The Frankfurter Files

UFO Sighting

2011-07-06T22:42:00.004+10:00

So, you've probably had enough of my impressive crochet skills by now. Seasons have passed. It's time to post again.

Sometime between crocheting those cupcakes and today we made a trip to Freiburg with Matti when he was visiting and stayed in a nearby town called Emmendingen. Mads knew straight away that this was our town - for a start, the hotel we stayed at had a giant M out the front. There were 'M's on our pillows. We had soon formed a theory that everyone in Emmendingen had to have an M in their name somewhere. But the real proof that we were destined to go to Emmindingen was when Matti and Matt spotted my genie book in the window of one of the shops in town. I'd known that the German translation has been out in the shops for a while but I hadn't seen it anywhere. And there it was. In the bookshop window of Emmendingen.

It's that blurry yellowish shape in the middle of the picture. Not a UFO. My book. Truly. We went inside and found it on the shelf. Then the bookshop lady came over and it turned out that she'd grown up in Australia. So then Matt suggested that I sign the book and there was a slightly awkward moment where I saw the thought flit across (let's call her) Mary's mind that perhaps I hadn't written it. Perhaps we were just a group of weird tourists who went into bookshops and signed other people's books. I offered to produce my passport but she smiled (a little nervously) and said it wasn't necessary.

And then that was it. First sighting of one of my books in a foriegn land. We left the shop and headed off to the ice-cream shop. Mads had the green nutty flavour. 'Moustachio.'

Cupcakes

2011-03-04T07:19:00.008+11:00

There are many, many things I should be doing with my time right now. Finishing a book for instance. Packing for the trip to Australia next week. Maybe a little Spring cleaning. But at the moment all I seem to be able to do is make little woolly cupcakes.

I can't really explain it. Mads has enough now to set up quite an impressive bakery. And yet I keep creating them, night after night. It's like an obsession. I suppose I should just be thankful that I'm not churning out real cupcakes at the same rate.

And in my defence (and in case my editor happens to read this) I have been working on the book during the day. And (in case my mum reads this) I have made a packing list so theoretically it should now just be a matter of chucking all our stuff in for a bag. It's just that of an evening I see the wool and the urge comes over me for cakes.

Hopefully it won't last. Perhaps if I keep reading this blog I will be able to wean myself off the cupcake habit and onto something a little less old-ladyish.

Finished

2011-02-17T02:17:00.010+11:00

Here is a picture of M + M both looking extremely pleased that I've finally finished the large project that I've been working on for some time now. They are both thinking; 'Phew. Maybe she'll stop being such a cranky cow for a bit.' I'm not making any promises. Behind Mads you can see another recently finished project - my latest rug.

Go on. You can say it. It's really weird-looking, isn't it? This is what happens when you launch into a project without any real plan - nothing much at all beyond; 'I'd like there to be circles. And some red.' So I just started making it and it just got weirder and weirder. That strange purpley-pink colour. The orange. I don't know what I was thinking. Sadly it's reminiscent of the way I cook - adding stronger and stronger flavours one after another in a mad panic. The rug is far too ugly to inflict on anyone so I have it hanging over a chair in the dining room which is where I do most of my work and I'm hoping it will act as a reminder as to the importance of planning.

Books have been arriving from everywhere over the last couple of weeks, proving that I'm not the only person who has been busy finishing stuff. First there was the German version of Tweenie Genie:

And then the paperback version of the Fairy School Dropout series which I find so pretty, especially the yellow one which is unusual as I'm not a big fan of yellow for the most part.

And then yesterday the Brazilian version of FSDO arrived:
.

I have quite a collection of Portuguese books now. If we end up going to Portugal this year perhaps I'll take them with me and give them to some kid.

So what next? I've got a couple more things to finish before our trip to Oz in March and today I went and bought some more wool. Because I can't seem to sit and watch The Wire without something to do.

Christmas etc

2011-01-06T22:25:00.009+11:00

Another city, another pair of crazy shoes.

Our ten days in Amsterdam with Trish, Ol, Kate and Jost went by in a cold, snowy, delightful flash. Kate and Jost moved into their new house on the 24th and while the last thing I would've done would be host Christmas lunch for 13 people the following day this is what Kate did. With grace and elegance. We did help though. For instance, Trish and I spent a delightful couple of hours trimming the Christmas tree on Christmas eve with Kate's gorgeous decorations. That's helpful, isn't it? It was supposed to be a kid-based activity but the kids could not have been less interested. We forced them to hang a few things on and then allowed them to escape.

The photo really doesn't do justice either to Kate's decorations or to the extrodinary trimming abilities of Trish and me. You'll just have to imagine it. It was stunning.

Owing to the lack of a kitchen at Kate's place (it's being installed next week) Christmas lunch was an Australian-style spread with lots of salads and sashimi and prawns which was absolutely fine by me. There was also an impressive dessert-buffet which was absolutely fine by Mads.

A large cardboard box had been installed in the middle of the kitchen-to-be as a sort of make-shift work bench and also to cover up some wires sticking up from the floor. Under instruction from Kate Trish and I wrapped it in Christmas wrap. I wish I'd taken a photo. We did a magnificent job.

So it was a very nice Christmas and a very nice holiday. Kate's house is near the Vondelpark and every morning we would vondel through it, pretending to skate on the ice, admiring all the houses.

No one in Amsterdam seems to have blinds on their windows. Someone on the train told me this is because they are desperate to allow as much light in as possible but Kate had another theory. 'It's to prove that you have nothing to hide,' she said.

One morning in the Vondelpark, near the iron igloo, we found this tree.

The next day the temperature soared to 2 degrees and the face disappeared.

The Brief, Tragic Life of a Snowman

2010-12-21T18:36:00.006+11:00

On Sunday Thieu and Mads went to the Platz out the front of our flat and built a snowman. The only carrots we had were some left-over roasted ones so the nose was on the droopy side. Mads was unwilling to sacrifice any of the sticks in her stick collection for the snowman's arms and suggested Thieu use leeks instead. Which he did. In the typical way of snowpeople-building Mads lost interest fairly quickly but Thieu became deeply involved. Emotionally involved. I started to worry. There are really only two main crimes around here - bike theft and snowman desctruction. With this in mind I took lots of photos of the one that Thieu and Mads' built. But after we returned inside Thieu kept checking out the window to see if the snowman was still there and growling menacingly below his breath whenever anyone got too close to it.

Of course, the inevitable occurred. In the afternoon Mads and I went ice skating and by the time we returned home all that was left of the snowman was two frozen leeks, laying on the ground. I've no idea what happened to the roast carrot.

We came inside and I decorated Mads' stick collection with baubles. I knew I'd find a use for it eventually.

That Time of Year

2010-12-17T02:11:00.009+11:00

Last year it felt like one day I rounded a corner in Frankfurt and tripped over the Christmas market. I remember I was shocked. It seemed so early. I probably grumbled something along the lines of; 'I refuse to think about Christmas before my birthday,' which is the same thing I've been grumbling for some time now. But this year it was different. This year I was impatient for the market to appear. Perhaps it was because the market was so Glühwein-y good last year, despite the crowds, despite the high-tack factor. Or perhaps it was because I was happy for anything to come along that might stop me from thinking about my birthday. Which was rather a large one. I even decorated the Christmas tree two days before the Big Day because I was so keen to forget about the whole thing.

Then the Birthday came and I must admit I sulked for most of the day, especially as Thieu was away and I was feeling rather neglected. But then in the evening my upstairs neighbour came down with a cake she'd made and the downstairs neighbour came up with a present and so I stopped sulking and invited them in for a glass of sekt and suddenly things were much brighter.

Then Thieu came home with flowers and Mads gave me the very lovely Ü you can see in the picture above and I started to feel quite cheery because I have always wanted an Ü of my very own and now I have one. And I also received a camera which I used to photograph the Ü. And we went out for dinner across the road and I had goose which is the sort of thing people of my age probably shouldn't eat any more but I did it anyway and it was delicious. So it was all very fine in the end, you see?

And since then we have partaken of many seasonally-appropriate past times. There's been much arranging and re-arranging of the new "Activity Scene" (as the kid calls it) which was delivered by St Nicholaus on Dec 11. Generally Saint N fills children's shoes up with lollies on this day - or sticks if they're naughty - but I think he was a little confused by Mad's announcement the night before that she hoped he would bring her 'a really nice stick' for her stick collection and he therefore decided that an Activity Scene was the safest option.

What else? There's been much eating of snow. And also laying down in snow and moving arms and legs to make snow angels - something Mads learnt to do by watching Charlie and Lola. There's also been that fun parental past-time known as 'lugging around all the stuff that your kid peels off when she enters a train or shop'followed by that equally fun game; 'putting all the stuff back on when you leave the train or shop.' Yeah, we love those. And of course visiting of the Weihnacht Markts.
I've noticed a rather lovely symbiotic relationship between Glühwein stands and carousels. Where you find one you generally find the other not far away and it works beautifully for all concerned. Child goes around and around on the carousel while the parents keep toastily warm drinking wine. Happiness for all.

Now, does the kid look sick in the photo above? Not really does she? But apparently she had scarlet fever. It took us another two days to find that out and even the doctor who administered the test seemed surprised when it came up positive. No one over here seemed fazed by it. Perhaps it's just another seasonal past time.

So that's the year I guess. This time next week we'll be in Amsterdam - or at least on our way. I wonder if they have Christmas markets there?

Madrid

2010-11-10T06:17:00.007+11:00

A couple of weekends ago we went to Madrid for the weekend to meet up with Malena and Raffa (who must, surely, win the prize for most chilled four-month old in the world), eat lots of Spanish food and, you know, see Madrid a bit as well. Most of our goals were achieved - especially the eating part. You know you're on holiday when your breakfast consists of doughnuts dunked in melted chocolate. Luckily we did lots of walking too - mostly just wandering around the old town and the gardens and wondering how long after doughnuts you need to wait before buying an ice-cream (answer: not very long at all). We did make it to La Guernica but there was a lot that we didn't get to see. So I guess we'll have to go back. What a shame.

Malena mentioned that children's flamenco outfits could be purchased from most of the tourist shops and that perhaps Mads, given her well-known love of dressing up, might be interested in receiving one?

She was. Her favourite bit were the polka-dotted "high heels". Did I ever think I would be the kind of mother who would buy high heels for her four year old? No I did not. Did Mads love them? Yes she did. They were so very clippity- cloppity, you see, and there are so many cobblestones in Madrid to test shoes like these out on.

Mads wore the flamenco outfit all weekend - and she swore the shoes didn't hurt. If we'd been walking around in Frankfurt I'm sure we would've received a lot of disapproving stares from old ladies, but in Madrid all the old ladies thought she was gorgeous.

Even when we weren't out reaping in the old lady compliments Mads continued to wear the outfit. Ever wondered what a flamenco dancer would look like on an exercise bike?

It was reminiscent of when she wore a Buzz Lightyear outfit for an entire summer. We have shots of her on the beach with her shovel and spade dressed as Buzz. Eating sushi dressed as Buzz. Asleep dressed as Buzz.

Mads wore the costume back to Frankfurt on the plane and on the Ubahn back to our house. But since returning she's only worn it once. Perhaps she realises that she won't receive the same kind of adoring attention over here. Or perhaps she's saving it for mid-winter so she can pop it on over her snow suit.

The Chateau

2010-10-05T05:41:00.007+11:00

A couple of weekends ago we motored down to stay at the Chateau de Percey. I think you have to motor to a chateau, don't you?

We went with some visiting Australian friends who'd found the place on the internet, arranged a very reasonable off-season rate and also organised the car in which we did the motoring. Quite a bit of motoring as it turned out. I am finding it difficult to rid myself of that dearly-held Australian-falsehood that everything in Europe is close. I mean, I guess it is if you're say 'it take two hours to get from Frankfurt to France.' But that's only to the border. It took us almost 8 hours to get from Frankfurt to our Chateau. Our chateau. I like the way that sounds.

It was worth the drive, truly it was.
And actually the drive wasn't too bad from my perspective as I simply sat in the back and drank champagne with my severely jet-lagged friend and sang Playschool songs at our bemused children. We stopped for dinner at what we think must have been a French version of TGIFs called Flunch which yes, I'll admit, we went to because after half a bottle of champers seemed like the funniest name of a restaurant in the world. I think I understand where the name comes from now. It's the noise your stomach makes as you're leaving the restaurant.

Luckily, after sleeping a night in the Chateau we became a little more classy and on Saturday morning we found a farmers' market in a neighbouring town where we bought far too much cheese and fish and local tomatoes etc than was necessary for a long weekend. We stood in a queue for some pain au chocolat that were so warm and delicious that once they were gone I almost got back at the end of the line and waited all over again. We went for a ride along a canal and Mads consolidated her newly acquired bike-riding skills. I learnt to ride in the quiet suburban streets of Adelaide. It took me ages to master it. Perhaps I would've learnt faster had I been learning in Burgundy - especially if falling off had meant tumbling into a canal.

We went for a walk and discovered, to the consternation of one particular member of our party, that French Nacktschnecken are not only as large as the German variety, but also bright orange.
You can probably imagine the horror.

Then, when we were all exhausted and Mads had started whimpering, 'I just want to go back to the chateau,' we returned and had a three course dinner cooked for us - a present for me arranged by my dear Aussie friend in honour of a certain rather large upcoming milestone-type birthday. It was a wonderful gift. We talked about things we'd done over the twenty years since we'd first met, how amazing kids are in general and ours in particular, about living overseas, travel and about a friend who had died just the week before. One who'd only just made it to the milestone birthday we were now celebrating for me. It felt like the right setting for all of these conversations.

Slugs and Snails

2010-09-20T21:59:00.002+10:00

Autumn is here and the rainy weather has delivered me a new favourite German word:Nacktschnecke.It means 'naked snail' and it's what you called a slug over here. We learned this word on a train recently when we were going to meet some friends for a camping trip. A little girl came and sat across from us and stared at Thieu. 'Nacktshnecke,' she said, meaningfully. 'Nacktshnecke, Nacktshnecke, Nacktshnecke.' We had no idea at the time what it meant. 'I think she's saying she wants a night time snack,' whispered Matt, although it was clearly daytime.

When we met our friends and the native German speaker translated the word for us. His English wife (who is also fluent in German) frowned. 'Is that the word for slug?' she said. 'I've been calling them 'snails without houses'. No wonder everyone sniggers when I say it.'

Mads is terrified of the slugs. In her defence they are huge over here - way bigger than Australian ones. I commented on this to our friends and they looked quite proud. 'You may have huge spiders,' they said, 'but we win when it comes to slugs.'

Perhaps Thieu still had snails on the brain the next day when he went to collect Mads from kindy. They were having their afternoon snack of crispbread known as Knäckebrot. Thieu likes practicing his German at the kindy. Generally if you try to speak in German over here the other person will sympathetically switch into flawless English. Kindy is the only chance Thieu gets for a decent convo.
'Are you enjoying your Schneckerbrot?' he said, cheerily. Schneckerbrot means snail bread. A number of the four year olds literally fell off their ikea chairs laughing.

Mads and I had a play-date with a kindy friend last week. The mother said 'I heard about the Schneckerbrot incident.' I assumed she'd heard it from her son, but no. The kindy teacher had told everyone about it at a parent night we didn't attend. Apparently there was much mirth.

Today it is sunny and I'm looking forward to going to the airport to pick up Fi, Peter and Thomas. Thankfully there are no Nacktschnecken to be seen.

So, how was Norway?

2010-08-27T04:47:00.015+10:00

Why, thanks for asking. Norway was very pretty.

And pointy.

It was also grass-roofy.

And although summer it was still a bit snowy

though more often it was green-y.

In some parts it was quite stinky.

It was also surprisingly empty.

There were lots of Whew Points for photo opportunities.

Not too many of these, luckily:

But still a few of these:

So now we're back - and happy to be back, really, especially after staying in 12 different places during the three weeks. It's nice to be in the one place. It's going to be a busy few months leading up to Christmas - lots of work and some visits from some Melbourne people which is already being feverishly anticipated.

Kitsch Kitschy Coo

2010-07-30T19:18:00.012+10:00

There have been a few (accidental) plate breakages recently around here the cupboard was looking kind of depleted. Given that there is bound to be further breakages in the years to come I didn't really want to shell out a whole lot of money on replacements. But I couldn't quite face Ikea either. So at last Saturday's flea market I looked out for something that would do for the time being. At the very first stand I found a set of 14 Christmas plates (1975 - 1988) all with blue and white images of a nearby town called Darmstatt. At first I was struck by the fact that someone had been able to find 14 separate scenic shots of Darmstatt to photograph (clearly there's more to Darmstatt than I had realised), then that someone else had chosen to turn the somewhat bleak images into plates, then that someone had bought them at great expense(one of the plates had the original price still stuck on the back - 67.50 Deutschemarks). Then, as I gloried in their incredible kitschness I realised the most astounding fact of all: I had to own them. Yes. All fourteen.

Thieu managed to talk the man into selling the lot for 30 Euros - which works out to be just over 2 euros each. Bargain. Of course, Thieu started googling when we got home to see if they were worth anything but, surprise surprise, they're not. I don't care though. I'm dying to use them. They even have hooks on the back so perhaps I should hang them on the wall when they're not in use? I kind of like just casually telling people to grab themselves a plate off the wall when they come around for dinner.

I have subsequently spent a lot of time thinking about the plates, wondering if there are other towns with Christmas plates (presumably there are) and how far back in time they go. I've also wondered about the previous owner. Some of the plates were still in their boxes. Maybe they were unwanted Christmas pressies to a mum or grandma? Or maybe they're shop remnants. I wish I knew. Of course, kitsch and it's associated high risks of pathos and sentimentality is almost definitely bad for the digestion. Oh well. If people start weeping during dinner at least I can blame the Darmstatt Christmas plates and not my cooking.

The weather is cooling here in Frankers and I have a feeling summer might be over. Just like that. At least this year I felt like I was onto it, wearing skirts even when I was actually freezing, going for picnics and swims in the local lake. We were going for lots of bike rides too until Thieu's bike was stolen from the back yard. Bummer.

We are off the Norway for three weeks on Monday. Auntie Hil said that Norway always reminds her of Adrian Mole's poem and once she pointed that out I couldn't stop thinking about it either:

Norway! Land of difficult spelling.
Hiding your beauty behind strange vowels.
Land of long nights, short days, and dots over 'O's.
Ruminating majestic reindeers
Tread warily on ice floes
Ever aware of what happened to the
Titanic.
One day I will sojourn to your shores
I live in the middle of England
But!
Norway! My soul resides in your watery ~~fiords fyords fiiords~~ Inlets.

I plan to keep an eye out for ruminating majestic reindeer plates while I'm there.

Still here...

2010-06-30T05:28:00.002+10:00

Yes, much slackness on the blogging front and this is just a placeholding post to say I am still here, I'm not abandoning the blog, just dealing with a pressing deadline. Hopefully all will ease off mid July.

It's summer. Finally. Today it even reached 30 degrees. I know! Insanity. Some kindergartens even closed early owing to the extreme weather conditions. The beer bike is back doing the rounds. Perhaps I'll celebrate meeting my deadline by taking one out for a spin.

The Long Haul

2010-05-08T00:40:00.004+10:00

As we settled into our plane seats in Frankfurt last Monday afternoon, about to take off on the first leg of our 22 hour journey, the kid said 'I'm not going to watch any television on this trip.' I felt my stomach drop. 'What?' I said. 'Why not?' Mads shrugged. 'Don't want to.' 'What about the ipod?' I said. 'There's lots of stuff on there for you to watch or play.'
She shook her head. 'Nope.'

I then found myself entering into one of the surreal reverso topsy-turvy conversations I often seem to have with my daughter. I began pleading with her to at least try watching some television, just a little bit maybe. Perhaps she'd enjoy it. There wasn't much else to do on a long haul flight after all. I even explained to her, in quite a bit of technical detail, how the whole 'eyes going square' thing simply doesn't happen on a plane. I may have even said; 'If you don't watch television you can't....' But what could I threaten exactly? On a plane? None of it made no difference anyway. She was firm. No TV.

'You realise,' I said to Matt, 'that we are the only parents in the history of parents who have tried to force their child to watch tv.' It reminded me of the time that I'd heard myself saying to her; 'OK that's enough broccoli for today.' She'd eaten almost an entire head of it. Raw.

'So what are you going to do to pass the time?' I asked. 'Because mummy's going to be watching a lot of television.'
'And so is daddy,' said Matt. Mads pulled out the flight safety card.
'I'm going to look at this,' she said. Then she smiled. 'I really hope we get to use those inflatable slides this time.'

She stuck to her word about the no tv. The only time she watched anything was when they played the obligatory 'Welcome' videos as we approached KL and then Melbourne. I'm not exactly sure how the rest of the time was spent. We drew. We read. We made a book to give to Sally Rippin called 'The Magical Fat Man and his Hat.' We made a rattle for the niecephew out of a juice bottle, some paper and a hair elastic. We played a game with the two toys I'd shoved in her bag at the last minute - a manky My Little Pony (handed on to us pre-manked by another child) and a plastic brontosaurus called Hungry. Do you know how hard it is to make up a game involving a glittery pony and a brontosaurus? I was really wishing I'd grabbed at least one carnivore. I used my old favourite plotline and had one be mean to the other one and then the two of them made up and put on a concert.

Just as we were doing the big finale number the steward came over with a small orange bag. 'For the baby,' she said, smiling at me sympathetically. Mads and I looked around in alarm. Had a baby somehow managed to sneak into the seat beside us? But no, the steward meant Mads. And the present was a rattle with a blue elephant's head. When she left Mads whispered; 'She must know about auntie Hil's baby.' 'Yes,' I agreed, so, so thankful that Mads hadn't hit the roof about being referred to as a baby. She's kind of touchy about such things.

There are positives though, of course. Luckily the kid slept for the KL to Melbourne leg. Luckily we didn't get to use the inflatable slides. Luckily we're here - here where the birds look like jewels and sound like they're screaming obscenities, and where old ladies smile at your kid rather than looking at her like she's some kind of pustulant growth. Luckily I made it here before the niecephew arrived. And luckily it's several weeks before I have to get back on a plane and go through it all again. Hooray-ness.

Preparations

2010-05-02T05:20:00.002+10:00

The volcanic ash seems to have cleared from the air so it looks like we'll be boarding a plane on Monday. I can't say I'm looking forward to the flight - I always smile bitterly when they say 'Now, sit back and enjoy your trip.' Yeah, what fun. I'm also becoming a much more nervy traveller in my old age. It doesn't help that I spend way too much time with air traffic controllers who blithely say things like 'we're due for a major air disaster you know. Hasn't been one for a while.' Thanks for that.

Still.
It will be worth it once I get there. There will be babies to admire and people to catch up with and shops to visit. I remember last time it took me a few days to adjust to understanding everything that was going on. It was way too much information all of a sudden. I wonder if it'll be the same this time?

OK, better go and pack.

Spring Fever

2010-04-24T22:12:00.005+10:00

It was Wald Woche at Mads' kindergarten last week, which meant they spent every morning in the nearby woods. Mads, despite a firmly-held love of sticks and a new-found passion for the Faraway Tree books was not keen on Wood Week and protested loudly each morning as we headed off. So on Friday she said she didn't feel well ("my eyebrows hurt...") I assumed it was a wood-avoidance technique and used the very same lines used on me all those years ago by my own mother: 'Well, get up and see how you feel after breakfast" - the follow-up to this being "Well, you're up now so you may as well go." A magic, unbeatable technique. I didn't have a single day off school until I was 14.

When Thieu picked Mads up after lunch she silently wrapped her arms around his neck and put her head on his shoulder. Oops. The eyebrow ache had developed into a headache, her cheeks were pink and hot. She had a feverish sleep last night, calling out strange, random things like 'But I must get to the boat!' and around 1 am she held out some invisible item of clothing and asking me to assist her putting it on. Consequently I have spent most of the last 24 hours either reading or patting (and of course, adjusting the invisible clothing).

While she was dozing yesterday afternoon I sat on her floor and made the little characters in the photo above, being deeply inspired by this blog post. My idea was originally that Mads and I would do them together, but she's not up for it right now.

Outside it's glorious. In here the shutters are closed and the kid is asleep.

Bookish

2010-04-20T20:42:00.007+10:00

Is there a nicer person in the world than Sally Rippin? Seriously, I think you'd be hard pressed to find one. When I heard about the new series she was writing for Hardie Grant called Billie B Brown I knew I needed it. I had planned to buy it during our Oz visit next month but Sally beat me to it. A set of Billie B arrived in the mail today. Such happiness! Thanks Sally. I already love them and I know Mads will too.

There are a few other books I need to pick up when in Oz. My sister Hilary's new series, Space Scout, for one. And also Ebony McKenna's book Ondine. My own bookish news is that the first of my Tweenie Genie books has been picked up by a German publisher and will be released, fully-translated and re-illustrated (in a more German style) in Spring 2011. Most exciting and good.

Something Missing

2010-04-19T05:01:00.003+10:00

The air traffic in Frankfurt is so constant that you don't notice it most of the time - except maybe on very clear, blue days if you glance up and see the sky completely criss-crossed with contrails. From our dining room window we can see a constant stream of planes - as one leaves the right-hand side another appears at the left. So it was strange looking out the window on Friday morning and not seeing a single plane anywhere. I had a brief moment of claustrophobia, and then I just enjoyed looking at the smooth, perfect sky.

The weekend was fine and we spent most of it outside, in our upstairs neighbour's Schrieber Garten on Saturday and walking to a beer garden in the forest on Sunday. What we kept noticing was the silence - no rumble of planes except for the occasional whirr of a light aircraft.

At the end of our forest day today as we neared the tram there was a familiar noise above - 747 approaching Frankfurt. It looked strangely unfamiliar and wrong.

We enjoyed the quiet and the perfect blue skies for three days - but at the same time I am hoping we will have no troubles getting to Australia in early May.

Hysterical Towns

2010-04-06T20:54:00.006+10:00

Yesterday we arrived back from a ten day Easter trip around what is known at the 'Romantic Road.' This includes a number of historic towns such as Dinkelbuhl, Rothenburg and Augsburg. We also went to Fussen so we could visit Castle Neuschwanstein as Mads has been bitterly disappointed by the broken-down, crumbly castles we've dragged her to so far. No kid could argue with the castley-ness of Neuschwanstein. You can see it behind our heads in the photo above. I'm not quite sure why Mads and I are pulling those faces. I think perhaps Mads is yawning. And maybe mine was meant to mean 'You really think I'm going to get this kid to walk up there?' Or maybe it's a hangover from when I travelled around Europe with Shell. She often used to convince me to copy the expressions of statues or monuments we saw, then she'd take a photo. So maybe I just don't feel right unless I'm doing something dumb in a picture.

As we headed home yesterday Thieu said 'I don't ever want to see another historical town again.' And I had to agree with him. Once you've walked around one for a while and gone 'isn't it quaint?' and 'aren't the doors low?' a few hundred times you start getting bored. So then you have a bad coffee served to you by a grumpy-looking woman in a dirndl. And you stare at wrought-iron pot-plant holders shaped like cats or dogs with springs for necks in the shops and wonder, both silently and aloud about who would ever buy such a thing. Especially in a historical town. Then you wander past a torture museums and insist that your family pose for a photograph, even though there's no way you're going in. Because why should you be the only one photographically humiliated for posterity? I told them to pull 'baddie' faces for the shot below. Mads, as you can see, took this direction very seriously. It looks like her face is imploding from the badness, don't you think?

I had a shocking schnupfen for most of the time too, so although it was nice to have a holiday, it was very very nice to return home. It was especially nice to see these appearing everywhere:

Thank God.

& now what?

2010-03-22T22:20:00.005+11:00

One of my current favourite German words is die Puppenecke - the dolls' corner - with 'Puppen' being dolls and 'Ecke' being corner. Mads and I had fun the other day coming up with other types of 'ecke's, like, the corner where all the snails hung out would be die schneckenecke. OK...so that was the only one we came up with. But I still like it.

My favourite Ecke in the flat recently has been the cane chair by the window where I've been working on the blanket for my unborn niecephew. It's a light, sunny spot to work, close to the teeve and the cd player. I've spent some very pleasant - between-drafts time in this corner, working away, listening to music or watching DVDs (Madmen, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad).

Then on Saturday I finished the blanket and I feel a little lost. I can't really justify watching tv without a project to work on. It doesn't seem right. Besides, there is a new book to start work on and there will be revisions to the teen novel too very soon. Looks like the days of the sunny corner might be over for now at least.

p.s. cushions by Auntie Cookie.

Toothy Car

2010-03-19T06:34:00.007+11:00

It was a sunny 15 degrees today in Frankfurt and we were sweltering. A perfect day for grabbing the camera and taking photographs of strange things. The van in the photo above was by far the strangest thing I saw. It's so weird and somehow menacing. In my eagerness to photograph it I forgot to pay any attention to what it was actually advertising, and now I can only wonder. Mobile dentist perhaps? Because I can be a bit thick I was actually marvelling at how amazing it was that the smile had so perfectly lined up with the rest of the face when the van had stopped. I literally only realised ten minutes ago that, of course, the mouth probably doesn't spin around at all. I wish that it did though. How cool it would be to see those gleaming white teeth rotating endlessly.

My other favourite sighting of the day was this:

because I've always been partial to a bit of texta-facial hair action and because from a distance it looked so real that I did, just for a moment, think it was really a bearded lady.

Frühlingsmüdekeit

2010-03-17T06:14:00.005+11:00

In Germany there seems to be a festival for things I've never considered celebrating before (the arrival of asparagus, for instance) and there is a word to describe concepts or phenomena I've never experienced before.

At a friend's house for dinner on Saturday night Thieu mentioned he tired a lot lately, and low in energy. I pointed out that Mads has been the same - she even went back to being a schlafen kind at kindergarten after not having a nap there for months.

'That's because of Frühlingsmüdekeit,' said our friend. 'Haven't you noticed everyone going on about it?' Well no, we hadn't. Apparently feeling exhausted and lethargic is a common complaint at this time of year. Your seratonin levels are low after a few months of low sunlight and, traditionally, a lack of fresh fruit and vegetables (although of course now everything is just imported. I bought strawberries just last week). Frühlingsmüdekeit basically means 'spring tiredness'.

'You need to exercise,' said our friend. And so, on Monday I went to Aldi, having been tipped off that they were selling rollerblades this week. Ah Aldi. Remember how the Faraway Tree is always growing different fruit everytime it's visited? Aldi reminds me of that. One week it's selling trumpets. The next it's unicycles. Then car radios. And you find yourself grabbing things you never knew existed but suddenly must, must have. You have to be prepared to brave the fearsome old ladies who ram you with their shopping trolleys if they think you've taken more than your fairshare of rainpants (another Aldi speciality) but it's worth it.

Mads was thrilled with the rollerblades. We headed down to the park after kindy yesterday so she could bask in the envy of other children. Simulataneoulsy I stumbled across another cure for Frühlingsmüde - laughing at your kid as she learns to rollerblade.

(Luckily Aldi was also selling knee, wrist and elbow pads).

Something to Chew On

2010-03-11T20:06:00.005+11:00

There are two things that I continually do which by this stage in my life I should have learned not to do. One is tell Mads about play-dates in advance (because she's so, like, devo when they fall through)and the other is to get overly excited about an up-coming event.

Our trip to London last weekend was kind of a disaster. We didn't even take any pictures because the whole thing was mostly traumatising. There were good things about it, of course - catching up with friends, mostly understanding stuff on the TV - but there were a whole lot of things that weren't so good. Missing our flight from Frankfurt for one. We decided to be super-smart and take only hand-luggage which we figured meant that we wouldn't have to be at the airport quite so early. Clearly we were too cocky because when we arrived at the gate it had close 5 minutes before and they wouldn't let us on. Oh bother, as Mads would say.

So then we had to buy new tickets (for a a lot more than the original price) and endure a lecture from the Lufthansa rep on making sure we arrived two hours before an international flight. Afterwards it dawned on us that if we'd checked in luggage they would've been much less likely to take off without paging us. Shtoopid.

Then it started to snow. Heavily.
Then the flight was delayed.
Then they made us board and sit in the plane for an hour and a half before taking off.
Then there was the hot stinky tube ride into the British museum where our friend had been waiting for us for two hours.
And that was just Saturday. One Sunday there was my near-death experience.

The previous weekend's hilarious near death experience was almost being hit by flying roof tiles as we went sight-seeing in Strasbourg (during a cyclone - yes, smart). This weekend it was near-death by choking. I met up with an old work friend who is living in London and we decided to get all Englishy and have a roast lunch and a cider. And it was all going well until a piece of beef became firmly lodged in my throat. Gaspingly, blue-in-the-face lodged. I think it's the closest I've ever come to actually dying and all I could think while it was happening was; 'this is so humiliating.' I just knew that it would taint everyone's sympathy for my passing because of the comic way I'd departed. People might not laugh at first, but after a little while it'd be 'Oh yeah Meredith. She's the one who choked to death on a Sunday roast. Ha ha.' Too, too embarassing.

Somehow I managed to force the bit down and I am seriously considering a return to committed vegetarianism. Either that or a baby food only diet.

On the whole I was happy to return - alive - to Frankfurt, where I have continued working on the blanket I'm making for my sister's unborn child. Crochet is my daggy secret - it has none of the urban-cool of knitting - but as I am now nearly 40 now I don't really care so much. In fact, I'm nearly at the stage where I'm prepared to crochet in public. Nearly, but not quite. I have finally finished the squares and am in the process of joining them up and sewing in the loose threads. I have totally ripped off the design and colour scheme from here although I added green to the middle and I'm joining the squares up with caramel because I aint no copy-cat OK? (Now I think about it white would've probably been a better joining choice than a baby-poo colour but perhaps this will end up being a good thing).

My blanket won't look nearly as neat and professional as the Bee Handmade one as I am a terrible corner-cutter and I also can't count which is kind of important with this sort of thing and means that some of my squares are a little wonky. But as a project-abandoner from way back I'm proud of myself at having stuck at it.

So this week my plan is to finish the blanket. And remember to chew.

Haupt Bahnhof

2010-03-05T07:02:00.011+11:00

What do you want to hear about? There was the whole Faschings Carnival thing a couple of weeks ago, where the locals went bezerk and dressed up (the adults more than the children) as pumpkins, lone rangers, clowns, sexy she-devils etc and paraded through the streets throwing lollies at the crowd. Thieu had made himself a very tall crown to wear to the main parade which the lollies kept landing in. Mads was mortified by the crown and told him that perhaps he should just leave it at home. Which of course Thieu didn't. And the success with catching the lollies in it has him already making plans for next year's hat which will be shaped like a satellite dish.

And then there was our spontaneous trip to Strasbourg last weekend where we woke up and said 'yeah, let's go to France' and were there in time for baguette avec fromage at lunchtime. We walked around admiring the lovely old buildings constructing sentences in our new hybrid French-German language (Frerman) and then narrowly avoided decapitation when the strong winds started blowing the roof tiles off the lovely old roofs.

There's also our upcoming visit to London this weekend which I am so, so looking forward to - I'm tired of my muteness and looking forward to catching up with some friends.

But I don't know if I can be bothered writing about any of these things. I've got mid-book laziness and don't feel like writing much at all.

The photo above is from a current advertising campaign and translates as (or so google translate tells me) 'What now, dear parents?' I've seen it around a lot but this one was spotted at the main train station - Haupt Bahnhof - before we boarded the inter-city to Strazzers.

The other thing that we always visit at the 'hof is the model railway. Mads is fascinated by it:

It's very detailed. In fact, I'd visited it a few times before I noticed one particular detail on the wall around the miniature playground:

I pointed it out to Thieu.
'A swear word,' I said. 'In a model train diorama.'
'I don't know why you're so surprised,' he said. 'That newsagency over there has a range of crack pipes on display in its front window.'

To finish, here's a picture of Mads looking through a round thing in Strasbourg. Our dad used to like photographing us examining leaves. Maybe he was hoping to turn us into botanists. I like photographing Mads looking through round things. Not sure why.

Clemintine's Day

2010-02-16T05:01:00.007+11:00

Sometimes other people's blogs - the ones written by people I don't know - make me feel bad about my life. They are often filled with beautifully lit shots of their organised homes, their possessions and the delicious-looking batch of something they've just whipped up using all organic ingredients. Their blog lives seem so perfect, so effortlessly dirt-free, so full of gorgeous stuff and there is this suggestion of limitless time.

But then yesterday I thought 'to hell with it, I can pretend to be like that too.' So observe above: my artfully arranged tulip (a Valentine's Day gift from Thieu) laid over some clemintines, because Mads gets 'valentines' and 'clemintines' confused and presented me with one in the morning. Isn't that adorable?

What you can't see is that just out of frame the entire contents of our cupboards is laid out on the floor because Mads wanted to make a house for the bottle opener, that she has named 'Spanner.' And you also can't see the bags under my eyes because she'd been sick for three days and Thieu and I had undergone some sort of sleep-deprivation torture where every half an hour during the night she'd woken up yelling 'I need to blow my nose!' or 'I'm thirsty!' and then, later 'I need to go to the toilet!' In this photo you also can't hear Mads getting upset every time I tried to thank Thieu for the beautiful necklace he most unexpectedly gave me in the morning, saying that I just wasn't praising her gift enough - a set of pen drawings on individual squares of toilet paper (as well as the clemintine, of course). And you also can't see that I'm at that point with my latest draft of my latest project where I hate every word I've written, even the 'ands'. Especially the 'ands'.

But now of course I remind myself that there are plenty of 'bare my soul' and 'rip my guts out' blogs I could be reading, if I so chose, but I'd actually much rather read the ones that show people's enviable homes and perfect lives and sigh a little sigh of envious pleasure.

Have another look at my photo. Nice, isn't it?

Anyway. Hope you had a Happy Clemintines Day.

Signs

2010-02-09T08:03:00.008+11:00

On the whole I'm not really big on dogs. They smell damp, I'm irritated by their blind devotion and I don't like the little plastic bags of poo that seem to go with dog ownership. But having said that, if I had to have a dog, I'd choose a dachshund. It's the ridiculous proportions, I think. Long body. Stumpy legs. It's funny. I pass this sign when I'm dropping M off at kinder and I always admire it. I like the way it's so specific: No dachshunds on this grass - any other type of dog ok. I also love the way the dachshund has just skillfully slid out from underneath the red line, like it's saying 'yeah, well just you try to stop me. My stumpy legs and ridiculously long body makes it easy for me to escape your stupid sign.'

Further down the same path is this sign:

I don't know what kind of dog this one is, but it's not nearly as sneaky as the dachshund. It's just standing there passively, letting that red line hold it back.

Another favourite sign of mine belongs to a chain of health food shops:

I noticed this sign first because I have a second cousin called Freya. Then the more I noticed it, the more I realised there was to love about it. Firstly, how great is it to have a health food shop called a reformhaus. It sounds so severe and punitive. Reformhaus Freya sounds even better - it makes me think of the title of a cheap paperback from the 50s with a lurid cover.

Here's another shop sign I love:

Doesn't Schrumpf sound exactly like the noise of biting into an apple?

This one is good too:

I would love to meet Herr Schlapp - or maybe view him from a distance. I can picture him so clearly. He'd be some leering, red-faced middle-aged man with large hands and a cheap suit. I'm always on the lookout for names that would hyphenate well with Badger and I think Schlapp-Badger is pretty much perfect. I bet he causes poor old Herr Habel no end of grief.

This is Not a Kindergarten

2010-02-02T00:13:00.003+11:00

The big blockbuster art exhibition at the Frankfurt gallery this winter was Botticelli. I wasn't going to see it, especially after going to the Uffizi in January and seeing a room full of Botticellis there. But then one of the German mothers from the kindergarten invited me and as I knew I'd get in for free with my gallery card I decided I would.

My friend was bringing along her sister and also her child - an incredibly well-behaved, perfect little three year old who always makes me doubt my parenting skills. I decided against bringing Mads as Botticelli isn't her favourite. Too decorative, not enough substance, she reckons.

It was the right decision, for the moment we walked in with V's little girl the gallery guards were on our case.
'Don't let her touch anything,' they said - like we were going to let her start rubbing her hands all over the Birth of Venus (which wasn't there anyway - it was at the Uffizi). 'Don't get too close.' 'Don't stand there.' etc etc. I started getting a little jumpy.

The worst incident was when we were standing in front of a wall of information reading the notes - there wasn't a single painting anywhere nearby at all. V noticed that there was quite a strong backlight - the whole space had been set up in this very reverential, church-like way with dim rooms and spot lights - and she started making a shadow-puppet bird on the wall to amuse her daughter. The aunt joined in, making her hand into a dog. Straight away, one of the guards rushed over and said something in German and the puppet show abruptly ended.
'What did he say?' I asked.
'He said "This is not a kindergarten. You have to be respectful",' said V.

'This is very typical of art galleries in Germany,' said the aunt. 'You are not supposed to enjoy yourself. You are supposed to take it very seriously.' I looked around and saw exactly what she meant. People looked like they were in pain - solemn, gloomy faces, clutching their gallery guides and frowning at the paintings, like somehow they weren't giving them what they'd hoped for.

When I told Thieu about it later he said 'let's go in tomorrow with Mads. That will make them appreciate the next well-behaved, quiet German child that goes in.'

Five Day Forecast

2010-01-28T09:09:00.003+11:00

I like the way the weather people try to break up the repetitiveness of a forecast like this by distinguishing between 'light snow' and a 'light snow shower'.

Thieu is still attempting to dry his shirts by hanging them on the balcony. If you tap them, they shatter.

Never mind the Ps and Qs

2010-01-22T23:44:00.004+11:00

Did you notice how in my last post I didn't apologise for the lack of recent posting. That was because one of my New Year's Resolutions is to cut down on apologising and saying thankyou.

I have always been a big over-thanker and in Germany I've been told that it's frowned upon as being insincere and something that English people do. God forbid. I think it's something Australians do too, although I suspect my over-thanking is excessive. This would be a typical exchange for me if, for instance, I'd gone into a shop to buy a house brick.

Me: (handing over house brick) Thanks! (presumably meaning - "thanks for allowing me to buy this house brick").
Shop assistant: Would you like that wrapped?
Me: Thanks!
Shop assistant: that will be ten dollars.
Me: (handing over the money) Thanks! (presumably meaning - "thanks for accepting my money for the purchase of this house brick").
Shop assistant: Would you like a bag?
Me: No thanks!
Shap assistant: Goodbye.
Me: (leaving shop exhausted) Thanks. Thanks a lot.

I'd continued this bad habit here in Germany until Matty pointed out, when he visited us in October, that when you hand over money in Germany and say 'danke' it basically means 'you've done such a great job that I want you to keep the change. No really, keep it.' This was quite a revelation and explained the confused looks I'd been getting at the supermarket checkout and train station. Clearly it was a habit I had to break and I'm trying, although it's a struggle.

The other thing - the apologising - isn't too bad, although I do slip up occasionally. The thing that helps me there is that the word for excuse me - Entschuldigung - is such an awkward word to get out. Once I've managed to form it in my brain, the recipient of my apology is often long gone.

Over here it's considered ridiculous to apologise for things that didn't happen. If you don't actually crash into someone, but narrowly miss instead, why apologise for it? If you do, the other person will look at you in confusion and say 'but nothing happened,' then walk away muttering 'weirdo.' As for that bizarre English habit of apologising when someone crashes into you ('Oh my Lord I'm so sorry for being in your way just when you weren't looking where you were going!') that's just not done either.

Yesterday a woman stopped me on the street and started asking for directions. Maybe I could've worked it out, but I snapped into auto pilot.
'Sorry,' I said (in German) 'I don't speak German.' She turned way angrily, saying what I think basically translated as
'Yeah, that'd be right. Weirdo.'

So on the whole, I'm very much into my not-apologising resolution. I think it'll help me blend in.

Here are some other resolutions I'd make if there were any chance of them being achieveable:

- grow more bottom eyelashes (just to be clear - that's eyelashes on my bottom eyelids, not eyelashes on my bottom). I swear I used to have them. Now they're mostly gone. Oh how I wish everytime I'd brushed an eyelash off my cheek in irritation I'd stored it in some dainty little eyelash box so it could be transplanted now that I need replacements.

-learn to speak German. This just aint happening. Mads officially understands way more than me. And she loves to correct my pronunciation. Show-off kid.

Ugg Love

2010-01-22T01:09:00.005+11:00

OK, so I have to admit I've owned ugg boots before. Growing up in Ringwood it was practically manditory. The thing I remember about them most was that if you walked more than a few hundred metres in them your feet began to melt from overheating. And I remember that they became smelly quickly. It was only later that I realised they were also deeply unfashionable and something you should probably not admit to ever having owned.

So at first I was quite surprised to see the popularity of ugg boots in Frankfurt - especially on otherwise stylishly dressed women. Someone told me it was because Posh Spice wore some once, but I haven't been able to find any photographic evidence of this. And then as the temperature began to drop I began finding myself looking at the uggs around me with a certain amount of envy. The ugg wearers looked comfy. They weren't hoping from one foot to the other in an agitated fashion. They seemed at ease with the ugliness of their footwear. I found myself examining at a pair in a shop. Do you know how much ugg boots cost here? Anywhere between 160 euros to 300 euros. Go and currency-convert that and truly your ghast will be flabbered.

Things sped up after that. There was a quick email to the Parental Unit,which set in motion a trip to the Vic market. Then lo - I had acquired myself a Christmas present. 75 Aussie bucks thanks very much. Stubbie holder thrown in for free.

At first I promised myself that my uggs would only take me to the local park and the swimming pool - nowhere else. But then I found myself conveniently forgetting I had them on and heading to the supermarket in them. And then to the further-away supermarket. Then one day I thought 'stuff it, I'm going to kindy in them,' and that's what I did, although I could see the teachers staring ('there goes that weird foriegn mother in her 300 euro shoes'). And you know what? It felt great. My toes were so snuggly and happy that I stopped caring. Warm feet = happiness. I smiled smugly at anyone who stared. Yes, they're ugg boots. They feel good. Stuff you. The day we went tobogganing and mum was practically crying from the coldness of her toes confirmed my ugg love because my feet were fine.

So now I wear them everywhere. And they don't even stink yet.

Snowflakes

2009-12-18T23:18:00.005+11:00

The locals are convinced on a strong link between inappropriate clothing and illness. Go outside during winter without decent shoes and you'll get a kidney infection. Leave a milimetre of neck skin uncovered and your lungs will shrivel up. Three days into this latest bout of cold weather Mads' eye gunked up. Perhaps it was because her tights aren't thick enough - whatever the reason I couldn't send poor old puss-eyes off to kinder like that so it was off to the doctor with us on Wednesday morning. Mum and dad decided to fill the time by going to the travel agent.

On the walk back home from the doctor's, it started snowing. Mads and I walked along with out mouths open, trying to catch snowflakes. When mum and dad arrived home we told them about the snowflake-in-mouth-catching and mum said 'we did the same thing.'

My dad is full of praise for Frankfurt ('I like the architecture! The people in the shops are very helpful!'), but my mum seems somewhat underwhelmed. I took her to H & M - a shop she'd been keen to visit and she was disapointed by their underwear range.
'What were you expecting?' I asked. It looked like a pretty standard range of underwear to me.
'Just something a little more cutting edge,' mum said.

I'm not sure where you need to go for cutting edge undies. Maybe Japan?

Last Sunday we went to the natural history museum, which has an enormous diplidocus and a t.rex model out the front.
'They're not very good, are they?' mum said.
'What do you mean?' I asked.
'Well, they're a bit cheesy, don't you think?'

Mum does approve of the local bread though. And the beer, which is not too fizzy.

Arrivals

2009-12-14T20:52:00.002+11:00

There were a number of exciting arrivals last week. On Friday a bubbled-wrapped package from Hardie Grant turned up containing Tweenie Genie 2 with its pretty rasperry cover. Happinesss.

Then, on Saturday morning, there was an even more exciting arrival: Arma and Arpa. (They were not in bubble wrap but definitely well rugged up.) Mads and I got up at 5 am to catch the train out to the airport to meet them, and although we had a bit of difficulty finding the exit point we did eventually locate them. Mads dressed in her Sam Sam outfit for the occasion. It was a very joyful reunion and we may not let them leave again.

Up until this point it really hasn't been that cold in Frankfurt. But on Saturday, the wind started blowing from the north (that is, the North Pole) and things have suddenly become a whole lot colder. The weather forecasts all kept promising snow on Sunday and I had early reports from other families living just out of Frankfurt that there was enough snow where they were to make small snowmen. I was desperate for it to snow here, too. Sadly, we didn't get anything like that amount of snow - just a few flakes whirling around in a dandruff-like way - but still, it's the first time we'd experienced snow in an urban setting and it was exciting. Today's top is 0 degrees, but no snow unfortunately. Maybe there will be some by Christmas though.

Der Hund ist Lustig

2009-12-11T23:46:00.005+11:00

For a long time Mads resisted using any German words other than 'kartoffel' and 'nein'. But gradually - so gradually - this is changing. I get the feeling that she understands a lot of what is said to her, especially when it's along the lines of 'do you want anything more to eat/drink?' as well as 'wash your hands and let's go outside.' She has also just recently started singing entire songs in German - I think some of the words aren't entirely right (I can't actually tell)- but it's still amazing for me to hear her singing away in another language.

Then this week there has been another big jump: she has started talking to other children in German. There is just a slight issue that what she says doesn't always make a lot of sense. I suspect that sometimes she is quoting lyrics from songs she's learning at kinder. Still, I'm so impressed that she's even trying. Yesterday for instance she bowled up to a small boy and said 'St Nickolas kommt heute Abend!' which was not strictly true but got a very positive response. Then she said 'Der Hund is lustig,' and the boy looked at her blankly, probably because we were in a shop and there were no dogs around, funny or otherwise. I guess it's lucky that she's still at an age where kids do just say random, seemingly non-sensical things. I remember a small kid coming up to me in a park once in Melbourne and saying in a very confidential tone; 'I'm wearing underpants.'
'Good work,' I said. 'So am I.' I mean, what else can you say?

'Tschüss!' said Mads to the boy, as we left the shop. 'Bitte aufräumen!'

Loser State

2009-12-11T06:13:00.005+11:00

We seem to have lost Victoria from our Australia puzzle.

For a while I kept spotting it in odd places around the flat and a couple of time thought it was some food-based item squashed onto the floor. I even laughed about what an unattractive shape it is, once removed from its neighbours. It looks like something that accidentally went through the wash in someone's pocket. But this morning I couldn't find Victoria anywhere and I feel bad about it. Like a traitor. If it had been NSW that wouldn't have mattered so much, but to lose your own State, that feels unforgiveable.

It's probably just as well then that the grandparents are arriving on Saturday to give us a top up on all things Victorian.

2009-12-08T06:46:00.002+11:00

So, what happens if you leave your boots out on the 6th of December in Hessen? St Nicolaus comes along and fills them up. It's kind of like a early indicator of if you're on track for a good haul of Christmas presents - if you've been good, your boots are filled up with tasty treats. If you've been bad, you get sticks. We did wonder about this, because Mads is quite fond of sticks and we thought she might prefer them. St Nicolaus was onto it though and put in some pretzel sticks in with the lollies. Oh, what a humourous guy he is.

In other thrilling news, today I had my first ever German haircut. I've been putting it off for ages, worried that I might end up with something like this but finally I decided that I had to do it, to hell with the risk. Besides, I figured if it was truly terrible I could just hide it under a hat for the next three months.

So I went to a place around the corner that a friend recommended - no appointment, 12 euros. The most alluring part was that the hair dressers there don't speak any English so I knew I wouldn't have to engage in painful small talk. The result? A twelve euro haircut. Eh. Oh well. It'll do. My favourite part was that at the end I had the option of whether I wanted the hairdresser to dry my hair or if I wanted to dry my own. Of course I went the dry my own option - partly because I always hate the way it looks after it's been 'done' by a hairdresser and also because doing it myself meant I could get the whole process over with even quicker. It didn't lower the price however, which I thought was a little unreasonable.

Laternin Fest

2009-12-05T04:49:00.004+11:00

In November there is a German celebration called St Martin's Day where all the small children walk around holding lanterns. St Martin was this guy who was walking through the snow with his lantern one day and came across a man, freezing to death. St Martin took off his coat, ripped it in half and gave half to the man. (I imagine it was a cloak, or some sort of wrappy thing because otherwise surely half a coat would be of minimal use to either man.) So St Martin's day is all about celebrating this gesture (although no one wears ripped up coats I noticed).

I suffered a certain amount of stress when instructed by Mads' kindy teacher that I needed to purchase a 'stick with a light bulb on the end' so Mads could hang her lantern on it. It's a strange thing, searching for something in the shops when really you have no idea what it is exactly that you are looking for. As it turned out I easily recognised the item I was searching for. It was the stick with the small light bulb dangling from the end. That was a relief, but there was further stress when I realised the stick needed batteries - two 'baby batteries' the instructions said. Baby batteries? Never heard of them. I sent Thieu out - he is the battery guy - and he came through with the goods. I'm still not sure why they're called baby batteries though. They weren't even small.

So at 5 pm the following evening Mads and I (Thieu was working) loaded the lantern up onto the stick and joined the other parent/child combos at the kinder. Then we paraded through the backstreets of Langen until coming to a halt outside the local, and rather drab, Langen pizza shop. Then, for some reason that is not clear to me, everyone began to sing a German song to the tune of 'Oh When The Saints Go Marching In.' Maybe we were begging for food? No food was forth-coming, unfortunately, and we all turned and marched back to the kindergarten.

At the kindergarten I bought some soup, a pretzel, some kinder-punsch and a gluhwein and staggered back into the kinder room to find all the chairs were occupied. A man saw me looking around, stood up and carefully lay his coat and umbrella across one of the seats, eyeing me with a look that clearly said 'this is my seat. Rack off.' Then he left the room, presumably to purchase food. So Mads and I stood and somehow managed to balance all the items in my hands without spilling very much at all. 15 minutes later the man returned with no food picked up his belongings and departed, seemingly oblivious to my hateful glares. Had he understood any of the St Martin's Day message of sharing and being neighbourly? Luckily, the gluhwein had kicked in by then and I resisted grabbing his coat and ripping it in two.

Next Hessen tradition: finding out what happens to your boots on the evening of Dec 6..

I still call Australia tasty

2009-11-04T07:22:00.004+11:00

The sudden shift in seasons has taken us a little by surprise. Weren't we frolicking through golden hued leaves in light-weight clothing just a few weeks ago? Temperatures of 9 and lower sent us scuttling for warmer clothing. But even wearing all our warmest Melbourne clothing at once didn't seem to be enough. I felt like someone who has turned up to an auction, feeling confident that they'll do well, only to have the bidding whirl past their highest price in a matter of seconds. Gazumped by the cold as Thieu put it.

It's feet that are my problem - coldness thereof. Mine are often cold when they have no good reason to be, so the downturn in degrees has not been pleasant for them. Last week I went and purchased some (fake) fur-lined boots and some furry innersoles to shove in them for good measure. Bliss. It's like sticking your foot into an inverted teddy bear, but it's certainly made a difference when I'm standing around in the local park.

So far Mads hasn't seemed too bothered by the coldness. In fact, she mostly complains about being too hot when we get on the train or go to the shops where the heating is insanely high. Otherwise, life continues as normal. Mads is enjoying playing with the Australia puzzle sent by the grandparents, but more as a set of ingredients than as a puzzle. Here is a tasty feast she cooked up for us on the weekend:

Somehow I managed to wangle it so that I scored Western Australia. It was a little dry in the middle but quite delicious around the coast. Thieu got South Australia and said it tasted of Farmers' Union iced coffee and frog cakes.

Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum Geburtstag

2009-10-27T07:53:00.003+11:00

Now that Mads has had her first German Birthday, I thought I'd make some notes on things I've learned about German Birthday customs. They may be of use next year.

No Pre-Birthday Birthdays

Maybe I'm wrong here, but my feeling is that in Australia if you are going to have a 'do' for a Birthday you choose the day closest to the actual day. So, if your Birthday is on a Saturday but you want to have a cake and champers at work, you'd do it on the Friday rather than wait until the Monday because it's closer in actual days. Is that right? In Germany it seems to be bad luck (or at least bad form) to pre-empt a Birthday. You don't wish people happy birthday in advance and you can't take a cake to the kindergarten before the day.

Also, I discovered to my horror, you are expected to bake a cake for your child's kindergarten birthday. Explaining that you are a terrible cook and the cake will be very flat makes no difference. You have to do it anyway.

Cake Carriers

I must admit I used to chortle whenever I saw people walking around carrying their cakes in one of these. I guess they are probably available in Australia, I'd just never seen one before. Maybe we are a nation that simply doesn't transport cakes much or maybe it's more about my own deliberate avoidance of cake-making or carrying. But when I realised there was no way out of making a cake for the kindergarten, I borrowed one of these transporters from someone and frankly, it was great. The cake barely moved as I swung it around, although that could have been because the cake was about 5 centimetres high and somewhat heavy. Still. It did make the train trip easier and the cloudy plastic stopped people from being able to see just how flat my cake was.

Birthday Registries

I've noticed that a lot of the big department stores here have a system where a kid who is about to have a birthday is given one of the store's plastic tubs to fill up with all the things they'd like their guests to give them. Then the tub is labelled and left in a shelf so that guests can come and choose things from it to give at the party. A sort of bridal registry, I guess, but for kids' gifts. Do these exist in Australia? I've not seen them.

And finally:
A kid dressed up as an obscure bright red super hero with bunny ears will attract less attention at Rome Termini than you might expect.

(See below)

Still here

2009-10-15T07:36:00.006+11:00

So yes, there has been slackness on the blogging front of late which has been owing, in part, to there being a large amount of writing to be done in a short amount of time and to our recent slew of visitors (all of which we adored having!). First there was the delightful Marisa who overcame an unfortunate incident with a bad burrito early on in her stay and rallied to play endless games of 'Super Mouse' with Mads, even though she was herself only ever allowed to be 'regular cat'.

Then last week Matti and Evie arrived, which was very exciting, not the least because they speak German so finally we had someone to tell us what our mail said. I did discover, however, that it's a little humilating to have an 8 year old order for you in a cafe, so I began pretending I had larynjitus. One evening we took them to one of the Sachsenhausen Apple Wine Bars where the photo above was taken. I am leaning forward because I always look like I have a pin head in photos (although my head is actually quite large) and frankly, I'm tired of it.

Another day there was a visit to a reconstructed Roman barracks. I didn't go on that excursion, but apparently there was an impressive display of barracks-related items including a sandal, some weapons and handcuffs. It made quite an impression on Mads. When she got home she went straight to her room and made handcuffs for the Donnies (both hard and soft) with pipe cleaners. Then she left them on her floor to think about their misdeeds.

Tomorrow morning I'm going to the Frankfurt book fair. It's the biggest book fair in the world and I suspect it will be a somewhat sobering experience in some ways, but it should be interesting too.

Then on Friday we are going to Itri to meet up with Evie and Matti for the weekend and hopefully catch the last of the rapidly diminishing European warmth.

In which my cooking nearly kills me

2009-09-22T05:34:00.002+10:00

There has been a definite seasonal change in Frankfurt during our absence. The days are much shorter, the air is cooler and there are piles of dead leaves everywhere. There is also a preponderance of pumpkins and squash. These are not only in the supermarket but arranged decoratively outside people's houses. Early halloween preparations? I'm not sure.

On Sunday we visited a nearby Schloss (which turned out to be another castle that didn't measure up to Mads' exacting castle standards) and, inspired by the general autumness of our surrounds, we collected up some chestnuts to roast in the oven that evening. I actually don't really like chestnuts all that much - they are so floury - but it seemed like a cosy, autumny thing to do. Besides, they kept falling out of the trees and clonking us on our heads.

'I have a feeling we're supposed to score the top of them,' I said to Thieu as I bunged the chestnuts in the oven, 'but that's probably just to make them easier to peel.'

Ah. Not so it would seem. 45 minutes later we heard a loud bang in the kitchen. The fine white powder covering the inside of the oven (and the fragments of shell) would have probably been enough to convince most people that a chestnut had exploded. But it wasn't enough proof for me. I took another chestnut out of the oven and popped it into the water-filled sink where it obligingly exploded for me, very nearly taking out an eye. I shut the oven door and no one ventured near the kitchen again until the oven was stone cold. The chestnuts tasted terrible.

Ah, autumn.

Pharlap

2009-09-10T22:43:00.005+10:00

When Mads and I were at the Melbourne Museum during the first week of our trip we were on our way to visit the poo in the body section and somehow ended up in the Australian history section instead. Maybe subconsciously I steered us there, thinking a bit of a top up on Australiana wouldn't hurt. We've definitely seen enough poos. Mads didn't seem all that impressed by Pharlap but she was intrigued by the archival footage of him playing nearby. She sat and watched the entire loop three or four times.

Nothing more was said about it until this afternoon when Mads announced she wanted to 'play Pharlap.' She, naturally, took the starring role as the great horse himself. What do you think my role was? One of the other horses, perhaps? The jockey? Perhaps someone cheering in the crowd? The camera man filming the race?

No.

I had to be the giant white arrow that points out where Pharlap is in the archival footage. In practical terms this meant I had to run along beside her pointing at her head as she galloped along. Is that strange? It seemed quite strange.

Adobe Punk

2009-09-07T21:35:00.002+10:00

For the first few days back in Melbourne I kept turning my head everytime I heard someone speak, thinking 'they're Australian!'. But the appeal and amazement quickly faded and by the end of the first week I started to feel irritated by being able to understand everything everyone said. It was way too much information all the time. And most of it was deathly dull. I found myself listening to a couple of young women on a tram one day, but they were having pretty much exactly the same conversation I overheard in London. At the risk of sounding really, really old, don't young women have anything else to talk about? Something more interesting for old women to eavesdrop on?

Then there were the people who decided to talk to me, even though I'd shown no interest in talking with them - like the woman who berated me for letting Mads walk in a flower bed near the floral clock ('These gardens are for everyone, not just you!') and who didn't apologise when I pointed out Mads was actually walking along a path.

The worst bit was when I started suspecting people were eavesdropping on me. A woman sat ridiculously close to Mads and me in a not-crowded train back from the zoo last week. I swear she was listening to the story I was making up about the day Mads went to super-hero kindergarten.

But luckily last Saturday afternoon something that made all the listening in worth while. I was catching the tram back from town at 5 pm and a group of young male punks got on the tram, talking loudly and swigging from a red wine bottle. The thing I noticed about them, besides the loudness, was that they weren't all that convincing as punks. They had the hair and the clothes, but there was something kind of nerdy about them. One had glasses which he kept pushing up his nose in an almost nervous way while raving on at the top of his voice about how much pot he smoked that morning. It was quite odd.

And then, once they'd finished discussing pot, they started talking about computer programs. One of them took a large swig of wine and said 'the great thing about Illustrator is that you can save a path, import it into a new file and apply the same path to the new file.' It was a most unexpected topic of conversation for a group of punks and I found myself edging a little closer - party out of surprise but partly because I've always been a little hazy about using paths in Illustrator. But unfortunately they got off at the next stop, leaving me unclear as to whether they were really punks or just graphic designers on their way to a dress up party. I was also still unclear about using paths in Illustrator.

Still, it was an satisfying bit of eavesdropping. I doubt I'll see its like again in the six days left of my stay here.

Sneaky

2009-08-14T06:42:00.003+10:00

A few things have taken me by surprise recently (and not just the kilo per month I've gained while living on a diet of beer, salty bread and potatoes). Like, for instance, Mads and I are getting on a plane tomorrow night and flying to Melbourne. I really should pack.

I also knew, but have only just taken seriously the fact that I have five days of book week school visits ahead of me (including one session with a group of 120 high school students, which is making me feel a little queasy). And then there's this event (it's at 10 am by the way Sally). I need to work out what I'm going to do for that because surely I can't just read for an hour?

I think the reason I haven't really let myself dwell on any of these events until now is because it would require me to think about the thing I am fearing most of all: the long haul flight, on my own, with my not-great-traveller three year old. I have packed books and toys galore but I suspect I will spend most of the time pretending that my arm is a sea slug called Celina which is what I can be found doing most afternoons on the train home from kinder. Still, hopefully the pain (and the RSI) will be forgotten shortly after we disembark and I hand Mads to the grandparents.

The blog will be on holidays too until mid September when we return as hopefully I'll be catching up with the two of you who read this blog in person shortly.

Wish me luck.

Real or Not Real?

2009-08-06T06:32:00.005+10:00

So let's just move along from my culinary attempts of the other weekend. I didn't give anyone food-poisoning (as far as I know), which surely counts for something. And let me present instead a gameshow concept I've been working on called 'Real or Not Real?' based on the characters Mads' tells me about and my attempts to work out which ones actually exist.

Emily Rude.
This is an easy one to start with. Not real, or at least, not in a breathing kind of way. Emily lives in our cutlery drawer. Also clearly not real is her associate, Emily Nice who lives on the kitchen shelf and looks like this.

Holly Honda.
Also almost definitely not real, although I have a strong mental image of her looking a little bit like this but with a manga-esque modernity to her. Her grandma is called Polly Peugeot.

Bim Bim.
Not real. Bim Bim has been with us for years now. Bim Bim swaps effortlessly between genders, ages and degrees of naughtiness and bravery, depending on the role he needs to fit.

The Girl Who Says No.
This is where things start to get tricky. She was supposedly a girl at Mads' kinder who would always say 'no' whenever Mads went near her. But then surely she'd be the girl who says 'nein'? One day when I was dropping Mads off she pointed excitedly to a girl and said 'that's the girl who says no!' She has left the kinder for school but she still looms large in Mads' stories of her day - apparently coming for visits or even staring through the kindergarten fence just so she can say 'no' to Mads occasionally.

Naughtius.
Last week Mads started telling me about a boy who liked to pinch the other kids at kinder. I asked what he was called and Mads said 'I call him Naughtius.' I hope Nautius is not real, because otherwise his parents have a lot to answer for giving their child a name like that. It was asking for trouble. All the same, I have grown rather fond of Naughtius, especially as his bad behaviour escalates. It's become one of the first things I ask Mads when I pick her up: what did Naughtius do today? Sometimes he's been piffing food around at the teachers, sometimes it's pooing on people's heads. And according to Mads the teachers are powerless to stop him. I picture Naughtius as a miniature Roman emperor, despotic, horrific, feared by all. Unfortunately I fear that Naughtius may be ficticious, or at least exaggerated. Her kinder teacher does not strike me as someone who is likely to put up with such antics.

Guess who's coming for Abend Essen?

2009-08-02T22:32:00.003+10:00

We have a German family coming over for dinner tonight and I'm nervous. Not being the best cook even when cooking for my Best Beloveds, when I'm cooking for others - particularly new acquaintances - I get a little rattled. It's just a BBQ, which in theory should be straight-forward but it's the first time we've used the BBQ in question and all the knob-labels are in German. When we first moved into the flat Thieu sat in front of the washing machine for an hour with a dictionary, working out which was the gentle cycle and which was for the coloured clothes. I hope the BBQ will be a little less complicated.

No supermarkets are open on Sunday and, naturally, I woke up this morning and realised all the things I don't have which may be required by our German guests. These include:

Bottled water, with gas and without. Whenever we've visited the locals they always seem to have a huge range of bottled waters to offer us. Not just with still or sparkling, but with varying grades of bubbles - from very fizzy through to just a couple of bubbles. I still baulk at the idea of paying for water at all, and Thieu, well, he thinks it's all a worldwide conspiracy and next they'll be charging for air etc etc. But serving tap water here would be the equivalent of scooping water straight out of the toilet. Just not done.

A wide range of condiments. At least two varieties of mustard and two types of ketchup are required, preferably with one of the mustards coming from a farmers' market. We have only one of each. I also realised we are missing another important condiment, especially as we're having potatoes:

Herb butter. Not just an interesting addition to a meal, but an essential part of one. I have only normal butter. Social disaster is imminent.

Actually, while I'm on the topic, there's a whole lot of dairy things that flummox me whenever I'm in the local Rewe supermarket. Staring at them fills me with both anxiety and desire. Quark, for instance, which sounds like something a posh duck might say. What does one do with Quark? Then there's creme fraiche. ANd buttermilch. I know, of course, that these things are readily available in Australia, but there aren't usually entire cabinets in the dairy cabinet devoted to varieties of buttermilk. So I sense that these things are important and every good hostess should have some of each on offer. In desperation the other day I bought a small tub of creme fraiche. But I have no idea what to do with it. Offer it with the potatoes? With the summer pudding? With both? Neither?

Buying wine is also intimidating because I don't recognise the bottles. I often don't even recognise the grape varietals. There are a few Aussie wines in the supermarket, but they are ones I'd never buy in Aus and wouldn't inflict on anyone else. And anyway, serving supermarket wine to anyone other than your immediate family is frowned upon.

Oh dear. I think I may have to have a large glass of (supermarket)wine before they arrive.

The Strangest Hotel in the World

2009-07-30T05:24:00.006+10:00

A couple of weeks ago Thieu had to go to a training thing in a nearby city called Karlruhe. There's an air traffic control centre there, an operational one rather than a training one, so Thieu and his collegues were sent to have a look. Mads and I joined him for the second half of the week. When Thieu rang after he arrived he kept saying 'You're going to love this hotel. It's the weirdest place. I think it's been designed by an insane person.'

When we arrived I saw what he meant. If a building could ever be described as a 'stream of consciousness' than this hotel was such a thing. And the stream of consciousness would sound something like this: 'We'll make a big clown face and each section of the face could be a separate room. The eye room. The nose room. The mouth room. And there will be other rooms, equally as weird, with weird decorations and strange, out of place objects in them, just to keep people guessing. And there will be a labyrinth of underground tunnels, so that the guests will continually doubt the strutural integrity of the rooms they're sleeping in.'

Here is a shot of inside our room:

Yes. The artwork is hanging upside down. I felt like I was back at art school viewing someone's end of year installation. Here's another shot:

So strange. But our room was positively conservative compared to the one given to one of Thieu's collegues and his family. This one had a waterbed (which is weird in itself as far as I'm concerned) and a coffin-like sauna in the children's room:

Here is a shot of one of the children's beds:

That's a sunlamp. What a lovely, homely touch. Give the children cancer while they sleep.

Despite the weirdness (because of it?) we had a great time. It was the kind of place children love as it had all kinds of weird (and possibly dangerous) objects everywhere and great places to hide. And it had a full German barf-ay breakfast, which, as I've previously mentioned, Mads is hugely in favour of. She wept when we left, but I suspect this was largely due to being separated from the other children.

Then we went to Munich. Munich was rainy. Torrentially so. We headed for the Deutches Museum on Saturday morning, along with everyone else, just to be somewhere dry. The queue was 45 minutes long. Happily, this provided me with an excellent eaves-dropping opportunity, as the American couple behind us had fallen into that travellers' trap of assuming that no one around you understands what you're saying, so you can speak with impunity. Hooray! Here's what I heard:

She: I'm not going to do it any more, Peter. I'm not going to starve myself.
He: Robin, please. Listen to me.
She: I'm not going to starve myself or gorge myself. I'm sick of it.
He: Robin. You're a beautiful woman. Beautiful! Why won't you listen to me?

Sadly, it all came to an end when Mads blew my cover by breaking into the chorus of 'Emily Rude'. Then there was an awkward moment where we all exchanged tight smiles and said 'how about the rain?' Then Peter said 'your daughter is so sweet. We have a daughter just like her,' and Robin said, 'well, not quite like her, Peter,' and I thought 'should I tell them she was just singing a song about her favourite kitchen implement?' I decided against it and recommended they go to the high voltage electricity display which we saw last time we were there. They seemed like the kind of couple who would enjoy it.

Schadenfreude

2009-07-24T18:18:00.003+10:00

We were in the park yesterday, between bouts of rain and I noticed this little boy straight away. He was the one stomping on other kids' sandcastles and throwing rocks at the toddlers. Nice kid. His grandfather sat on a bench in the sun, reading the newspaper and paying no attention to his vile progeny's doings.

Then Mads whacked her head on a piece of equipment and the delightful lad rushed over, climbed up the tower she was standing on, and stood in front of her laughing. I can't tell you how close I came to pushing him over the edge.

As we left the park a little later I saw the boy near the basketball ring, bawling his eyes out. 'Look Mads, I said, 'that mean boy is crying. He looks like he hurt himself.' Mads looked at me sternly. 'Mummy,' she said. 'He's not a mean boy. What he did was mean.'

I rolled my eyes. 'Yeah, whatever,' I said. 'Now, run over there and laugh in his face.'

My inner German

2009-07-15T05:40:00.005+10:00

There are many ways in which I feel that I am already quite German. A love of sensible footwear? I've been wearing Birkenstocks for years. A reluctance to drop in on people unannounced? Makes perfect sense to me. A passion for carbohydrates that borders on the evangelical? Yes, oh yes. A hatred of plastic bags? We'd been here for a month before I even realised that our local supermarket was bag-free because I had always brought my own bag anyway. In my opinion, the concept of the beer garden borders on genius, especially those with a well-equipped playground (nothing like setting a good example to those future drinkers). So there are lots of things about being in Frankfurt that make me feel like I belong.

Yet there are some things that confuse me. I don't understand the German love of smoking - everyone here is so sensible that the local fixation with smoking puzzles me deeply. I've seen people smoking while eating, smoking holding their babies, kissing someone else's babies, while jogging. Well, maybe not quite. But almost. The same goes for the lack of bike helmets. I don't understand it. And after having heard C's story of being knocked off her bike, sans helmet and ending up in a coma for three days, plus losing her sense of smell for an entire year, I'm a committed wearer of the helmet. And if there was anywhere in the world I expected to see others who felt the same way it was here. But no. So Thieu and I are the only big old dorky mushroom-heads riding around. Well, we will be, once we locate our helmets.

Then there's this, which I simply refuse to understand:

It is called 'spaghetti eis' and every ice-cream shop offers it. Why anyone would want to eat something that looks like spaghetti bolognese for dessert is beyond me. I feel nauseous whenever I see one. So I say nein to spaghetti eis. NEIN NEIN NEIN!(The picture came from wikipedia by the way, so that's not my spaghetti eis or my boob either).

I am not sure about this either:

It is a pub on wheels. One person sits in the front and steers and the other twelve people sit along the sides, peddling and drinking beer. I don't get it. Why would you want to ride a bike and drink beer simultaneously? It sounds simply awful to me. Yet all weekend we see the bier bike trundling up and down outside our window. Not a single bike helmet to be seen, either. Maybe it's for tourists. That would make more sense to me. And maybe once they've finished cycling and drinking they seek out the nearest ice-cream parlour and down a couple of spaghetti eises.

We are going to Munich this weekend. And then it's less than a month before Mads and I return to Melbourne for a visit. Talk about time flying.

New Books

2009-07-15T05:29:00.002+10:00

Whenever I receive the advanced copies of a book I'm always reminded of the period of time in which I wrote them. So these latest ones - 'Beach Break' and 'Keeping Secrets' instantly made me think of the time when we finally committed to moving to Germany, then the subsequent stress of packing up our house, the terrible insomnia I went through during this period, the sadness of saying goodbye to everyone and even just making myself believe that 'yes, we're really going.'

Still, it was quite wonderful receiving them in the mail the other day. And now they are sitting on my bookshelf, all shiny and pretty and utterly, unquestionably finished, that all the effort and pain feels worth it. Which is something I have to remind myself as I struggle through the writing of Tweenie Genie 2.

Back

2009-07-08T20:29:00.013+10:00

On Monday night we returned to Frankfurt after ten days away - 2 nights in London then the rest in Italy. I managed to fulfill a few of my aims in London, but not all of them. One important aim I failed at dismally was catching up with everyone I wanted to see. I realise now I was way too ambitious about what could be achieved, especially with a small person in tow. But I did manage to tick one important thing off my list early on - eaves-dropping. As a committed sticky-beak it has been driving me crazy not being able to understand what people are talking about in Frankfurt. So when we boarded the Tube I carefully positioned myself next to two young women and started listening.

'So have you decided on the dress?' said one. 'Is it the one in the photo you sent?' The other woman nodded. 'Yes.' There was a pause. 'Are you doing your own hair?' 'No, Louise is doing it for me.' 'What about your make up?' 'I'm doing that myself.'

Perhaps it wasn't the most exciting conversation to listen in on, but that wasn't the point. I could understand it. All of it. I was equally enthusiastic about reading things. 'Warning: Contents may be hot.' 'No pedestrian access.' 'This weekend only: 50 percent off.' I felt so intelligent.

Another one of my aims was to find some English-speaking kids for Mads to play with. I was concerned she was losing her friend-making skills so we took her to a museum that had a kids play area in it (the place we were staying had no local park). There was one other kid there - a slightly older boy, and I was suddenly concerned that the whole exercise would turn into a huge disaster, but Mads was enthusiastic to try. She came running up to me after less than a minute, her face shining and said 'I asked him what his name was and he told me. It's Christopher. And he wants to be my friend.' It was lovely to watch, but it also made my heart ache. It's not that Mads is friendless in Frankfurt - she has a couple of really great mates, but it reminded me of how much easier it is to make new aquaintances when you share a language. Not surprisingly there were tears when we had to say goodbye to Christopher.

Then on Monday I was propelled back into stupid muteness. Mads and I went to Italy on our own (Thieu joined us on Friday) to meet our friends Trish and Ol in Castel Gandolfo, which is where the Pope chooses to summer. I seem to have this naive idea that everything in Europe is incredibly close and that the longest trip you'll have to do is maybe going as far as Mt Eliza or something. But that's really not the case. It took us all day to get to Castel Gandolfo and the journey tried the patience of both mother and daughter.

To be fair, the German leg of the trip was fine (we left from Frankfurt) but the moment we arrived in Italy, Chaos rose up and consumed us. I had done some intensive study on how to get Mads and me from Rome to Castel Gandolfo - there was a bus, costing a very reasonable 4 euros that went from Termini to the small, regional airport where we were to meet our friends. It all seemed easy enough. In theory.

After some effort I found the bus station at Termini and entered the office. Once inside I almost left instantly, as I assumed I had stumbled into a production of some kind of complicated Italian farce. A femle customer was shouting at the top of her lungs at the girl selling tickets and only left after she'd kicked over an over-flowing bin. The girl in the ticket office was shouting back. Then another customer (with an impressive and clearly quite new scratch on his neck) leant into the office and scratched the ticket girl's arm. She shrieked, grabbed her bag, locked up the office and departed. Mads watched all this, open-mouthed. I could tell what she was thinkiing. We have arrived in Tantrum Land. I shall be happy here.

I really had no idea what was going on. A kindly French woman said to me, eventually, 'we have to go and queue. The bus leaves in only an hour and there is no guarantee that we'll get a seat.' I thought at first that I hadn't understood her properly. But no. We were expected to stand in a queue for an hour (me with a grumpy three year old) for a bus (already there, but locked up) that we may or may not get a seat on. Trish's plane was due in 40 minutes and if we didn't connect wih her I had no idea how I was going to get to the appartment she'd rented.

So that's when I decided a taxi was a better option. I found one and the driver and I agreed on a horrifically expensive fare (at this stage I would've paid anything) and once inside, Mads promptly fell asleep. I was thankful for this, because the taxi went so fast (I stopped watching when the speedo was pointing to 150 kms) that I consoled myself by thinking 'at least she'll be asleep when we crash and die.'

But we didn't crash, and we didn't die, and even the fact that Trish's plane ended up being an hour late failed to concern me, or the thunder storm that commenced just as we all left the airport together, as it was just so lovely to be there. Or perhaps I'd plateau-ed with the stress.

And once we arrived at the appartment and opened some wine and admired the view of the volcanic lago from our balcony and the dome of the Bernini-designed church in front of Il Papo's summer residence the pain of the trip quickly receded.

So for the next week, things went something like this: Long breakfast followed by coffees in the piazza. Lunch. Swim in the lago. Gelati (Mads discovered a new favourite green flavour which she referred to as moustachio). Some dancing to the Wiggles. Wine and pasta. Kids in bed. DVD. Rinse and repeat. We did go into Rome one day, which was a whole other test of endurance, although quite wonderful in its own way.

It was a great, crazy, fun, exhausting holiday, and I'd do it again in a flash, but next time I'm going to hitch a lift in the Papal helicopter. Or something.

Barfay Breakfast

2009-06-23T05:02:00.005+10:00

It seems to be a common pastime in Frankfurt to attend a buffet breakfast on a Saturday or Sunday morning (or both mornings, of course). They usually run from about 10 until 2 and the aim is to sit there for as much of this time as possible, chatting with your friends, reviewing the week etc. Mads and Thieu are both huge fans of a buffet breakfast (Mads calls them a 'barfay breakfast') and I'm not adverse to them either, yet somehow it took us almost three months to get to one. We chose the perfect day though - rainy, dreary and nothing much on so why not spend the day eating?

It was 16 euros per adult and the guy behind the bar looked at Mads and said 'just 8 euros for her.' Sucker! I thought, as Mads made a bee line for the smoked salmon. So we filled our plates and settled in to sip coffee and champagne and discuss our week - the things we'd learnt, interesting things we'd seen or heard.

'I discovered that you can lose a German raffle before a single number has been drawn,' I said. On Saturday we went to a 'family fun day' at Mads' kinder. There was a 'tombola' where you picked your tightly rolled-up ticket(s) out of a hat. I bought three tickets and one of them had writing on it instead of a number. Someone looked at it and said 'that means 'too bad, you're not going to win with this ticket.'I was incensed. I mean, I never expected to win the raffle but to tell me that I didn't even stand a chance seemed unneccessarily unkind.

Then Thieu related a conversation he'd had with a German collegue.'It's complicated, being German,' the collegue had said. 'We were taught at school that we could not be proud to be German. Patriotism of any kind was frowned upon. I once wanted to take a German flag to the tennis to show my support of Boris Becker and I couldn't find one anywhere. In the end I had to get a tailor to make me one specially.'

The other big event last week was that Thieu taught his first student - with a fully-qualified instrutor adding comments over his shoulder of course, but still, it went well. So well, in fact, that the instructor came up to Thieu's office and presented him with his own instructor's pointer. It is telescopic which means that it folds down to the size (and shape) of a pen. It even has the clippy bit so that you can wear it in your breast pocket.

I inspected it. It had a white plastic knob on the end, presumably so you wouldn't take anyone's eye out. 'Was there a choice of knob-colour?' I wanted to know. White seemed a little dull. 'Well,' said Thieu, 'the instructor's pointer did have a chrome knob, but he said he'd had it for 20 years.' A chrome knob. Now that sounded impressive. 'Maybe it's something you work up to,' I suggested. 'You start with white and then as you train more students you get to replace the colour of your knob until finally, you get a chrome one. Or even gold maybe.' Thieu gave me that look. 'It's possible,' he said.

We guzzled and sipped and the day meandered by nicely. On the way home we saw a man pull a portable dog bowl out his backpack. It was a plastic tray thing that was attached to a water bottle and neatly folded out, providing a drink for dogs too high and mighty to drink out of a puddle. I've never seen one before.

This Friday we're going to London for a Birthay party. I am planning to luxuriate in the English language - doing lots of eaves-dropping and asking complicated questions in shops. Mads is going to ask an entire playground full of kids to play with her, just for the sheer joy of being understood. I wonder if she'll freak out when they all sound a bit like Charlie and Lola?

Erlebnispark

2009-06-17T02:39:00.015+10:00

Ever woken up in the morning and felt like you would really like to ride on a giant mushroom? If so, then Erlebnispark Steinau is the place to head (watch out for the talking donkey on that link. It gave me a heart-attack the first time). Our upstairs neighbour, L, took us there on Sunday with her son and some of their friends. It's about an hours drive from Frankfurt and definitely worth the drive. There were bbq facilities (naturlich) and there were fun things to play on - like a luge-type arrangement called a Sommenrodelbahn. There were trampolines on masse and there were weird rolling rides shaped like storks that you pedalled across an elevated platform. Mads and I rode on one together and Thieu rode the one behind us on his own. Half way through the ride, Thieu's friend Strutts Thieu from Australia called. 'Hey Strutts!' said Thieu. 'Twenty bucks if you can you guess where I am?' Strutts didn't guess.

There was so much to admire. I loved the slightly scary, slightly battered old-school rides:

And the strange Grimm Brothers-themed chairs in the cafe:

We heartily embraced every cheesy photo opportunity:

And oh, to have this wonderful fart-predicting machine for our very own!

I even loved the toilet paper dispensers...

...and the sanitary disposal bag dispenser (although this kind of freaked me out too.)

But most of all I loved the little carts that the locals had which seemed to be especially designed for ferrying your stuff from the car to your picnic location:

The one in this photo is actually kind of inferior because it doesn't have solid sides. I saw some much better ones, but I started to feel a bit self-conscious photographing peoples' stuff as they wheeled efficently past me. These trollies are so useful, so solid and so very German. They look like something my dad would make, although he isn't German. But perhaps he is at heart?

Cosy Names and the H word

2009-06-10T05:20:00.006+10:00

Here are some shots of our local park. Mads and I have had a few dark moments here - not understanding anyone, not understanding why no one understands us. The other day Mads tried chatting to a group of girls and they looked at her, noses wrinkled and said 'Was? Was?. Mads angrily shouted back 'What are you 'wassing' about?' Then today she was happily playing in some bushes when a mother came over and said, 'that's where the children pee.' Awesome. I wanted to say 'there is a toilet. Have the children considered using that?' but perhaps it's not a toilet. Perhaps it's a cubby. Who knows?

Notice the headstones in the second photo? The park used to be a graveyard, but it was almost entirely destroyed during...you know, the War, and I guess they decided it was easier to just turn it into a play area.

Ah, the War. When Thieu did his 'cultural sensitivity' briefing when we first arrived here, the advice was a. 'never give a German person a boquet with an odd number of flowers in it' and b. 'don't mention The War.' We haven't mentioned it, but people keep mentioning it to us. And it's a hard topic to avoid because even now, 60 years later or whatever it is, there's evidence of it everywhere. We met our upstairs neighbour in the park one day and she pointed to the streetscape and said 'have you noticed the holes where the bombs fell?' I thought at first she meant little chunks out of the buildings, but she actually meant the way in which there will be three older style houses in a row, then suddenly, starkly, a modern one, built where an older one used to be before it was bombed.

Then today, I went to have my 'German lesson' with a very kind mother from Mads' kindergarten, which always just ends up with us chatting in English. Today we started talking about childrens' books. There's a character I keep seeing here called Straw Peter and I asked her about it. She said he's from a famous German kids' book - one of those old style books with heavy, scary morals ('Bob refused to keep his hands off the table. So a monster came and bit them off.' That kind of thing).

I was musing on what would make parents think this was a good thing to read to their kids and she said; 'There was a very terrible man here once called Hitler.' I paused for a moment, then said, cautiously, 'Yes. I've heard of him.' We ended up having a very interesting discussion and what was the most striking thing for me was the terrible guilt and shame she seemed to carry, as a 28 year old, for something that had happened so long before she was born. It was like she'd inherited the awful burden of it. She was near tears when she told me about how, when she used to work for an airline, she would sometimes come across older people who would refuse to speak to her because she was German. And I found myself telling her about the terrible attrocities that the early settlers in Australia did to the indigenous population, as if it would somehow make us more even. As if you could ever been even with something like that.

And now next week, after that conversation, how can I possibly go back to my faltering German and start constructing clunky sentences about how 'I like to read books and travel'?

Give and Take

2009-06-08T05:54:00.002+10:00

Remember the finger that was jammed in the door the other week? It was quite obvious it was going to fall off, and Mads has been stressing about the impendig event for some time. Eventually, out of desperation I told her about the Fingernail Fairy, who collects up fallen fingernails (whole ones, not clippings) and will leave a gift in return by way of thanks. But what, Mads wanted to know, does the Fingernail Fairy do with all those fingernails? Well, she gives them to children who have no fingernails. Of course.

When the fingernail finally dropped off last week the Fingernail Fairy made good her promise. She whisked the nail away (although I pity the poor child who will receive it) and left a present. As luck would have it, the Fingernail Fairy discovered a present that we didn't end up giving to Mads for Christmas - a keyboard - and she thought, well, it is a little large for such a tiny nail, but there was considerable pain involved in the losing of it, so why not.

Unfortunately, another fairy visited that night too - the Conjunctivitis Fairy, or, for fans of polysyllabic German words, the Bindehautenzundung Fairy. So it was back to the childrens' doctor for us. Oh well.

Paris

2009-06-03T18:08:00.010+10:00

So, we caught the Very Fast Train to Paris and this, on the whole, was very good. There was much more room than on a plane and we sat near a friendly German family who chatted to us and gave us kids books. I plugged Mads into the ipod and drank a beer. Then we hopped out at Gare L'est, straight into a taxi and were at our hotel half an hour later, rather than having to deal with the monstrousness of an airport.

First stop the next morning was a nearby cafe called Cafe Madeleine (d'accord...) for croissants and coffee.

Then Mads wanted to see the Eiffel Tower **(her 'must do' list for Paris was based on entirely on the Madeline books and the Eiffel Tower was number one on the list). We hadn't really decided what we would do once we got there, and the long queues nearly made us run away, but Mads was dead keen to go up, so in the end we compromised and went up half way. I'm glad we did. It's pretty amazing. My favourite bit was all the nets they have under each viewing platform to collect all the cameras and phones that fall from sweaty tourist hands before they plummet to the ground and clonk someone on the head. Do you think you'd ever get your phone back again?

We discovered a few things about Paris this time that we hadn't noticed on previous trips, sans Small Person. Like, there is a decided lack of playgrounds, although we've since been assured that they are there, you just need to know where to look. I found the 'no walking on the grass' signs very annoying last time, but they're completely infuriating when you've got a kid with you. Queues are even less appealing, especially when the kid is probably not going to be excited by the interior of the gothic church you are asking her to wait patiently to see. But luckily ice-cream is everywhere, and everywhere ice-cream is good. We also felt strangely articulate being in France after two months in Germany. My French was never good and it is extremely rusty now, but it's still far better to my German. Thieu felt the same. We were able to construct entire sentences and be understood. Pretty much.

We spent two nights in Paris, and then went to visit S and L and their two boys who live in a fantastic old farm house just outside Paris. The elder boy shared Mads' love of Spiderman, Tin Tin and dressing up. And Madeleine discovered a new character to dress up as - a super hero from a French show called Sam Sam which I'd never heard of before. Mads hadn't either, but she instantly recognised that the costume was a cracker.

We particularly like the eyebrows. I'm now in charge of trying to track down a Sam Sam costume for her.

(** I've been instructed that I'm not allowed to post the pictures of Thieu being a model on the Eiffel Tower because then his Superhero identity will be revealed. Sorry.)

Our Stuff Arrives

2009-05-30T05:00:00.013+10:00

I will write about the Paris trip. I even have photos - good ones, of Matt pretending to be a male model on top of the Eiffel Tower. But today an even more exciting event occurred: Our stuff arrived. After the disappointment of the air-freight boxes (I haven't used that thermometer once. Or the camera) I deliberately lowered my expectations of what it would be like to have our entire life delivered to our door. But it was surprisingly great. Especially as I disappeared with Mads off to kindergarten in the morning just as the truck arrived and by the time I arrived home, all the boxes were in the flat. Joy.

Mads was beside herself with delight, discovering all her old treasures. 'There's Hard Donnie!' 'There's my drumkit!' 'There's Sneezy the Activity Dragon!' Then she dressed up in her fairy outsuit, put a lampshade on her head and collapsed in front of the tv to watch a playschool DVD. While she did that, I stood in the doorway of our bedroom and admired my Auntie Cookie cushions for a while, then retired into the kitchen to eat vegemite toast. It was great. Truly great.

In which I become my own spam

2009-05-20T05:09:00.005+10:00

Recently, Mads has had two favourite games. The first one is called 'The Famous Artist Madeleine' and in this game I play the part of an adoring, slightly crazed art fan, who turns up at the studio of the Famous Artist Madeleine to be told by the person in charge of the studio (I'm not sure exactly who she is) that the Famous Artist Madeleine is in today and would I like to meet her? Then, when the Famous Artist Madeleine appears I get to fall about in adoration and the Famous Artist graciously deigns to show me some of her recent artwork.

The other game is 'Visiting the Doctors' in which I get to be a patient and Mads gets to jab needles in my arms, then she gives me a leaf (the bill?) and tells me, brusqely, to come back next week.

Both of these games, I have no doubt, have developed because most of Mads' non-kinder/ non-playground hours have been spent either at a museum/gallery or at the doctors. I don't think Mads has been to the doctors as much in her life as she has in the six weeks since we've arrived here. First there was the finger-jamming incident, quickly followed by the return visit for the all-clear-for-kinder health certificate. Then last week, there was another finger-injury. Thieu took her to a shopping centre and somehow, on the escalator, she managed to cut two of her fingers. Thieu said it was horrific. She wiped her hand across her face and soon there was blood everywhere and he had no idea where it was coming from.

Mads was, not surprisingly, screaming in horror during all this, and she and Thieu attracted quite a crowd. Our two weeks of German language lessons did not help much as he tried to communicate with the well-meaning passers-by, but eventually a couple of staff members whisked Mads and Thieu away to a quiet corner and cleaned them up. Sweets were administed. Mads got some too. And someone gave her a soft toy panda. Her injured fingers were very puffy and Mads couldn't move them, so an ambulance was called. More sweets. The ambos examined the fingers and said it wasn't a serious enough injury to go to the hospital in the ambulance, but that she should probably have an x-ray to check they weren't broken.

Meanwhile, I was oblivious to all this, as Thieu had forgotten his phone and didn't know my number, so he arrived home and uttered those terrifying words: 'Please don't freak out but.'

It was all fine though. The x-ray gave Mads the all clear. She loved the hospital and wanted to stay and play with the equipment, even though it was 9 pm. 'But the park is for sick kids, and I'm sick!' More sweets and a hasty exit. We still don't know exactly what happened but now we do a check of fingers and shoelaces whenever we get on an escalator. The soft toy panda has settled in well. 'He's a cute panda,' I said to Mads as I tucked him in beside her the other night. 'What's he called?' 'He's called Vagina,' Madeleine said, then rolled over and went to sleep.

As for the Famous Artist Madeleine game, well that would be because we've cranked up quite a few hours in the various (and I must say excellent) Frankfurt galleries. I had a deja-vu experience when we went to one called the Communication Museum and saw these:

Earlier this year someone definitely sent me an email with a picture of these sheep and I remember being quite taken with them. I think I may have sent the email on to other people, even. And suddenly, there they were! Right in front of me! It was like I'd walked into my own spam.

Now, jumping to an unrelated topic, I have to admit I've had some trouble getting Thieu to do his guest-blog although he swears he will. I shall continue hassling him about it, and I'll make sure he answers your excellent question about unfranked stamps in Frankfurt, Carolena. But not this week. Because we are off to Paris from tomorrow until Sunday to see what the galleries (and the hospitals) are like over there.

Sonnenblummenkernen

2009-05-09T05:09:00.006+10:00

It's been a big week. Mads started at kinder, 9 - 12 every day. The kinders here are open 7 am to 7 pm although I doubt that any kids actually go that much. (Then weirdly, when school starts it's from 8.30 to 1.)

Mads has been dying to start kinder. For the last two weeks, every morning the first thing she's said has been; 'can I go to kinder today?' and she's been devestated when I've had to break the news that no, it was just going to be another fun day with mummy.

Unfortunately, the first kinder day was not so good. Apparently she flitted from room to room and had some spectacular tantrums. When I arrived to collect her, she was sitting on her own, crying. Awful. She was very tired, though, after our adventures on the autobahn the night before and despite all of that, she assured me that she wanted to go back on Tuesday. I made sure she was well-rested and luckily it was a much more succesful day. Only one bout of frustrated crying and she actually sat at the table and did some glue-ing for half an hour or so.

Wednesday was better still. She spent a good hour and a half playing in the toddler pool full of balls (like the germ-infested ones they have at Ikea) and was happy, but exhausted, when I went to pick her up. And no tears at all.

While she's been at kinder I've been doing a German-language class provided by Thieu's work for the new recruits and their fraus. I got to go, even though I'm merely a Leibensgafertnen (or however you write this crazy word that means 'life's-partner'). The class started at 8.15 every day and went through to 2.15 but I could only make it for a couple of hours because of the kinder commitments.

It was useful though. Mostly it was useful in showing me that everything I've been saying so far has been wrong. For instance, I've been referring to Madeleine as 'it' rather than 'she' for the last month. Even my pronounciation of my favourite German word, sonnenblummenkernen (sunflower seeds) was incorrect, which is rather embarrassing because I've been saying it alot. I didn't know how to say 'breadroll' so I have been walking into bakeries and saying 'mit sonnenblummenkernen, bitte' and generally, they've handed over a breadroll with sunflower seeds on the top. I actually prefer poppy seeds, but I didn't know how to say that.

It's quite humilating to try and learn a language as an adult. It's all the more humilating because everyone in Europe speaks about nine languages each. I casually asked the woman in the flat upstairs from us how many languages she spoke and she said, modestly, 'only English, French and Spanish.'
'And German,' I pointed out.
'And German,' she agreed. 'Oh, and a few African languages.' I smiled, thinking she was making a sort of joke. But no. She actually does speak some African languages and has worked as a translator.

I started the week full of high hopes about mastering German. Actually, that's not quite true. I started the week thinking about all the other things I'd like to do with my newly acquired child-free hours in the morning, but I decided that was a bad attitude and made myself being optimistic about the lessons. I had a loose plan to learn nouns and Thieu was going to learn verbs (in the imperative only) and together, I thought, we might be able to form short, rude sentences. 'To drive taxi!' 'To cook food!' 'To pay bill!'

Notice how I've left out the articles? The articles are what really got me down this week. And at the risk of sounding bitter, let me just get it off my chest so I can move on: I can accept the notion, however weird, of all objects being either masculine or feminine. I studied French and I've come to terms with it. But the 'neuter' gender in German really makes a mockery of the whole thing. Why is a snail a 'she', but a horse an 'it'? Why is a door 'he', but a window 'it'? And the one that really annoys me - why is pepper 'he' but salt 'it'? Salt is more 'it-like' than pepper? 'Don't analyse,' the teacher kept saying, soothingly. 'Just accept.' And I have accepted. Defeat, that is. Maybe I'll swap to verbs instead.

To rub (neutral) saltz into the wound everyone here is always quick to apologise for how bad their English is. 'There are so many words I don't know!' they moan. 'Don't worry,' you reassure them. 'I'm sure you're Englsih is actually very good.' Then they'll launch into a highly detailed story in fluent English and when they stop to ask you for help the word they don't know is some incredibly technical, specialised thing that you've actually never heard of.

'Mit sonnenblumenkernen,' I keep muttering to myself. 'Mit sonnenblumenkernen.'

At least now I know how to ask for a breadroll without sonnenblumenkernen. And my pronounciation of 'Sorry, I don't speak German,' is much improved.

**Special Announcement**
Thieu has promised to do a guest appearance on the Frankfurter files to update you on his place of work. If you have any questions for him, please feel free to post them in the comments.

Fun, Fun, Fun on the Autobahn

2009-05-05T01:25:00.018+10:00

On Saturday we hired a car and went and did some tourist-ing in a nearby town called Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Rothenburg was apparently the inspiration for the town in Pinoccio, if Wikipedia is to be believed (and who doesn't believe Wikipedia?) If you look at Rothenburg from the top of a tower that is approximately 200 metres from the ground it looks like this:

We didn't stay up on the tower for very long, because apparently it has no actual foundations of its own, it's just sort of resting on the top of the building. Thieu didn't like that. I kept saying 'it's not windy, don't worry,' but we came down in record time anyway.

I've been looking through the shots we took and I've noticed an important difference between the shots Thieu takes and the ones I take, even when the subject matter is basically the same. Here's my shot of the town hall:

You see, I like to pretend I'm the only tourist in the town. And the only way I can pull that off photographically is to take lots of shots of roofs and sky. Luckily, this was a pretty nice roof. Thieu doesn't care so much about pretending the tourists aren't there. Here's his photo:

Clearly, his is much better. And it's partially because of the tourist in the foreground. Who is he? Is he wandering around on his own? Perhaps he's come to Germany for business purposes, leaving his family behind and when the weekend came he thought 'Well, I may as well do some sightseeing. I probably won't come back again.' Or maybe his wife and small children are sitting in an icecream shop. Who knows?

This is another one of Thieu's:

I love the small, bobbly head in the foreground, but most of all I love the small figure (a kid?) pressed against the wall of the building. What the heck is he doing? Is he kissing the building? Doing push-ups with his nose? I have no idea, and that's why I like it. I also like the man walking past who is staring at the kissing figure, obviously also confused. So I'm going to review my approach to photo-taking at tourist attractions. The tourists will be the attractions from now on.

This is from Rothenburg too:

This is outside a quaint little shop where you can buy mannequins of small girls. I don't look particularly happy with my purchase, do I? But I think it's just that I'm realising that I'm going to have to lug it around for the rest of the day and I'm regretting not taking the shipping option, bugger the expense.

On the way back home the autobahn was so choked with people returning home after the bank holiday weekend that after covering only 20 kms in one hour and having tired of discussing what a Schwein Grippe would be if it were a wrestling move instead of a deadly virus, (we decided it would be when one wrestler grabs hold of the other wrestler's nose) we turned off and hung out in some town whose name I forget that had 1. a playpark and 2. some non-German restaurants. We had Greek food. It was good. And I finally spotted my first socks-n-sandals combo. Nationality of the wearer is unknown, but I have my suspicions.

The Finger

2009-05-01T05:34:00.009+10:00

A lot of this week has focussed on Madeleine's finger. One night, after an exciting evening running around the flat with two non-English-speaking big kids, Madeleine's finger was somehow jammed in the door. She rushed to me, and cried at a pitch so stratospherically high that it was actually not not audible to human ears for several seconds. Then it was very audible, and for quite some time. Poor kid.

I wrapped it up and denied its existence for a while, but then when I peeked at it through half-shut eyes, I realised that it looked how it does in the above photo. Not very nice, really. Maybe I could just prick it with a needle, squeeze the gunk out then put a band-aid on it? I thought. But even to me that sounded like a bad idea.

So then I had to find a local children's doctor, try to convince the non-English speaking receptionist with my bad (ie, non-existent German) that I needed an appointment. And then I had to try and explain to the receptionist that while I haven't received my German health insurance card yet, we have signed up with a company, look, here's a slightly dog-eared fax with some numbers on it, eh? Eh?

But finally we got through. And the children's doctor was a nice lady in a white coat with lots of toys in her office. She examined Mads' manky finger with a peturbed expression.
There is blood under the nail,' she pronounced eventually. 'And poos.'

Well, blood was one thing. But poos was quite another.

She sent me off to another doctor - this time a nice man in a green outfit and a seemingly endless supply of packets of gummi bears which he kept producing, like magic, and I never worked out from where.

He examined Mads' finger and agreed about the blood, but said that it wasn't infected and that there was no pus (or poos) which I was mightily relieved to hear. Then he said 'I could take the nail off. It's going to fall off anyway. But I think it's maybe better just to leave it.'

I seconded that. I doubt all the gummi bears in Christendom could have helped us through such an experience.

Then he said 'So I think the best thing is to puncture the swelling and squeeze out the blood and then put a bandage on it.' Which, you may note, is what I'd briefly considered doing myself. But he did it much more swiftly and efficiently and with a lot less wincing than I would've.

I was expecting poor Mads to lift the roof with her wails while this happened, but she was surprisingly restrained. Earlier in the day she had whacked herself in the face with a banana (I really don't know how these things happen) and she cried just as much for that as she did when the doctor pricked her finger and squeezed the blood out.

Which makes for an interesting comparative scale, really; where 0 = no pain and 10 = finger jammed in door and 6.5 = banana in the face / pricked and squeezed finger.

This is how Madeleine's finger looked yesterday. I think it pretty much sums up how she felt about the whole experience:

Me und Kaiser Karl

2009-04-28T05:02:00.014+10:00

Here is a photo of Kaiser Karl (der Grosse, 742 - 814), known to his mates as Charlemagne.

If you think "Grosse" sounds pretty insulting, just keep in mind that his father was apparently known as King Pippin the Short, which is infinitely worse, I reckon.

Me and Kaiser Karl have become mates of late, largely because his stony likeness is positioned beside a pile of rocks which Madeleine finds irresistable. We can't walk by without her spending a good twenty minutes scrabbling about on them. And, you know, it's not like I've got a whole lot of pressing engagements right now. So I sit beside Kaiser Karl and watch the world pass by.

Last week I ended up spending even more time than usual sitting beside Karl because Madeleine was busy working on the theme song for a new character she's invented called 'Emily Rude'. The song went:
'Emily Rude
Emily Rude
Emily Rude
That's me!'
and was accompanied by a complex dance routine which, apparently, could only be performed on the rocks surrounding Kaiser Karl.

So to kill the time while Mads worked I decided to embark on a photographic project I've been planning for some time about footwear in Frankfurt. I'll admit straight up that I was hoping for knee high socks and sandals. So I got my camera out and tried to take some surreptitious photos of the people walking by. Having a small child is a good cover for exercises like this. For one thing, no one suspects a bored-looking mother of taking photos of people's feet. And for another, having a three year old singing about Emily Rude at the top of her lungs is a great diversion.

But my photographic exercise totally bombed. For one thing I kept taking photos of my lap, and not in an amusing, titilating way, just in a boring, close up of fabric, 'what the hell is that?' kind of way. Secondly, the footwear that passed me by was very conventional. Runners mostly. And sensible, but unremarkable walking shoes. No knee-high socks at all.

And then, of course, then I noticed that by far the most impressive examples of German footwear I'd spotted all days were those worn by none other than Madeleine and myself. Oh, the irony! And how predictable. In fact, there is probably some multi-syllabic German word that exactly describes this situation. I had on some birkenstocks and Mads was wearing some brand new red and orange German runners, paired with purple socks. Because really, what other socks would you wear with red and orange runners?

So here is a shot of Kaiser Karl (der Grosse)'s foot next to the foot of Madeleine Pearl (die kleine)'s:

Kaiser Karl's shoes are rather nice, don't you think? They remind me a little of these:

These are 'indoor only' shoes made by Elephant and Chickpea. Not German, but quite lovely. Perhaps I will buy myself some (once the shop reopens), seeming as how I'm a Haus Frau these days. I rather fancy swishing around on the floorboards in these. At the moment my indoor shoes are, well, socks. Kaiser Karl would not approve.

Then last night, I was cooking dinner (in my socks) and Madeleine came in and pulled something out of the kitchen drawer. 'Mummy,' she said. 'This is what Emily Rude looks like':

Stuff

2009-04-24T04:23:00.005+10:00

Before you read this, just remember, you know we are hopeless. So no eye-rolling, ok?

When we were packing to leave, we knew that some of our stuff could be sent air-freight and the rest would come by sea. Back then, all those weeks ago, I was keen to shed as much stuff as possible. 'We won't be taking anything,' I declared. 'Maybe just a single face-washer and a change of underpants.' So I didn't really take the airfreight stuff seriously. 'I'll just decide on the day,' I thought. Like I said. Hopeless.

So of course the moving day was frenzied and foul and Thieu and I ran around giving incoherent instructions to the removalists ('All the books with orange spines are being shipped. The white spines are staying. The forks are coming, but just leave the splades.' The removalists just rolled their eyes and shoved stuff in boxes. I was in charge of sorting out the stuff for air freight, so I had to make some very quick decisions about what to pack into the five boxes we'd been alloted. I had to isolate those items which would be of the greatest use to us once we arrived. The things that would make our life in Frankfurt complete and comfortable.

Well, yesterday our much anticipated five boxes of air freight arrived:

I have been dreaming about these boxes for the last week. It felt like Christmas, but better, because it was suff I knew I really needed (even though I couldn't exactly remember what it was). When I opened up the boxes yesterday afternoon, however, I thought 'What mad person decided that this junk was vital?' Some of the highlights included my winter clothes (and it's like, totally spring over here), a backpack, an ancient camera, a themometer. What was I thinking? Where were the sheets? The towels? The baby panadol? Madeleine's toys, for heaven's sake? Even a dvd or too would've been nice. But no. How about a finger puppet shaped like a panda and some stripy, knee-high socks?

It reminded of those stories you read about people who flee their burning houses, grabbing random objects on the way out. A salt cellar. The phonebook. At first I felt cross at my three-week-ago self for being so stupid. And then I remembered how hideously stressful the day was, and I (begrudgingly) forgave myself. Just this once.

The thing I felt worst about was the lack of toys for Mads, especially as I'd been promising her a bounty of goodness once The Boxes arrived. But then I remembered something important. For Mads, the best toy of all is a box, and now we had five.

So, with the aid of a marker pen and a stanley knife, we quickly turned one of the excellent boxes that Heidi gave us (thanks again for that, Heidi) into a submarine. Or U-Boot as they call them here.

And the bit we cut out for the porthole we turned into a pizza. (Smoked salmon with capers, because Mads likes a little salt.) Perfect.

Vapour Trails

2009-04-22T06:33:00.008+10:00

Here is a genuine Frankfurt vapour-trail, heading for the Henninger Beer tower that we can see from our balcony. Thieu took the shot. He is a fan of the digital zoom, which I maintain makes the pictures look all furry. He denies it. You decide for yourself:

The sky above Frankfurt is covered with vapour trails. There isn't a moment of the day when you can't see five or more of them criss-crossing the sky. And, because I'm not very good at spacial stuff, there is a time every day that I stand stock still, staring up in horror at what appears to be two planes heading straight for each other. And then the vapour-trails neatly intersect and the planes keep flying and I realise that one plane is teeny-tiny and the other is really quite large and probably quite close and I breathe again. I don't recall seeing vapour-trails like this in Australia. I'm sure I've only really seen them when some telecommunication company is trying to convince people to switch mobile phone plans.

Mads did an hour's orientation at kinder today. I was a little trepidatious but she literally flung herself into the room of children, with the joyus expression of someone presented with a table laden with food after having starved for several weeks. When I picked her up, her teacher, Frau Richter, said 'Madeleine sang a song and did a dance routine for us shortly after arriving.'

Which will come as no surprise to those who know her. Just wait till all her dress-up costumes arrive.

Frankfurt Food

2009-04-19T05:43:00.009+10:00

So, food in Frankfurt. There are sausages everywhere, of course. Breakfast sausages. Lunchtime sausages. 'Quick! I need a sausage!' sausages. There are sausage-sellers roaming the streets and everywhere you look, at any time of day, someone is tucking into one. There's lots of processed meats around, too. I'm not quite sure how these differ to sausages, other than they are more, well, floppy-looking. Some are pink, but mostly they are a dead-ish beige. I saw some in the local supermarket where some pink processed meat bits had been inserted into beige circles to make a processed meat-face. Friendly and fun.

Frankfurt is known for a couple of culinary traditions. One is a green sauce (that's grun soss in German, but with dots and that funny letter that looks like a B but is actually a double s). Green sauce is made, I think, from cream (or possibly yoghurt?) and the green-ness comes from various green herbs that are added during the cooking process. The locals seem to have green sauce with everything - salad, crackers, on schnitzels. With sausages, of course. It looks like it'd make a nice smoothie, too. It's actually very tasty. Even Maddles liked it. Here is a photo of her dinner the night we first had it. The green sauce is hard to see in the green container, but believe me, it's a very pretty colour and Maddls enjoyed dipping everything into it:

Our upstairs neighbour is going to give us a lesson in how to make it. Or maybe I've just decided that she is. I can't quite remember.

The local drink is apple wine, which everyone tells us is NOT cider. But it tastes like cider. Just a bit flatter. But don't tell the Frankfurters I told you that.

And finally, there's sweet stuff, which Germany does very well. All the supermarkets sell chocolate covered with labels proclaiming the stuff to be bio-dynamic and fairtrade and 70 percent cocoa etc so you actually feel a bit guilty if you leave the shop without a block or two. Like you'd be letting down your family and the planet.

For those less concerned with purity, there is a vast array of delights too. Thieu returned from the supermarket the other day with these:

They are chocolate on the outside, marshmallow inside. And they are huge. 'There were mini dickmanns,' explained Thieu, a little sheepishly. 'But I couldn't bring myself to buy those.'

Konigstein

2009-04-14T06:41:00.007+10:00

When you are three and a half, and you're told you're being taken to see a castle, you expect something like this:

It's something of a shock then, when after a long train trip, what you arrive at is this:

Poor Mads discovered how disappointing real castles can be when we went on our first train trip outside of Frankfurt this weekend to see the castle at Konigstein. (Please note that there should be two dots over the 'o' in Konigstein but I haven't worked out how to do that, or even if it's possible on my computer). Where were the ballrooms? The sumptuous feasts? The roof? There was great consternation, and only an ice cream, hastily applied, could console her. It reminded me of how disappointed my sister was when she was taken to see the fairy penguins at Phillip Island as a child and discovered that they weren't dressed up with wings, tutus and wands.

Konigstein was, incidentally, the site of our first public tantrum in Germany(when the afore-mentioned ice-cream was not applied quite hastily enough). A crowd quickly gathered around us as the tantrum unfolded, awe-inspired by our off-spring's noise-making abilities and the speed with which her limbs can flail. Perhaps they were wondering if such impressive energy could be harnessed to power a small to medium sized generator. It was then that I realised that German kids do not have tantrums. Or even cry much. There's quite a bit of shoving, but it all seems to be done silently, almost like a mime. Mads' wailing seemed to reverberate off the nearby Taunus mountain range. A couple of heavy blocks toppled from the ancient castle walls. The crowd parted as we scooped up our thrashing child and headed determindedly towards the ruins.

Kinder, which supposedly starts this week, is going to be interesting.

Frohe Ostern in der Schrebergarten

2009-04-13T05:10:00.009+10:00

So, no hot cross buns for breakfast this morning, but thankfully plenty of chocolate. And also a strange cakey-thing that looked like a sphinx covered in chocolate, but which was apparently a chocolate-covered lamb cake, which in itself is a pretty weird idea. Mads was less disturbed by it than I was, and happily ripped its head off and shoved it in her mouth, before dashing off in search of further chocolatey goodness. Eggs turned up in the strangest of places (shoes etc) but I was impressed by Mads' thoroughness when she carefully checked both toilets.

Mid-morning we joined our upstairs neighbour, L and her son V for a picnic in the private garden they share with some friends. This is quite a common thing to do in Frankfurt, apparently. You put your name down at the local council and after a year or so you are matched up with a garden that suits your needs. They are called Schrebergartens - although no one today seemed to know what 'Schreber' means exactly, and if they don't know, being Germans, I can't possibly be expected to know either.

It was a very nice spot - sort of like a large backyard with no house, designed for people who live in flats, like most people do here, it seems. This particular schrebergarten was fairly wild and loose (perfect for Easter egg hunting) but apparently there are some gardens which are only rented out on the condition that they are maintained precisely. Very precisely. One third of the garden is for vegetables, one third for flowers, one third purely for grass. 'Yeah, and if you mess it up, the garden nazis come and get you,' one of the German guests explained. Thieu and I tittered nervously. Are we allowed to laugh at nazi jokes so soon after arriving? We really weren't sure.

It's a public holiday tomorrow, of course, and we don't have any milk. I asked a few people if they thought there'd be anywhere I could get some. There were a few suggestions, but no one seemed very confident. I really need to do some stocking up.

There were two Indian mums at the bbq today too, and they told me how their daughters eat nothing and I told them how mine eats everything, even strange-looking chocolate sphinx-lambs. Then the three of us ran around, basting our kids in suncreme, while the German mothers looked at us in mild confusion.

All in all, it was a very pleasant way to spend our first Easter here. Then later in the evening, as I was making Mads' dinner, the doorbell rang. One of the parents from the bbq had brought us around some milk. I only wished I had some chocolate lamb left to offer him as thanks.

Frankfurt: The Arrival

2009-04-08T23:55:00.009+10:00

Our flight from Singapore left at 11.30, so we had an arvo nap and then somehow managed to keep Mads awake until take-off. Luckily, there was a small play area at the airport, and lots of excited kids (surrounded by tired parents). Then five minutes after take-off, she was asleep. And stayed asleep for ten of the twelve hours! It was incredible. I didn't sleep at all, but I wasn't expecting to. I don't understand how anyone actually can sleep on a plane (in economy at least, which has been my only experience of flying). A couple of times I started nodding off, but as my head would fall forward I'd instantly, and horribly, wake up. Is my head heavier than normal peoples' heads? Do other people have some technique that keeps their heads in position? I don't get it. It's like those earbud things. I cannot keep them in my ears, especially my right ear. Is my ear deformed? The only way I can make them stay in place is if I stay very still and tilt my head back slightly. No one else seems to need to do this. It's all coming back to me having a weirdly shaped head. Oh well. At least I had ten hours to stare at my slumbering daughter in delighted amazement, occasionally muttering 'das ist fantastich' to myself.

Everything continued to go smoothly after we landed. Customs, no probs. Bags all arrived in one piece. Taxi, no worries. When we arrived at the flat (which did actually exist - hooray!) our upstairs neighbour was there, as planned, awake and ready to let us in. She'd even bought us some basic supplies and made us a card, which was very, very kind. Mads was very excited to see her son, Vicco. She shouted 'do you want to go and play in my room Vicco?' Vicco doesn't speak English yet, but smiled politely and then hid behind his mother, just a little. Later they brought down some lego for Mads. So freaking nice!

The flat is lovely and light (and warm) and close to all the important things (supermarket, park, train station, library, trink-halle). It is very strange to be here and I keep reflecting on the incredible good fortune we had in getting this flat in the first place.

We are going to need some German lessons, and soon, because although a lot of people speak English of course, it sucks not understanding what people are saying, especially for people as nosey and Thieu and me. And Mads really needs to be able to talk to kids in the park or she'll go nuts. I did have a loose plan that Mads would learn fluent German at kinder and then we'd just get her to do everything (buy the groceries, speak with the immigration department, the bank etc) but perhaps this is a bit much to expect. My ambition has always been to acquire enough German to hold my own in conversation with a four year old so that I won't embarrass Mads in front of her friends, but I'm realising now that this is perhaps aiming too high. Maybe I should aim to understand a slow-speaking 3 year old. We have been watching German kids TV to try and pick some words up from that. Mads' approach is to just make up words that sound vaguely German and use those.

Here are some things I've noticed so far:

- the pedestrian traffic lights are silent and we keep missing them because we're waiting for the 'BEEUW!tok-tok-tok-tok-tok' noise.

-they don't have hot cross buns. But they do have bun-shaped-bunnies, which look a little cross (at least, the one-eared one I bought for Mads this morning looked slightly peeved).

-Germans are confused about the notion of a de-facto relationship. We met someone from Matt's work yesterday who said 'What? After ten years you still haven't decided if you want to get married or not?'

-Frankfurt is a lot prettier than everyone led me to believe. Hooray for low expectations!

-you can buy vegetables in Germany. I will take some photographs to prove it.

Next post's topic is: German toilet design and what does this say about the German personality?

We're here. (Bodily, at least)

2009-04-06T21:26:00.004+10:00

Sorry about crying at the airport. That was inevitable, I guess, but I didn't intend to do it. But I think I started crying sometime on Tuesday and it felt kind of good, so I just kept going. Inevitably, the plane was delayed (partly because of the crazy stormy weather, but partly also because of some stupid seat malfunction in business class. As we boarded two very grumpy-looking women were standing in that kind of weird kitcheny-space they have on planes. A steward asked them if they'd like a champagne and one said, snappily, 'Yes, but not while I'm standing here.' I wonder if she relented during the 45 minutes it took them to fix whatever the problem was? No one was offering the shleppers down in eco class if they'd like a drink. I would've happily taken theirs for them.

So the flight was kind of crap, because Qantas is like that - food was bad, the in flight entertainment inexplicably stopped working half-way through the flight etc etc. And I had a cold that got worse and worse until I seriously thought my eardrum was going to pop. But we made it, and my ear doesn't seem to have popped.

I picked the hotel from the plethora on the internet based purely on the fact that it had a glass lift featured in its profile, and Mads liked the glass lift in Cairns so much that I decided that was enough of a selling point for me. It was a pretty amazing lift. Singapore seems to be mostly shopping and eating, is that right? We did a reasonable amount of eating, but there was no way we felt like shopping after all the stuff we had to deal with during the move. It was actually good - I didn't feel even slightly tempted to shop. Actually, on Sat, I didn't really feel like doing much more than laying in a darkened bed, nursing my sore head, which is basically what I did.

The stop in Singapore was definitely the right to do. About two hours into the flight Mads started saying 'When are we going to get there? This is taking forever etc' and I was so relieved that we only had five hours ahead of us instead of seventeen.

Have to go. The slumberers are stirring. Maybe I should see how long I can go without sleep? Luckily, I'm not capable of actually calculating how many hours I've been awake already, but I do I think I'm starting to hallucinate. I keep having this weird sensation that I quit my job and moved to a country where I don't speak the language or know anyone. Strange....

You've Got the Cutest Little Baby Gates

2009-03-25T21:36:00.002+11:00

Thieu took down the two baby gates which have blocked the top and bottom of the stairs ever since Mads was about 6 months old. It is so strange not to have them there. The stairs suddenly seem so open, so dangerous. Every time I go upstairs my hand reaches out automatically to open the gate, like some sort of nervous twitch.

The other big change is the enormous Peter Dombrovskis mural has been taken off our wall. I really wasn't happy about it going up initially, but I grew to quite like it and now that it's gone the room seems incredibly small and cramped. It's like we used to have an amazing view out of our window and someone has just blocked it with a big brick wall.

Mads has just started asking for her dummy again over the last couple of days, which she hasn't done for six months. Is it because we're moving? We saw a girl her age with one the other day, and perhaps this alerted her to the unfairness of hers being removed, when other children still have theirs. She announced yesterday that she wanted to be a 'bushranger'. I was supportive - I rather like the idea of being a bushranger's mother, and I know her grandma (badger) would approve. Then I asked her what a bushranger does and she said 'They arrange the bushes,' so I think she thinks a bushranger is perhaps some kind of florist. Which could be good too, but very different to what I'd imagined.

More Rubbish

2009-03-24T21:45:00.008+11:00

We've been shedding stuff - or attempting to, at least. I bundled up some stuff to take to the charity bin at a local church today and after daycare, Mads and I stopped off to donate. Someone else had donated something that couldn't fit into the slot and had left it beside the bin. It was a manky, broken dolls' highchair, and luckily, Mads immediately realised that we needed to take it home straight away for her dolls.

Mads has two dolls, both called Donnie, (this is how she used to say 'dolly'). To distinguish between them they are known as Soft Donnie and Hard Donnie. There is also Softest Donnie, but she's not really a major player. Hard Donnie is anatomically correct and, consequently, generally naked. This works for her, though, because her main purpose is to be submerged in water. You get the feeling she doesn't like it much, but she endures it. You have to give it to Hard Donnie, she rarely complains.

It's Soft Donnie who is the trouble-maker, the cheeky one. She's smaller and less spiky and because of this she often gets picked to go on adventures. It was Soft Donnie, not Hard Donnie, who joined us on the trip to Queensland, it is Soft Donnie who is cuddled up with Mads in bed right now, and I suspect that while both Donnies will be coming to Germany, it will be Soft Donnie who gets to travel in the plane and Hard Donnie who travels in a box along with everything else, via the relocation company. It hasn't been spoken about yet, but we all know it, not least of all Hard Donnie herself.

So I can only guess at Hard Donnie's astonishment when it was she, and not Soft Donnie who was selected to try out the newly acquired treasure. Of course, she was selected because of her other attribute besides being able to go in water - sitting up (Soft Donnie tends to flop around a bit) but still, it was a great honour. Hard Donnie's pride was palpable a she sat up between Mads and me for dinner this evening, in the high chair. Mads even got her a little bowl and spoon. If Hard Donnie could twitter, she would've been twittering like crazy about this incredible turn of events.

I felt happy for Hard Donnie. She might be a little humourless, but she's so stoic and so loyal. I felt that she deserved this little victory. And I wanted to celebrate it, somehow. So I picked up the spoon and started to feed her. I'd only given her a couple of mouthfuls when Mads shook her head.
'Don't feed her, mummy,' she said sternly. 'Hard Donnie has to learn to feed herself.'

Of course. I should've known.
She's still sitting at the table now, bowl and spoon in front of her. Naked. Anatomically correct. But happy, I think, in her own way.

Do We Own the World's Most Boring Books?

2009-03-20T21:52:00.008+11:00

One thing you discover when you move is that you are a Collector, whether you intended to be one or not. Or at least, this has been my experience. Whenever I move I always find masses of notebooks, all with only a few pages used. I have a ridiculous amount of them and really, I don't write notes much. I also seem to collect packets of Panadol and twenty cent coins. It's odd. Thieu collects articles from newspapers and seeds from interesting trees he has come across on walks, stored in baby-food jars.

The other thing that Thieu and I have in large proportions is books. They're everywhere. And one thing that I've always suspected, but which has become clear to me as we pack up, is that we have a lot of extremely boring books. Take this random selection:

The 'Canals of England' and the 'Computers: Concepts and Uses' is Thieu's, but the Grammar Games one is mine. There are many, many more titles along similar lines, but the one I came across yesterday which I think deserves the prize for the most boring book in our collection is this one:

The worst bit is that these books are not in the 'throwing out' pile. Oh no. They are in the keeping pile. Because who knows when we might want to play some grammar games while finding out about the history of kerosene lamps?

German phrase of the day (this one was actually used by someone we know): Es ist ein kaka in das Schwimmbad.

Sixteen Days to Go

2009-03-18T21:30:00.000+11:00

It's now only just over two weeks before we head to Frankfurt. Well, first we're going to stop in Singapore for two nights to recover from the hideousness of moving. And hideous it is.

I thought I'd plateau-ed with my panic, and kept telling myself that it wouldn't be the horror that moving usually is, because Thieu's work is paying for the relocation. But that was before it dawned on me that while his work would pay for the fairly modest amount of crap we are moving to Germany, they obviously wouldn't be paying for the much larger amount of crap we need to store here. So much rifling through of old diaries, awful sketchbooks, ancient letters and tiny, stained clothes (Mads') has ensued. I've been selling stuff on ebay, but I'm going to stop because it's just not worth it for the most part. I am glad, however, that we've finally found someone who will take the Ikea cot. Thieu tried to flog it off via an ad in the window of the local shop. He headed the ad 'Scandanavian Cot'. Funny, but it didn't work.

I was much more honest on ebay and some good people from Templestowe and driving over at some stage (hopefully very soon) to lug the wretched thing away. They are even giving us fifty bucks for the privilege, which makes me feel a bit guilty. But still, I'm sure they probably have a very impressive ebay profile and simply intend to resell it to someone else.

So, because I have way too much to do, I've started to blog. Because this is what I do when I'm anxious. And I've just handed in a Go Girl draft so my typing fingers were feeling all weird and under-exercised.

So why start a blog again? Bad habits are hard to break, I guess. Plus the Rents have started one so I thought I may as well respond in kind. Maybe it will be a nice record of our time in Frankfurt. Maybe I'll save it all to disk and present it to Mads one day and say 'here's a record of our two years in Frankfurt' and she'll look at me sullenly (she's a teenager in my vision) and say 'but mum, we didn't stay for two years, remember? You freaked out after a week and we came back. So yeah, thanks for reminding me that I never learned to speak German and now I'll never be a diplomat/translator/Goethe expert/Miss World' etc.

Dunno. Rambling. Better stop. So much to do. Still not sleeping. How long will the insomnia continue? Surely it will stop once we finally arrive in Frankfurt? But maybe it's like the drought not really being a drought but the 'new dry'? Maybe this is not insomnia but the 'new non-sleep'? Well, at least that will free up plenty of time for blogging.

German phrase for the day: Ich spreche kein Deutsch.