Just returned from a chilly, rainy weekend in Aachen, Germany where I visited family, saw the city, and heard a ton of Deutsch. It was an interesting trip to say the least as I met many relatives and attended my 3rd cousin's confirmation.
We ate loads of cake, and turkish food. Popped over to Belgium for lunch on Sunday, and discussed politics....a lot.
I saw "Maibaums" which are birch branches that guys decorate and put in front of their girlfriend's house on the 1st of May.
I also saw the Aachen Cathedral, which apparently contains Jesus' diaper, and lots of places that were frequented by Charlemagne. I learned some german words: Genaugh means exactly (and they use it all the time!), verdamt means damn, kapf means head, augen means eyes, orring means earring, and schtool means chair. Oh and I actually heard someone use the term Schadenfreude. (They were quite impressed that I knew what that meant.) But I also spent a great deal of time sitting at a crowded table listening to everyone laugh at German jokes that I hadn't understood, and probably wouldn't have if they were in English. I also sat through a 2 hour confirmation ceremony without the slightest idea of when to stand or sit, or how to pronounce the words of the creed. But they sang some songs in English as well as a song in German that was set to the tune of Go tell it on the Mountain. On Monday I helped clean up the house and ran errands with my... lets call her my aunt and then took a nap until my cousin got home and we had coffee and, you guessed it, cake, and then drove to Dusseldorf Weeze (an ex-army base) to catch my flight.
By the time I got to the airport I was tired and hungry for some real, untranslated English, but my phone didn't have enough money to call home from Germany, and the duty free store didn't sell Cosmo. So I settled for a Newsweek that cost a whopping 4.50 euro, and a seat next to an elderly British gentleman who was obsessed with fixing the zipper on his suitcase. On board I encountered the rudest flight attendant I have ever met, she pulled the earphones out of people's ears and then grilled them on where the life-jacket was on board. When they couldn't answer, she scolded in her heavy German accent, "Pay attention next time, it is your safety not mine." I agreed with her sentiment, but not her behavior. And the irony was they just continued to pay no attention to the rules. The steward specifically said turn off all electronic devices including cameras, and a flash went off 2 seconds later. Then as he was saying leave your seat belts fastened until we come to a complete stop, he was answered by a chorus of seatbelt clicks. I am not sure if they were doing this to spite the flight attendants, but it certainly seemed that way.
I called home from the bus and almost cried when they picked up, so much for my firm stance against homesickness. We chatted for the entire bus ride, and when I arrived at Piazzale Roma I was ecstatic. The smell of the canals, the musical sound of the Italian language, and my slow meander through the creepily charming, empty Venetian Calle emphasized the fact that this place is going to be really hard to leave. It feels like home.
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