ages so it doesn't seem like a big deal anymore.

I might be starting to make some more friends, so we can all cross our fingers on that one. Why does that sentence make me feel like I'm in 5th grade again? As aforementioned I have been lucky enough to be introduced to Bona- aka Stalker #2. He just moved into Jacky's hall, and is working at a lab here in Goettingen, but like many others his program is in English so he doesn't know a lick of German. He sort of latched onto Jacky and I one night last week when we were watching the Olympics in her Tagesraum (hall living room, kind of). So he went with us into town to get Indian food (cuz Jacky owed me), and then we went to Trou, which he pointed out with his native French means "hole." One vein-drainingly long beer later Jacky and I were able to make excuses about being tired at 10pm so we could get home and away from him. It wasn't so much that he creeped us out then (THEN), but it is just really difficult to maintain conversation when the he couldn't understand what we were saying half the time, and we couldn't understand his accent the other half of the time. Since then he's moved quickly into CREEPY MODE with more-than-would-be-necessary-in-even-the-steamiest-love-affair texts and calls. He officially signed himself on my NEVER WANT TO TALK TO AGAIN list last night by calling me at 2:30 in the morning as I had just arrived home from Andreas'. He had seen Jacky get back to her room (because he lives on her hall), and for some reason that gave him license to think he could start walking over to my room to talk to me. So he calls me and tells me he needs to talk to me. Well, I say, I am about to go to bed (not true, but true enough to say to him). I have to talk to you. Well, what do you want to talk about? Nothing. Nothing? Okay, well if you don't have anything particular to talk about, lets do it later, cuz like I said, I am going to sleep soon. I am already on my way over. What? Uhm, okay, sorry, but like I said, I am going to sleep.

This conversation drags on for another four minutes before I realize this guy is NOT LISTENING TO WHAT I AM SAYING. So I finally have to hang up, and I go lock my door. Seven phone calls later I have taken my name off my door and I am sitting in the dark. I am thinking, how does it get like this? What kind of culture does one grow up in that its somehow acceptable to try to guilt-trip (But I am already walking over there! Well, idiot, I don't remember asking you to come over or EVER even telling you it would be okay for you to come over, especially at THREE IN THE MORNING, so sorry, but it ain't my fault) and completely invade someone's personal space? Ugh. I was so angry and am still completely disgusted. Who gave him the right to make me scared like that? Like I told Jacky, at least now we have good reason to completely shun him and never speak to him again.

And with that, I am going to go brush my teeth and get to bed.

fjarskanistan

I have another journal I write in on occassion, mostly for private entries and for when I don't feel like putting forth the proper effort to post it here. The following is the latter-

Jim Carrey's mouth and German coming out of it just don't line up right. It confuses me how people can say they like so and so actor when they've actually never HEARD the actor. At first I thought the dubbing was funny, but now its just sort of annoying. It'd probably be more helpful to hear the English while reading german subtitles, like they do in MOST other European countries... but alas, not here. We were so excited to see that the movies in Amsterdam were shown in English that we saw 'The Constant Gardener' the first night we were there- an experience I won't forget anytime soon.

I have been remembering more of my dreams as of late (finally catching up on some sleep). A couple nights ago Josh and CJ from The West Wing were running around with me, and last night Jen's dad showed up in Germany to give me a bunch of beer I had apparently bought in the 4th grade and left with him for safekeeping. He said a little spiel about customs and how they are gonna love to tax me on stuff that I could sell cheaper here than where I bought it (which would be true: store-bought alcohol continues to surprise me with its discount prices), and then I woke up with a knock at my door from a white-suited man asking if I had Schimmel. Ja, habe Schimmel. Due to the stink of ammonia it took me a half an hour to go back to sleep after he left, and another dream probably greeted me there, though it escapes me now.

I started making a friend last night. I was horrified at how bad my german got in just a week of hibernation, but so it goes. I am not sure if it is this way for everyone else, but it takes me awhile to get used to how a new person talks, and what kind of sentence construction and slang they use. Every German has a different accent and once that gets successfully imported into your brain its generally smoother sailing.

Looking at a bunch of his traveling pictures was crazy--- its amazing how so many places feel like parts of California. For a long time, every time I would go somewhere new I'd try to match it up to a place I'd previously been... but eventually you realize nowhere new is like anywhere you've been before. Least of all Germany. And so when you are sitting on that train, looking out onto the fast-paced landscape running by, you can almost sense the scent of places you've been wafting along just through the pane of glass your head is resting againist- and without fail its everything you miss and everything you are glad is far away.

We went up to the rooftop to get a better view, but it was dark and snowy and instead of being clearer it was just different.

say something

To make sure everyone realizes what a terrible procrastinator I am, I am posting yet another facebook album I created today. So, without further ado: pictures from backpacking trip in December part I and part II.

Oh, and if you need to do your smoking inside the UK you better hurry and get to Scotland before the House of Commons outlaws it there too. More for us in Germany, then. Seriously, I think they'd set the country on fire before they entertained even the cousin of that notion here.

be careful with the details of the war

Abenteuer beim Zahnarzt or Meredith Loves the Dentist

When they look at you concernedly, asking you (you think) if you can swallow, you have to nod because yes, technically you can swallow. The problem, however, is not the real-time saliva, rather the store of phlegm residing just past your uvula. And, by the way, if you ever need to look up uvula to make sure it means that dangly thing at the back of your throat, by god please don't use google images to do it. That stuff is horrific.

I am just back from my fourth trip to the dentist. I had a different hygentist this time, so I felt like I needed to apologize for staring blankly at her in response to about half the things she said, but I didn't really get the chance. Its amazing how terrible my dental vocabulary is. I got a broken? filling re-filling-ed, and got to experience once more the subtle nuances of european dentistry. Apart from the initial shock of them not prepping me for the needle-in-the-gum thing (is it just me or don't they normally put some silly little paste on your gums a couple minutes before to make the shot a little less painful?), it went pretty well. I was confused as to why something to the likeness of a purple rubber glove was stuffed in my mouth, but they didn't touch my wallet or tie me to a chair, so I guess I can count myself lucky. The real problem was holding my jaw open for that long, and oh, the sweet noises it made once I finally was able to wrench it out of locked position and close my mouth. The bite plate I got (paid handsomely for, I mean) a couple of weeks ago is fashioned so that my lower jaw is supposed to move up a couple centimeters to actually meet my top row of teeth, but the process is slow. I am not sure if its actually working at all, but the result is my jaw feeling better, if still a little out of whack. But there are already big indents in the plate, which makes one wonder what sort of pent up aggression I have that I only let out when I am unconscious.

I have yet to write my paper, and I have yet to really figure out what I am doing travel-wise in a couple of weeks, but right now I am telling myself its okay to rest a little. I am sick and I have just recently been introduced to The West Wing (the television show), so obviously I have other things to attend to.

I spent most of yesterday/Thursday in bed. I got home at 9:30am and slept from 10-4. I spent 1-5 in Hamburg train station's 24-hour McDonald's. I have to say, it was the nicest McDonald's I think I've ever had the pleasure of being in, but I don't think I ever want to be in one again. The reason for said marathon-sleep deprivation was the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah concert at Tanzhalle, in the St. Pauli area of Hamburg. We spent four hours on a train Thursday afternoon to get to Hamburg, then spent an hour and a half in a Subway (food place) watching truly atrocious MTV programming waiting for it to get late enough to sanction us going over to the venue. At least the shows had subtitles so I could hear the English and read the German and laugh at what they changed, but really, it made me quite glad to not be in high school in Southern California. As it was we were still there frightfully early, and they ended letting people in an hour after was printed, so we were standing out in the cold for another good hour or two, but other than the before and after, the show was one of the easiest concert experiences I've ever had. Even though we had been the first ones there it took us awhile to get in because Germans have absolutely no idea of lines or any sort of order in that sense, but we were able to secure the absolute best spot in the place just because we didn't make a beeline for the bar like everyone else.

The embarassing thing is that we didn't realize the opening band wasn't the band. There wasn't talk anywhere of there being an opener, and so we were shocked when the band played like seven songs and then started packing up. I was like, that was great, but that was ALL? But I turned around, and everyone was still standing there, so we asked the short guy next to Jacky and he cleared it up for us. Ironic that we probably understood what the band was saying between songs (hey guys, thanks for coming out, blah blah) better than anyone else, but we still couldn't figure out they were another band. Anyhow, we didn't have to wait too long before Clap Your Hands came out, and that was awesome. Both bands, the opener (Dr. Dog) and Clap Your Hands were both really fun and I had the pleasure of dancing and obstructing everyone else's view right in front of the singer. Tanzhalle is a really small venue, and the stage is raised only a little bit, so we were standing literally front and center, right in front of both singers. I felt kind of bad with Clap Your Hands, like if I had been the singer I would have felt weird someone standing arm's length away from me looking straight at me while I sang, but I guess they're supposed to be used to that? All the same, I tried not to make him uncomfortable whether he would have been or not, which wasn't too hard since we had generally busy dancing.

Since we had so much time to kill before the next train home, we hung around after the show and ended up talking with the singer and one of the guitarists of Clap Your Hands for awhile. They were both really cool, and I got my CD signed eventhough I felt kind of lame asking. I always like getting the 'are you guys from the States?' questions and explaining the situation, and it was nice to have some American humor appreciated as well. I am always surprised when famous people (and maybe they're not household names, but if you are a touring musician you are famous to somebody, at least) turn out just to be people too. That must be such a strange kind of life.

For some pictures of the show, you can check out this album. I've posted this link before, but I've added pictures since, so its worth your time to check it out. Maybe.

While I'm here I should say something about Amsterdam. I was gone for four days, and it was a lot of fun, though I was glad to be back home when I was. Somebody at the hostel STOLE MY TOWEL, which is weird as it is, but I also had my name blazoned across it... so I hope karma comes to fetch you, jerkface. Amsterdam is a really beautiful city, I don't think I've ever been anywhere that had canals like that (or canals at all, if I remember correctly). It was actually a bit warmer there than here (no snow there!), and my three companions and I had a lot of fun trying our hand at the Dutch language. A lot of the time it seems like the missing link between German and English, and then other times it looks like something somebody with long-term syphillis and a penchant for vowels came up with.

The Dutch architecture was really interesting and cool, and like anyone who has been traveling with me recently can probably attest, when I like a city I'll just walk around talking about how much I like it, and thats what I did in Amsterdam. The whole drug-scene is kind of a weird inlay to the city, its like this classical place with this seedy and yet unobtrusive underbelly. I could talk more about this but its probably unnecessary. I was in the city for four days with Jennifer, Keinst and Kate, all American friends of mine who are studying in Goettingen. For only being there a few days we did a surprising amount of stuff. I'll list off some stuff now: Vincent van Gogh Museum (completely worth it), Rijksmuseum (=National Gallery, saw Rembrandts!), Anne Frank House (really cool to have been able to see), Heineken Factory, Vondelpark (a beautiful park where we killed a few hours feeding birds before our train on Friday), anddd... other stuff. We took a canal boat tour, which was really pretty, and I think I can say that I've seen the North Sea now. Also saw the Red Light District, of course, which is actually just pretty weird. Not morally upsetting so much as just uncomfortable. Oh, AND we had Dim Sum and I found that white bread dumpling filled with barbequed pork that I used to love so much as a child! I have been looking for that for like 14 years.

i will never see the sun

So, I've been a little MIA. Its all explainable in due time, but for right now you'll have to be satisfied with some tidbits.

Winter semester is over. I have one more paper to write (which has been remarkably easy to put off working on, so far), and a couple of grades to worry about getting in, but other than that- no school for awhile. Plans for traveling this break have gone back and forth and back and forth, but I think tomorrow I am going to figure some things out, finally. Sitting on the train with Jacky the four hours to Hamburg should be enough time to make a decent gameplan. We are seeing 'Clap Your Hands Say Yeah' (a band) and thus it should be a good time- though I am feeling under the weather, so hopefully the staying up all tomorrow night waiting for the earliest train back to Goettingen won't be too detrimental.

Steven and I seated and waiting for our very last lecture on Thomas Mann. I was definitely the only one taking pictures of that old lecture hall that day.

And speaking of Thomas Mann- when I went to Elke's today to turn in my Wortschatzuebungen grade, I got my Thomas Mann essays, final and grade back. The final verdict:

"Die beiden Essays sind sehr gelunden, vor allem die Formulierung der eigenen Meinung ist herauszuheben. Das Referat war gut, an der Abschlussklausur ist nichts auszusetzen. Ebenso ist die Mitarbeit im Tutorium gewesen, die fast ausnahmlos von der guten Vorbereitung und dem Interesse an den Gespraechen im Plenum ablegte."

So yeah. I was in Amsterdam last week. If you want to see pictures, go here. More on this, and everything else, later. I leave you with a picture I took as we were saying goodbye to Kai, as she left Germany for Japan, eventually to head back to California. She became one of my favorites here, and she even taught me a little Japanese... but luckily I will be able to see her next year. The other kind of goodbyes are going to be a lot harder, I foresee.