the wiesn (or OKTOBERFEST to non-deutschys)

This weekend I did something very out of character for me, namely spending lots and lots of money in one go. However, I am so glad I did because you really shouldn't have a year in the scheisse and not go to Oktoberfest. The 12 hour round trip to Munich (this country is massive) cost €100 (at half price) and the beers (from here on known as Steins) were ten euros apiece. But I had a fucking brilliant weekend so I'd say it was definitely worth it.

Rather fortunately I managed to be cheeky enough to ask a girl called Rachael from Leeds who I didn't know before (thanks to my shocking lack of attempt to socialise with course people over the last two years, I am so sorry guys) if I could stay at hers along with the others who were heading down. With six of us to sleep in a room where she isn't technically allowed guests and given the fact that we hadn't reserved a table for the beer tents there was a fair amount of things that could go wrong. We didn't let it worry us on the friday night though and went out locally for some food and a few drinks. The man in the bar didn't seem too impressed at having to sort food at 10pm so instead of giving us the menus he insisted on giving us Gnnochi (which was incredibly cheesy). Me and Ali, being the 'lads' (loosest sense of the word) of the group raced ahead on the beer front and a good night was had by all.

Completely ignoring advice to get to the festival at 7am on the saturday in order to get a bench (you can't buy drinks unless you are sat at a table) we opted for the slighly later butstillreallyfuckingearlyonaweekend time of 11am for our arrival and after buying a can and some pizza at the Hauptbahnhof we got the tube out to the Wiesn. As an aside, if you ever find yourself in Munich Hbf, but pizza from the stand with slices for €2.20/€2.40 and you won't regret it. We arrived at the festival area in the pissing down rain and headed for the nearest tent. There was a big queue but eventually we got inside. And then we saw why you should go at 7am. There was probably 7000 odd people inside and we just couldn't find a table.

So after a lot of aimless walking around we did the very English thing and gatecrashed someone elses table. Once we had our massive Steins they couldn't shift us and when we finally took the subtle hints people were giving (or in the case of the German man who lost his temper and shouted 'RAUSGEHEN' at us repeatedly, less subtle hints) and moved on to a different table. This way we managed to meet lots of Germans and people of various nationalities, including a Welsh man and an Australian who had devised a rather unsophisticated version of higher or lower and a good afternoon was had by all.




The Steins are lethal. Actually lethal. At €10 a time they should be really (well, €8.95 plus the tip you have no choice but to leave for the mardy and occasionally violent waitresses). Tipsy after a couple and completely gone after a couple more, there really isn't much I can say about the rest of the day. We angered on of the said waitresses by sitting at what looked like a perfectly available table. We went to a different tent for another drink. I spoke at length to an Australian man about cricket and probably didn't make much sense at all. I excitedly bought a Schnitzel sandwich and was completely gutted that it wasn't hot. I tried to put too much Currywurst in my mouth and it went everywhere. We went back to the same place as the previous night for tea and he took the tablecloths off the tables before letting us eat. We headed back to Rachael's with the intention of going out but i passed out under the desk and apparantly everyone else did soon after so the night out never happened. Probably a good idea really as much more alcohol would definitely been a bad idea!

The only regret I would have about the weekend is that I didn't have Lederhosen, but really at €100 it would have been one novelty purchase too far. So we did the English thing and wore white tshirts and wrote profanities on each other. And thanks to Sophie who thought writing "Ich will Maenner" on my back I got several concerned looks from German men!

So yeah, I had a brilliant weekend and I would definitely recommend Oktoberfest to everyone who likes sinking a few ales. And what could make an awesome weekend even better? Super Emile scoring a late winner in a local derby, that's what.

a thoroughly disturbing experience.

So I was at my Probetraining (kind of like a try before you buy session) at the gym the other day, innocently using one of the weight machines when a woman came over to use the machine opposite. As she lifted her weights I caught my first sight of an unshaven German female armpit. Needless to say I have now joined a different gym on the other side of Ratingen, which by the way is called McFit... a new direction for Ronald and co?

Sitzpinkeln bitte.

Only in Germany. I love this country.

some other random things i have noticed so far.

• there tends to be a bakery every 4th shop along, every 2 in a train station. they all smell gorgeous.
• most german people seem to have a dog, and they take them into town with them. in fact the other day i saw a dog as big as a baby camel, no joke.
• it is impossible to predict what the temperature is going to be from day to day.
  
• they have green lucky strikes!
• nowhere seems to sell wraps.
  
• they love their cover bands (well, if you're at Ratingen Live, the happening event of the town's social calendar, they do anyway).
• none of the schoolkids know who Aston Villa and Jamie T are.
  
• it's insanely rushed at the checkout in a supermarket and they also don't like putting your change in your hand, which makes you look simple when you struggle to scoop it up.
• most German women over the age of 55 look the same.
  
• they really really don't like it if you cross without the green man, i was tutted at yesterday
• the Pfand machines (where you recycle plastic bottles/cans for money) are amazing.
• the 'German Stare' exists, and isn't nice to be on the receiving end of.
• www.bahn.de is oddly addictive.
• they have awesomely named chocolate bars based on the german language:

the first few days in school.

I teach at the CFvW Gymnasium (grammar school, not actual gym) in Ratingen. My first day was on friday so I got up at half6 in the morning and cycled into school with the son of my host family. I say cycled... he cycled, and I struggled to stay on the bloody thing trying to negotiate my way along narrow pavements whilst avoiding stray children and badly parked cars. Why we didn't cycle on the road I don't know but he seemed to be enjoying himself. Needless to say I quickly decided to walk from then on. When we arrived (just about intact) I met with my mentor for the year who is brilliant, a really friendly man who speaks understandable German (just as an aside: don't try and keep up with a conversation between two Germans, maybe it's just me but they speak so bloody fast!).

I have had a weeks worth of trying out various lessons and teachers and will next week choose the classes I want to help out in on a permanent basis. So far there have been a mixed bag:

Year 7s - they were fine, and spoke really good English.
Year 8s - only wanted to know if I had a girlfriend, nosy bastards!
Year 13s - we were doing Shakespeare, not my cup of tea.

Year 9s - didn't stop bloody talking for the whole lesson, the teachers here don't seem to mind though which is odd. A few knobs in this class, won't be going back!
Year 13s - more Shakespeare. I nearly fell asleep as they were discussing their interpretations of Sonnets, mainly because of the 6.30am start but I think I'll steer clear of lit classes now just in case!

Year 11s - I thought thay would be the most disruptive students but they were really good, and had phenomenal English. I will go back to that class.

Year 9s mkII - a different Y9 class, and they were brilliant. This lesson was different to all the others I have had so far, because the teacher let them ask me questions about myself and England for the whole lesson... I felt quite important. By the way, if a German asks you 'who has the most style, English people or Germans?', don't say the English, no matter how true it may be. I also found out that they think the concept of a Full English is horrible, they clearly haven't been to Hukaz in Leeds.

So, in the school so far so good really. I haven't had much to do but it's been a bit of a breeze. The early mornings aren't enjoyable but when you walk out of work at 9.45am it doesn't feel too bad! Also I've been invited to a teacher team building weekend in a couple of weeks, so I'll be able to see how the Germans really let their hair down.

bureaucracy, bureaucracy, bureaucracy.

The Germans love it. Any excuse for forms? They will take it. Any excuse to ask for your passport? They will take it. Any excuse to photocopy any sort of official form? They bloody love it!

When you move out here you need to do anmelden, which means to register. Luckily, my host mother took me to the office to sort it out and it wasn't too difficult. Then we set up a bank account, which was another opportunity to sign several pieces of paper and have my passport checked a few times. Then we went to buy a sim card, and even at the Phone House (their Carphone Warehouse) I still had to show my bloody passport!

The worst of all of these processes, however, is enrolling at a university. When you have done this you can buy a Semesterticket, which gives you free travel throughout Nordrhein Westfalen until the end of March so is worth all the trouble, but only just! On monday I went to Essen to meet Mari, Katie and Alex so we could go and register at Essen uni at the same time. When we got to the office we were eventually told we needed an appointment and to go back on tuesday. When we went on tuesday we were told to go over the road and get some sort of insurance confirmation. When we had that we were finally able to enrol and go to bank to pay for our Semestertickets... or so we thought... the banks have variable opening hours here and the Sparkasse was closed when we got there. So I had to come back to Ratingen and cash it here today, and post my receipt to Mari so she can hopefully collect my card for me on friday. It might not sound like such a stressful process, but believe me it was! I am looking forward to this free travel though.

what's the name of the fucking game... say altenberg.

Every year the Fremdsprachassitenten (foreign language assistants) have a couple of days training in a convent just outside Köln in order to prepare them for being plonked in front of a class of german children. We all met up outside the Hauptbahnhof and were taken to the small town of Altenberg on coaches. The training is at a convent type place out in the countryside, which locks you in at 8pm and is the kind of place that you would imagine is why films like The Human Centipede are set in Germany. However, the actual place itself was lovely and shortly after arriving (desperate for the toilet... the can on the coach had been a bad idea) we were introduced to the course by a lovely German man called Günter Jacob. He is exactly what German men should be like, a new hero of mine.

Our first evening meal was one of the more bizarre that I'm sure I will eat throughout the year but I have been assured that Germans like it. We were given scrambled eggs, spinach and potatoes. Not the best of combinations when you are starving to be honest! But we can let them off the food because they gave us special dispensation to open a bar on the nights, selling big bottles of beer for €1.50 which was brilliant.

Over the course of the training the students from Leeds obtained a rather bad reputation as the loutish drinkers, with one girl even saying that whilst there was "a time and a place for getting pissed", that "this wasn't it". Anyway... we had a great time! In between the drinking games and shaving foam parties we learned a few tips about teaching in Germany and the educational side of the course, whilst not being as good as I had hoped, was still pretty useful. If only because I learned the words 'ziehen' and 'drücken', from all the bloody doors in the place! Also the getting up early routine began in Altenberg, not nice. We all returned to our towns around Germany on the thursday ready (in some cases) to start at our schools.

ankunft in deutschland.

When I found out I would be living in Ratingen for my year abroad it's fair to say I was less than impressed. There's not much info about it on the internet and I was dreading spending the year far away from everything. However when my flight landed and I met my host family it soon became clear I wouldn't be too cut off. Düsseldorf airport is only ten minutes from the town of Ratingen. My host family are very nice and after eating a quick tea with them I headed up to my room. I'm sharing the second floor of the house with the daughter of the family and I've actually got a really nice room which is brilliant, because there's a fair chance I will be spending many winter evenings in it!

There's also an ensuite shower room which is pretty cool because, if you know me you'll probably know, i am on it for having showers. Also, it's a power shower which is awesome.


There's also a toilet and a little kitchenette kind of thing on my floor with hobs and a fridge for me to use, so I'm set up pretty nicely really. So yeah, that's about it for the first day... I went to sleep reasonably early with the training course in Altenberg to look forward to the next day.