Türkische Bettlerinnen, und Bibelverkäufer

There's a certain type of beggar in Germany, that I thought was limited to Berlin (being the only place I've seen this type of beggar). They look just like a regular, middle-class Turkish woman, only they come up to you with paper in hand and ask you for money (or to buy something) for their baby. They're often carrying the baby, and the paper is written in various languages in case they come across someone who doesn't understand them.

The oddest part is that they have nice clothing, and purses, and new baby carriages and everything! They're far from the denizens of the Downtown East Side. I want to know what's really going on with them. I almost want to ask why they're doing this; but that's a little patronizing, and I guarantee you that they wont give a shit, and simply move on.

Regardless, I had two of them come up to me today (I thought they were asking for directions). The first one surprised me, as I didn't know they were in Freiburg; the second one I just walked past with a simple "es tut mir leid" (sorry, but a real sorry, not the fake "excuse me" sorry that we Canadians use). Not to sound cold, but if you dress better than I do, then I just don't give a shit. If you're legit, then sell your purse, or your makeup to buy things for your kid.

Of course I don't know the full story, so all I have are reactionary thoughts.

Then I get this guy phoning me from the lobby asking me if I speak Italian 'cause my name's Italian. I told him no, and it sounded like it blew his mind. What he was doing was wanting to talk to people about bibles in Italian, and he said he was phoning all the Italians. I told him the same thing I told both Turkish beggar-ladies and wished him a good evening.

Sometimes people rig the door downstairs so that it's open, and they can easily come back in, but I'm always the jerk that makes sure it locks, for the very reason of bible-salesmen running around the building. We had Jehovah's Witnesses in here a month ago, and they woke me up at the door so they could speak to my French room-mate.

Bible salesmen... As if Christianity wasn't wide-spread enough! I mean, I'm not gonna turn this into a rant against Christianity, simply to say that you won, man! I'd sooner lend an ear to a Pagan preacher; At least you know that guy's gotta work hard! But Christians? Nah, sorry. Everyone in Germany's within walking distances to, around, 8 churches, why do they need door-to-door salesmen? The bells that wake me up every morning do a hell of a better job.

Regardless, I was glad that all the shops were open today; I now have food... Delicious food.

Tschüß!

Langweilig

German boxing days are boring. Everything's closed. I'm hoping things are open tomorrow, 'cause they're sure as hell closed on Sunday!

Tschüss!

Weihnachten!

It's Christmas mornin' and all the presents were opened (past-tense passive), and are in the process of being enjoyed (present-tense passive). I wanted to thank everyone who sent me stuff.

I also went on a trip last weekend to England and Frankfurt. Here's the photo album, and here's one of my trip to Warhammer World while in England. There's some photos I want to rotate, and organize and junk; but Flickr's a bit of a bitch and will only let me do so much per month unless I pay for an account. They can go eff themselves.

Tschüss! Frohe Weihnachten!

A message from the collection of all human knowledge

Tschüß

Scheiße!

Well, I'm off to Nottingham, England for the weekend. Why? To visit a friend, and Games Workshop (my old place of work, and a holy land for a gamer like myself), however I'm taking the most ass-backwards way of getting there.

Originally it was to be like this:
Friday
Freiburg - Frankfurt (train)
Frankfurt - Manchester (plane)
Manchester - Nottingham (train)

Sunday
Nottingham - Manchester (train)
Manchester - Frankfurt (plane)
Frankfurt - Freiburg (train)

However, there's no train that goes to Manchester that can meet two criteria I have: a)it should not be at 3:30 Sunday morning, and b)it should get me to Manchester by 11:30am for my flight back to Germany.

So what was I to do? Change flights home, of course. Well, that didn't work 'cause I'm a fool and bought non-refundable tickets. So what did I do? Ate the flight back home, and booked a whole new flight back home that doesn't get into Frankfurt 'till 10pm.

Oh, not the REAL Frankfurt; Frankfurt Hahn. Frankfurth Hahn's about two hours away from the actual Frankfurt where my train leaves back to Freiburg. So I have to take a bus there... Only the bus leaves 10 minutes before I get there by plane. And the next one leaves in another half hour which will get me there two minutes after my train leaves... Which leaves me stranded in Frankfurt 'till 5:30 am.

Mistakes are okay if you only make them once. I've learned my lesson from planning this damned thing piecemeal. What I should've done is leave Thursday night, and not even thought of coming home 'till Monday, which would leave me more time in England. What I also should have done is flown cheap airlines there, and back. I should've gone in through Basel in Switzerland (a 45 minute train ride from Freiburg). This vacation was particularily hard because both Nottingham, and Freiburg are in strange spots for travel.

Anyways, I'm sure I'll still have fun, and it'll be a hell of an experience.

Tschüß.

Kurze Fortschreibung

Today I got a new fridge! My old one has been shitty for far too long (three months that I've known about. I don't know how the old people got by with that crummy junk-closet!), so I finally complained about it to the Hausmeister and he showed up and fixed it today.

Except he came into my apartment, and opened the old fridge, immediately closing it, and looking at me as if to say: "What the hell, man?!" I remember everything from our conversation the previous day except for this one sentence that I didn't really understand. I thought nothing of it at the time and was just happy that my fridge was going to get fixed.

Anyways, I now knew that sentence spoken yesterday was something akin to: "Just make sure that you're fridge is empty when I come." Well, it wasn't empty and he repeated the sentence (which I still don't fully understand), so I spent all of one minute emptying the fridge. Wouldn't really be a big deal for a North American; but Germans are efficient as hell, and don't really tolerate crap like the stuff I pulled.

Anyways, it's awesome! It even comes with egg trays, a butter tray, and an ice tray. I made ice this morning. I'm determined to take care of this fridge, I just hope my roommate feels the same way.





Tschüß

Schokolade Pfannkuchen

My culinary skills are utilitarian at best. However every now and then I'm struck with a sort of food-genius that I imagine the rat from Ratatouille must feel everyday! If... You know... He were real.

Today this inspiration came in the form of spreading Nutella over my pancakes. Now I can hear a few out there claiming that they've done it before; but in my syrup-filled (or occasionally powdered-sugar filled) world there was no room for Nutella. Besides, it's pretty expensive in Canada.

The verdict? Too sweet. I ate only about half of it because I could feel my teeth fall back in the face of a chocolatey assault, and my pancreas decide whether or not to start giving me diabetes, just to learn me this time!

This irrelevant post brought to you by the fact that my legs can't stop shaking from the amount of sugar I just had!



Tschüss

Neue Kamera

I bought a new camera, a Pentax Optio E65 (for those of you that know anything about cameras). It's not the greatest but I like Pentax cameras and it was the cheapest one I could find. Thus, I will take pictures with it!

Here's some pictures of a 60cm (24" for the Yankees reading this) christmas tree that I bought for my apartment.


I figure that after I'm done with it I'll plant it in this little forest outcrop by my window. Yes... good plan...

Tschüss