This blog has traditionally been for anything I wrote, so I think this counts - it's the Forge Radio Committee Christmas play that I co-wrote and which was broadcast on 25th Dec 2011. That's right, the actual Christmas day. It's a bit silly but it was a good laugh to write and record. Enjoy.
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Based (loosely) on A Christmas Carol and the Nativity 'A Committee Christmas Carol' follows station manager Ebeneezer Whitehouse back in time to the very first Christmas as he attempts to rediscover his long lost Christmas Spirit.
Written by James Kenny and Georgie Beardmore
Produced by Jack and Sophia
And starring the Forge Radio Committee.
Wednesday 28 December 2011
Thursday 13 October 2011
Creative Writing: "Monochrome Dream"
This was written to Sorrow - Monochrome Dream for Turnfables (LSRfm Thursday 3-4). It's meant to be a slightly tongue-in-cheek dig at old black and white romantic films. Or romantic films in general, because I am a cynical, cynical woman. Enjoy!
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A ballroom of a past time in an unspecified place. High heels, high fashion, back when smoking cigarettes spoke of sophistication and class and before wearing fur was taboo. A band plays for the benefit of the couples revolving on the dance floor, all executing the perfect waltz, because it is that era, the era when everyone knew the moves.
He is dressed to the nines. She is dressed to kill. They haven’t seen each other yet.
She drifts through the smoke like a teenage dream, silk pooling at her feet like an ink spill, skin shining like an August moon. What a leading lady… those lips, those eyes; she’s perfection. How are we supposed to believe that she is still yet to be asked to dance?
He broods in the shadows, tall and rugged, clutching his whiskey and pondering the frivolity of his friends, stereotype of a moody hero. These dances, hah! You won’t catch him on the dance floor, pointlessly twirling some dull blonde around and around, making small talk for little people.
She drifts. He broods. She drifts closer. Their eyes meet.
It’s like his reservations have been swept away with the force of her gaze. He can’t help but reach for her, enclosing her delicately gloved hand inside his strong, masculine paw. She does not resist. Her breath catches.
Now they are dancing, revolving alongside fifty other couples who think this waltz is love. But for them this is love. Neither knows the other’s name, but they know that this is their happily-ever-after. This moment is the one they have both been waiting for all their lives, it’s the moment they’ll never forget. They’ll tell their grandchildren about this moment, the first time they danced, the first time they kissed.
She could swoon in his arms, he could drown in her eyes and I could believe it if it wasn’t in monochrome.
Monday 10 October 2011
Creative Writing "Farsight"
Creative writing is back! This time for a shiny new LSR show "Turnfables" - less folk, more low-fi dubstep, Thursdays 3-4pm. Here's my very first piece that I wrote for them - it was inspired by the track "Farsight" from Ghostek & Buck UK.
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I am a speck on a deserted beach in winter, all hat and scarf and no umbrella. Up ahead steel grey clouds tumble, pouring fourth not raindrops but sheets of water that fall like perfect panes of glass. They shatter when they hit me and a thousand tiny shards dance around my feet, my shoulders, my wind-scorched face, water droplets tracking my cheeks like tears. The water cascades off my back like a waterfall, my clothes cling to me as ice creeps into my bones. I have a river for a coat and two puddles for shoes, and yet I don’t shudder, I don’t shiver, the cold does not bite. I wrap the rain around me like a shroud and I watch. I watch the waves. I watch them breathe softly over the sand, in and out, in and out. My own breath matches, in and out, in and out. We are one, me and the ocean, we’re in perfect time. Together we are perfectly calm. No rage today, no crashing upon the shore, only gentle drifting under a warring sky. Let the clouds fight, with their thunder and their lightening. Down here all is peaceful. And soon all will be well.
I am speck on a deserted beach in winter, and as the soft roaring of the waves mingles with the drumming of the raindrops, I wonder if all the water will wash me away.
Tuesday 6 September 2011
Travel: Duisburg Mole
This is the article I wrote for www.thirdyearabroad.com as part of their Mole Dairies (http://www.thirdyearabroad.com/german/item/957.html). It's an ins-and-outs guide to Duisburg - everything you wanted and ever needed to know about Germany's industrial heartland.
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And that’s Duisburg, folks. I wish you all the best with your year abroad; if you enjoy it half as much as I did, you’re in for a real treat. Have fun and good luck!
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So you’ve just found out you’re going to be spending some time in Duisburg, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Don’t worry, before my year abroad, I hadn’t heard of it either. However, after several months of living local, I’ve managed to collect lots of handy hints and tips that will hopefully help your year abroad in the heart of the Ruhrgebiet run smoothly.
The City and the Sights
I’ll level with you. Duisburg is not very pretty. In fact, it’s a bit blockish and industrial. You mustn’t hold that against it though; just because it ain’t good-looking doesn’t mean you can’t have an absolute blast there.
The main city centre runs from the Hauptbahnhof up Konigstraße to the Rathouse. It’s this street where you’ll find all the shops and banks, as well as two large shopping centres (the Forum and the City Palais, which is also home to a concert hall, several restaurants and a casino) and the Duisburg Theatre. They also hold the (quite impressive) Christmas Market here: keep your eye out for the full-size sailing boat serving hot Glühwein. There are also at least six fountains of varying sizes, the most famous of these being the Lifesaver Statue, a colourful revolving bird, which is either very artistic or very weird depending on your point of view.
If you take a left at the Lifesaver Statue and walk to the end of the street, you’ll come to a large park which is ideal in summer for relaxing in the sunshine with a picnic or a beer. Behind it is a large sculpture museum which for the artists among you is an enjoyable way to while away a few hours. There’s another interesting sculpture at the entrance to the park too, which I can’t describe for censorship reasons – but make sure you check it out, it’s a good laugh.
The other area of town worth a look is the Innenhafen, which is full of lovely bars and restaurants and an excellent place to go for a quiet meal and a few drinks. It’s fairly easy to find: if you continue in a straight line past the Rathaus (pause to look at excavated medieval house here, it’s quite interesting) and turn right just before the bridge, it’s about a ten minute walk along the Ruhr. On the way you’ll pass the Kultur-und Stadthistorisches Museum, which is alright if you’re a fan of industrial history, as well as another nice park and the old city walls. Down here you’ll also find the Legoland Discovery Centre, the entrance of which is dominated by the larger-than-life Lego giraffe that crops up on all the Duisburg postcards.
Student City
The Universität Duisburg-Essen is a large modern university with some 30,000 students, many of whom are international, making the city’s student vibe wonderfully multi-cultural. The university buildings are somewhat dotted about, but the main centre is on Lotharstraße, about a twenty minute walk from the Hauptbahnhof in the opposite direction to the city centre. Here you’ll find the majority of the departments, the Info Centre, the main canteen (Mensa) and the gym (completely unrelated to the University, it’s also around this area that the large and reasonably famous Duisburg Zoo is located).
There is a large international students society run by students which runs regular Stammtisches and trips (sometimes even trips abroad – whilst I was there they ran a day trip to Paris for 40Euro). You don’t even have to be a student at the university to be involved; they are happy to welcome any international students and the Stammtisches in particular are an excellent way to meet people in the area whilst practising your language skills.
Finding Accommodation
Your first and best option for finding accommodation in Duisburg is to apply for the non-university Studentenwohnheim on Dellplatz. This is cheap, sociable and easy walking distance from the city centre and the Hauptbahnhof. It is in the style of a traditional hall of residence, with individual rooms and a large shared kitchen, which is kept meticulously clean. It is popular with a large number of young working Germans and students as well as internationals and there is even a (very cheep) bar downstairs on Wednesday nights. Alternatively, it is possible to apply for university student accommodation. They have a large number of Studentenwohnheims available for students and non students (non students have to pay and additional guest fee of 20Euro per month), usually in the form of shared flats. This is also a very cheap option, but if you want to live with Germans then your chances are slim as the majority of inhabitants will be international students. Most of the Studentenwohnheims are located in Neudorf, just behind the Hauptbahnhof, which is a popular student area.
Getting Around
Duisburg, like the majority of German cities has a very good U-Bahn network. The 901 route is the one you’ll probably use most as a student as it connects the University to the Hauptbahnhof, as well as to the neighbouring city of Mülheim-an-der-Ruhr. In terms of trains, Duisburg is very well connected and it is possible to get a direct regional train to almost anywhere within Nordrhein-Westfalen, as well as to many exciting places further a-field, such as Berlin, Amsterdam and Copenhagen.
If you plan to do a lot of travelling within Nordrhein-Westfalen (as I did) and you are not already a student at the university, I highly recommend you enrol. It is 215Euro per semester and for this you will be issued with a Semesterticket entitling you to unlimited travel on regional transport (U-Bahn, busses and RE/RB/ S-Bahn trains). You can even take a friend on your ticket if it is after 7pm. To get one you have to go the AAA Office (located on the ground floor of a large university building on Geibelstraße) where they will make you fill out lots of forms and confuse you with insurance questions (make sure you take your passport and two passport photos with you). If anyone tells you that you are not permitted to enrol (they don’t seem to communicate information too well between staff) then persevere because they are talking nonsense. This may sound like a lot of faff, but it is thoroughly worth it for the amount of money you save on travel.
Eating, Drinking & Dancing
There are innumerable places to eat, drink and be merry in Duisburg. Here are a few of my favourites.
Restaurants
- Bodega: Located in the Innenhafen, this place does the best tapas outside of Espania as well as first-rate cocktails. Make sure you try the garlic marinated chicken; you won’t be kissing anyone for a while but it tastes like heaven.
- Brauhaus Schacht 4/8: Smack bang in the middle of the city centre, excellent beer and Schnitzel as big as your face.
- Nuh’s Thai: Eat in or takeaway, some of the best value and best tasting Thai food in the region.
Bars
- I have no idea what it’s called, but the little bar on the corner off Dellstraße and Krummacherstraße is a really good place to have a quiet beer and hang out.
- Pianissimo: A nice pub, often with live music. Generally the location of the International Students’ Stammtisch.
- Steinbruch: A café-come-bar which doubles as a gig venue. It’s quite a walk to get to it, so I recommend you get a taxi or use the shuttle bus from the Hauptbahnhof that runs on gig nights.
- Golden Grün: You can go early to drink and chat, or late to drink and dance. Tiny and lots of fun.
Clubs
- Pulp: On the 903 traim route and located in an old castle, this is Duisburg’s best club. The nights vary from hard rock to indie to mainstream, but its always got a friendly party atmosphere.
- DeJazz: This is a city centre club in a residential area so it tends to close a bit earlier than the standard German 6am. However, it’s a brilliant night with an eclectic mix of music, often live.
- Hundertmeister: This is the place to go if you want a nice normal night out with a good mix of music. The monthly Yum-Yum parties are legendary, but the queue to get in will be enormous. Also a nice place to sit outside in the summer with a crafty half of Duisburg’s local König Pilsner.
Hidden Gem
Duisburg does have a normal cinema just next to the Hauptbahnhof, but if you fancy a bit of class to your film viewing, check out the Film Forum just off Dellplatz, an old theatre that’s been converted into a cinema. It’s a fantastic place to enjoy arty and foreign films, as well as more mainstream ones and if you fancy something to eat before hand, there’s a restaurant downstairs that’s always packed.
Around Duisburg
There may be lots to do in Duisburg, but it would be sad if you spent your entire year without exploring all that NRW has to offer. Here are three of my top places to visit if you fancy travelling a little outside the city limits.
- Centro: Located in Oberhausen’s Neumitte (you can get a bus or tram there from Oberhausen Hauptbahnhof, which itself is only 5 minutes on the train from Duisburg), this is a large out-of-town shopping centre complete with a bar and restaurant promenade. Pretty much every shop you will ever need in Germany under one roof.
- Düsseldorf: It’s the capital of the region and just 15 minutes away on the train. Good for high-end shopping and full of interesting museums, and also a fantastic place for a night out. The majority of the bars are located in the Altstadt – check out Engelchen on Kurzestraße for a traditional German Kneipe and Zum Goldenen Einhorn on Rattingerstraße (the student street) for some traditional German grub. The cinema next to the Hauptbahnhof often screens new Hollywood releases in English – look out for screenings captioned “OV”.
- Münster: Welcome to NRW’s poshest city. It’s a long journey to get there (about an hour and 20 minutes by train), but wandering around its cobbled streets is a very pleasant way to spend a day. The Christmas Market (or should I say markets, as they have six) is probably one of the best in the region.
Tuesday 31 May 2011
YA: The Last Month (Thank You and Goodnight)
This is it. My last ever year abroad blog (probably) and certainly the last blog I'll ever write in Germany. I can't quite believe it. All those memories, those tales, those thousands of words... it all comes down to this moment. We've had some times, though, eh? Granted, those times were mostly stories of my inability to hold my alcohol in various parts of Europe, but they were damn good times none the less. I hope you enjoyed reading about them as much as I enjoyed living them. Don't get teary just yet, though., 'cause I've got one last lot of tales to impart before I sign this year abroad off for good. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I'll begin.
We decided that as it was our last month as citizens of Europe we had an obligation to try and see as much of it as physically possible. I'd already done Copenhagen, Amsterdam (x2), Groningen, Paris and virtually the entirety of NRW. It was time to add two more cities to that list: Berlin and Prague. The Deutsche Haupstadt came first, on our first full weekend back after the Easter holidays. We packed our shorts and our sunnies (the weather forecast was good), Kate brushed up on her fun facts about the Brandenburg Gate and we boarded the 7.05 inter-city express out of Duisburg. As soon as we arrived, I remembered all the reasons why Berlin had been my first choice of where to spend my year abroad. It´s certainly not the prettiest city I´ve seen (though some of the buildings are superb), but there´s so much culture and history there, not to mention so much hipster chic, and when I was walking round I really felt at home. It's just one of those cities where you can walk around for hours, content to soak up the atmosphere, which is pretty much exactly what we did; we thoroughly beasted all of Berlin´s famous monuments, walking at least two miles all over the city in the blazing sunshine and taking snapshots (or at least Ally and Kate took snapshots, my camera chose to die, an act I will never forgive it for). It was also lovely to catch up with some Sheffies who I hadn´t seen since we finished second year last June. Big thanks to Alex, Lucas and Rachel for showing us how to rock it up Berlin style. All in all, it was a wonderful weekend and I'm looking forward to getting myself back there sometime soon.
Prague was a different experience again. We chose to take the over-night train down because it was cheaper than flying, but unlike for my trip to Copenhagen (when I had a carriage to myself), the little compartment was very crammed and uncomfortable and there was very little sleeping achieved. It was worth the difficult journey, though, because Prague is stunning. I could have spent my entire two days there simply taking enough pictures of beautiful buildings to fill the hard-drive on my computer. We walked from architectural masterpiece to architectural masterpiece, mouths hanging open; Charles Bridge, the Astrological Clock, the castle, the palace, the Old Town Square, the museum, the Municipal House... we must have covered them all and all in the sensational Czech sunshine. At nights, true to form, we searched out bars. Recommendations from my home friends Charlie and Tom lead us on the first night first to a reasonable and excellent restaurant called Stoleti and then onwards to a quirky little locals bar (Duende) just up the street where they sell beer for just 20 Czech crowns. That's less than a euro, people. Both places were tucked away down the back streets, representative of what all of Prague must have been like before the stag parties arrived. The second night we tried a bar just behind the church in the Old Town Square where we must have been the only people not to be dressed as zombies (the reason behind the hordes of zombies mooching around the city I still don't know). We did, however, get picked up by a sort-of bar crawl of Canadians, Aussies, New Zealanders and a couple of Brits, who were on a camping tour of Europe's more famous cities. We took a trip to a funky underground bar with them, but opted out of their plans for Prague's star five-story club, which, from the outside, looked liked an over-priced temple to hen-party tourism. Instead we took a short walk and ducked into a likely looking place (actually opposite the bar from the previous evening) where we got chatting to a couple of Czech blokes. We enquired as to traditional Czech alcohol, and they provided us with what can only be described as a strange green herbal concoction smelling of ginger. Apparently there were eighteen different herbs in it, but I can't confirm this. I can confirm, however, that it was pretty strong and pretty horrible. After being plied with a couple more of (different) traditional Czech drinks, and Czech blokes in tow, we muzzily wandered off into the night and ended up in the bar we'd started off in the first place, where we remained until 6am despite the fact it was virtually entirely dead (no zombie pun intended). The journey home the next day (incorporating a three hour bus journey, I might add) was hungover to say the least.
There have also been some equally enjoyable shenanigans closer to home, specifically an event that took place in the interim weekend between these two excellent trips. Anyone who is anyone knows that the Eurovision song contest was held this year in Düsseldorf and who were we, living a mere fifteen minutes away, not to take advantage of this? I say fifteen minutes, some of my friends travelled much further than that. A lot took the hour trip from Münster, but full commitment points go to Lyndsay for coming all the way from Holland and to Matt for coming all the way from France. Despite the fair amount of embarrassment that ensues from having to support Blue (and, I think in all cases, Jedward) we painted ourselves blue, white and red and waved our union jacks with gusto. It was a great atmosphere, thousands of people gathering in Johannes-Rau Platz for what was essentially a massive outdoor Euro-disco, and is definitely one of my most favourite moments of this year. I think we were all surprised that Europe took Jedward so well (they are now frequent players in the German charts) but there was the little groan of disappointment from the Brits when Germany crept ahead of us at the final hurdle.
After we got back from Prague, the countdown to the end began. I de-registered as a German citizen, closed my bank account and started packing my life here into suitcases and boxes. Kelsey, Kate and Carol helped me paint my room back into ship-shape condition and I began saying my goodbyes at Heinrich-Heine. On the Thursday, I got given a goodbye gift from the girl I have been taking for Nachhilfe all year and got to play games (and dish out goodies) in my final lesson with 7a. I took sweets for both my Klasse 6 groups (earning myself a round of applause from 6a and a cheer from 6b) and thank you presents for the teachers I've been closest to. I also got thank you presents myself, from Petra and Jan and also from the school, Herr Winkler presenting me with my very own Heinrich-Heine-Gymnasium much in "corporate-friendly blue". Everyone said lovely things and I have to admit I got a bit teary.
Of course, we wouldn't be being true to form if there wasn't a big ol' piss-up to send us on our way, and boy did we do it in style. We didn't just go out to party; we treated Düsseldorf to a round of pub golf. Beginning (of course) at the Irish pub, we smashed our way through nine holes, including Guinness, Altbeer, Vodka Ahoi and an Irish Car-Bomb to top it all off. There was chugging. There were forfeits. There was extreme bladder control. Our outfits and plastic gold clubs attracted a lot of attention and we ended up picking up a group of Germans around the second hole who, fascinated, followed us from bar to bar so that they could play along. I think we probably covered all the essentials of one of our Germany nights out as well, what with the karaoke, the chatting to strangers, the losing people, the funny looks from passers by and the huge volume of drunken photography. What a perfect night to end on. Or not quite end on, should I say, because the following day we decided to grillen und chillen (chill out with a barbecue) at Carol's. It was a great excuse to have one last relax together with a beer and say goodbye to some of the excellent people we've met over the year. Maxime and Chris departed with promises to come visit and Sheffield and tears were shed when we (after many hugs) said goodbye to Kelsey. We hung out the window and waved her all the way down the street. I spent Sunday gathering up the last remaining items dotted about my room and stuffing them wherever they would fit in my vast amounts of luggage before Mum and Dad arrived on Monday with the car, ready to transport it all. We went out on Monday evening for a slap-up German meal at the Schackt Brauhaus, afterwards taking advantage of the hottest day of the year to sit outside Hundertmeister for a cocktail and one last giggle. Too soon it was time for hugs and bis balds and we all went out separate ways. I took my very last night-time walk home through Duisburg, got five hours sleep and went to teach my final lesson, which happened to be Vertretung. Just goes to show, education doesn't care if it's your last day or not, you still have to preside over an hour and a half of chaos. I then got my lovely goodbye, handed in my keys and left HHG for very last time. I went and met my wonderful parents, got teary again, and went to finish off sorting the last bits of my life into boxes. My room is back to the stark white state I found it in, the car is packed and I'm leaving... now.
There have been so many points this year when I have had to stop and think "wow, my life is awesome": dancing in Balkan music in a disused candy factory in Copenhagen, singing Karneval songs at the top of my voice at a Düsseldorf street party, lying on my back in a park in Münster listening to acoustic guitar, train-hopping across Holland, waving inflatable microphones and cheering my support at Eurovision, climbing the steps up to Prague castle just to gaze at the view, chatting up Tubelord in an obscure Duisburg bar, fighting dirty for sweets at the Rosenmontag parades, basking in the Berlin sunshine at Alexanderplatz, hanging out in the square late at night to drink beer and swap stories, walking round Paris in winter, roasting Bratwursts on a disposable BBQ behind Carol's building, buying hot Glühwein at a Christmas market in Cologne, feeding penguins at the zoo, playing drinking games in a shabby Amsterdam hotel room with a bunch of random Dutch boys... I could go on. And on and on and on.
But this year would have been nothing, nothing, without the people. I have made some incredible friends throughout the course of this and I want to thank each and every one of you for making my year abroad something truly special. First, Kelsey. You've been stuck with me ever since I had to steal all your toothpaste when we were room-mates in Altenburg and somehow you're still my friend; thanks for being there through the ups and downs and for putting up with nine months of similarly stupid behaviour. Kate, Carol, Lara, Ally and Jo - my local lovelies, fellow Dortlube members and pub golf partners in crime - thanks for letting me crash your friendship group and stick around. You've given me more giggles and lovely memories than I could possibly shake a stick at. I will see you all again, and soon - this is simply happy bis bald tard! Then my fellow Sheffies... Freebs, thanks for kicking this whole shebang off with me at Manchster airport all those months ago; I probably wouldn't have made it here without you. Soph, thanks for having me to stay and showing me Cologne and for being at the end of a Facebook thread when I needed some contact with home. Lynsday and Matt, I can't believe I wasted two years of my life not being best friends with you. You'd better know that you're both now pretty much indispensable to me and we are most certainly carrying on our Münster shenanigans when we get back in fourth year. And speaking of Münster, I need to thank those Münstites: Cerys, Linz, Sammy, Amy, Jon, Sarah G, Pete, Amelia, Emily, John R, John P, Gina, Lukas, Johan, Sarah H... thank you for letting me (and Kelsey) crash all your parties, for providing beds and floors, for making us feel like part of the posse and for just generally being brilliant. You're the most ramshackle and hilarious bunch of people I've ever had the pleasure to meet. To everyone at Heinrich-Heine, teacher or pupil, but especially to Jan, Petra and Franzi, I want to say thank you for being so supportive and welcoming and making me a part of your world for nine months. I've really enjoyed my job and just hope that I've done it well. Finally, there's everyone else that I've met along the way who have at various points helped me out, partied with me, gave me music, kept me company, invited me to things, lived with me or simply just been my friend: Hanna, Nicola, Hannah, Maxime, Chris, Heather, Sona, Lena, Andrey, Julian, Thomas, Miriam, Nadja... the biggest thanks to all of you, too, for adding your own excellence to an already excellent year.
When I think about how I felt about my year abroad way back in September, I'm ashamed. I was so negative, so disbelieving of all the people that told me that it would be the best year of my degree. I never would have imagined that I would be sitting here, nine months down the line, teary-eyed because I don't want to leave. This year has changed me, I think. There's something about having to cope entirely on your own in a foreign country and about setting up a life and a network of friends virtually from scratch that makes you a much more confident and flexible person. I don't really have any fears for my future any more; the miscellaneous experiences of this year have taught me that I can pretty much cope with whatever life throws my way, even if it's at 7 o'clock in the morning. I'm proud of myself too, because I think the Georgie of a couple of years back wouldn't have been able to do something like this at all. I consider coping with this year to be one of my greatest achievements; it's testimony that I'm finally independent and, in the majority of respects anyway, an adult. But, life-enhancing rubbish aside, the main thing is that I have enjoyed every single solitary second of this experience. Every last bit of it. The job, the travelling, the parties and especially the people... it's been one hundred percent incredible. I'm going to miss it very, very much.
And that's it. I have (at last) nothing left to write. But 'WTW?' is by no means dead. The year abroad side of its existence may have drawn to a close but it will still operate, and frequently, with reviews, views and any other rubbish I may need to get off my chest. This is not the end. I'll be back very soon so, as always, stay tuned. In terms of my year abroad, though, I will leave you with one last thought: I thought that this year would be awful. I thought that I would hate it. I thought I would be lonely and friendless and counting down the days until May 31st. Instead, I've ended up loving it more that I could possibly articulate, I've met the most incredible people and these last few days I've wanted time to back-pedal so I can stay here just that little bit longer.
Isn't it amazing just how wrong a person can be?
Prague was a different experience again. We chose to take the over-night train down because it was cheaper than flying, but unlike for my trip to Copenhagen (when I had a carriage to myself), the little compartment was very crammed and uncomfortable and there was very little sleeping achieved. It was worth the difficult journey, though, because Prague is stunning. I could have spent my entire two days there simply taking enough pictures of beautiful buildings to fill the hard-drive on my computer. We walked from architectural masterpiece to architectural masterpiece, mouths hanging open; Charles Bridge, the Astrological Clock, the castle, the palace, the Old Town Square, the museum, the Municipal House... we must have covered them all and all in the sensational Czech sunshine. At nights, true to form, we searched out bars. Recommendations from my home friends Charlie and Tom lead us on the first night first to a reasonable and excellent restaurant called Stoleti and then onwards to a quirky little locals bar (Duende) just up the street where they sell beer for just 20 Czech crowns. That's less than a euro, people. Both places were tucked away down the back streets, representative of what all of Prague must have been like before the stag parties arrived. The second night we tried a bar just behind the church in the Old Town Square where we must have been the only people not to be dressed as zombies (the reason behind the hordes of zombies mooching around the city I still don't know). We did, however, get picked up by a sort-of bar crawl of Canadians, Aussies, New Zealanders and a couple of Brits, who were on a camping tour of Europe's more famous cities. We took a trip to a funky underground bar with them, but opted out of their plans for Prague's star five-story club, which, from the outside, looked liked an over-priced temple to hen-party tourism. Instead we took a short walk and ducked into a likely looking place (actually opposite the bar from the previous evening) where we got chatting to a couple of Czech blokes. We enquired as to traditional Czech alcohol, and they provided us with what can only be described as a strange green herbal concoction smelling of ginger. Apparently there were eighteen different herbs in it, but I can't confirm this. I can confirm, however, that it was pretty strong and pretty horrible. After being plied with a couple more of (different) traditional Czech drinks, and Czech blokes in tow, we muzzily wandered off into the night and ended up in the bar we'd started off in the first place, where we remained until 6am despite the fact it was virtually entirely dead (no zombie pun intended). The journey home the next day (incorporating a three hour bus journey, I might add) was hungover to say the least.
There have also been some equally enjoyable shenanigans closer to home, specifically an event that took place in the interim weekend between these two excellent trips. Anyone who is anyone knows that the Eurovision song contest was held this year in Düsseldorf and who were we, living a mere fifteen minutes away, not to take advantage of this? I say fifteen minutes, some of my friends travelled much further than that. A lot took the hour trip from Münster, but full commitment points go to Lyndsay for coming all the way from Holland and to Matt for coming all the way from France. Despite the fair amount of embarrassment that ensues from having to support Blue (and, I think in all cases, Jedward) we painted ourselves blue, white and red and waved our union jacks with gusto. It was a great atmosphere, thousands of people gathering in Johannes-Rau Platz for what was essentially a massive outdoor Euro-disco, and is definitely one of my most favourite moments of this year. I think we were all surprised that Europe took Jedward so well (they are now frequent players in the German charts) but there was the little groan of disappointment from the Brits when Germany crept ahead of us at the final hurdle.
After we got back from Prague, the countdown to the end began. I de-registered as a German citizen, closed my bank account and started packing my life here into suitcases and boxes. Kelsey, Kate and Carol helped me paint my room back into ship-shape condition and I began saying my goodbyes at Heinrich-Heine. On the Thursday, I got given a goodbye gift from the girl I have been taking for Nachhilfe all year and got to play games (and dish out goodies) in my final lesson with 7a. I took sweets for both my Klasse 6 groups (earning myself a round of applause from 6a and a cheer from 6b) and thank you presents for the teachers I've been closest to. I also got thank you presents myself, from Petra and Jan and also from the school, Herr Winkler presenting me with my very own Heinrich-Heine-Gymnasium much in "corporate-friendly blue". Everyone said lovely things and I have to admit I got a bit teary.
Of course, we wouldn't be being true to form if there wasn't a big ol' piss-up to send us on our way, and boy did we do it in style. We didn't just go out to party; we treated Düsseldorf to a round of pub golf. Beginning (of course) at the Irish pub, we smashed our way through nine holes, including Guinness, Altbeer, Vodka Ahoi and an Irish Car-Bomb to top it all off. There was chugging. There were forfeits. There was extreme bladder control. Our outfits and plastic gold clubs attracted a lot of attention and we ended up picking up a group of Germans around the second hole who, fascinated, followed us from bar to bar so that they could play along. I think we probably covered all the essentials of one of our Germany nights out as well, what with the karaoke, the chatting to strangers, the losing people, the funny looks from passers by and the huge volume of drunken photography. What a perfect night to end on. Or not quite end on, should I say, because the following day we decided to grillen und chillen (chill out with a barbecue) at Carol's. It was a great excuse to have one last relax together with a beer and say goodbye to some of the excellent people we've met over the year. Maxime and Chris departed with promises to come visit and Sheffield and tears were shed when we (after many hugs) said goodbye to Kelsey. We hung out the window and waved her all the way down the street. I spent Sunday gathering up the last remaining items dotted about my room and stuffing them wherever they would fit in my vast amounts of luggage before Mum and Dad arrived on Monday with the car, ready to transport it all. We went out on Monday evening for a slap-up German meal at the Schackt Brauhaus, afterwards taking advantage of the hottest day of the year to sit outside Hundertmeister for a cocktail and one last giggle. Too soon it was time for hugs and bis balds and we all went out separate ways. I took my very last night-time walk home through Duisburg, got five hours sleep and went to teach my final lesson, which happened to be Vertretung. Just goes to show, education doesn't care if it's your last day or not, you still have to preside over an hour and a half of chaos. I then got my lovely goodbye, handed in my keys and left HHG for very last time. I went and met my wonderful parents, got teary again, and went to finish off sorting the last bits of my life into boxes. My room is back to the stark white state I found it in, the car is packed and I'm leaving... now.
There have been so many points this year when I have had to stop and think "wow, my life is awesome": dancing in Balkan music in a disused candy factory in Copenhagen, singing Karneval songs at the top of my voice at a Düsseldorf street party, lying on my back in a park in Münster listening to acoustic guitar, train-hopping across Holland, waving inflatable microphones and cheering my support at Eurovision, climbing the steps up to Prague castle just to gaze at the view, chatting up Tubelord in an obscure Duisburg bar, fighting dirty for sweets at the Rosenmontag parades, basking in the Berlin sunshine at Alexanderplatz, hanging out in the square late at night to drink beer and swap stories, walking round Paris in winter, roasting Bratwursts on a disposable BBQ behind Carol's building, buying hot Glühwein at a Christmas market in Cologne, feeding penguins at the zoo, playing drinking games in a shabby Amsterdam hotel room with a bunch of random Dutch boys... I could go on. And on and on and on.
But this year would have been nothing, nothing, without the people. I have made some incredible friends throughout the course of this and I want to thank each and every one of you for making my year abroad something truly special. First, Kelsey. You've been stuck with me ever since I had to steal all your toothpaste when we were room-mates in Altenburg and somehow you're still my friend; thanks for being there through the ups and downs and for putting up with nine months of similarly stupid behaviour. Kate, Carol, Lara, Ally and Jo - my local lovelies, fellow Dortlube members and pub golf partners in crime - thanks for letting me crash your friendship group and stick around. You've given me more giggles and lovely memories than I could possibly shake a stick at. I will see you all again, and soon - this is simply happy bis bald tard! Then my fellow Sheffies... Freebs, thanks for kicking this whole shebang off with me at Manchster airport all those months ago; I probably wouldn't have made it here without you. Soph, thanks for having me to stay and showing me Cologne and for being at the end of a Facebook thread when I needed some contact with home. Lynsday and Matt, I can't believe I wasted two years of my life not being best friends with you. You'd better know that you're both now pretty much indispensable to me and we are most certainly carrying on our Münster shenanigans when we get back in fourth year. And speaking of Münster, I need to thank those Münstites: Cerys, Linz, Sammy, Amy, Jon, Sarah G, Pete, Amelia, Emily, John R, John P, Gina, Lukas, Johan, Sarah H... thank you for letting me (and Kelsey) crash all your parties, for providing beds and floors, for making us feel like part of the posse and for just generally being brilliant. You're the most ramshackle and hilarious bunch of people I've ever had the pleasure to meet. To everyone at Heinrich-Heine, teacher or pupil, but especially to Jan, Petra and Franzi, I want to say thank you for being so supportive and welcoming and making me a part of your world for nine months. I've really enjoyed my job and just hope that I've done it well. Finally, there's everyone else that I've met along the way who have at various points helped me out, partied with me, gave me music, kept me company, invited me to things, lived with me or simply just been my friend: Hanna, Nicola, Hannah, Maxime, Chris, Heather, Sona, Lena, Andrey, Julian, Thomas, Miriam, Nadja... the biggest thanks to all of you, too, for adding your own excellence to an already excellent year.
When I think about how I felt about my year abroad way back in September, I'm ashamed. I was so negative, so disbelieving of all the people that told me that it would be the best year of my degree. I never would have imagined that I would be sitting here, nine months down the line, teary-eyed because I don't want to leave. This year has changed me, I think. There's something about having to cope entirely on your own in a foreign country and about setting up a life and a network of friends virtually from scratch that makes you a much more confident and flexible person. I don't really have any fears for my future any more; the miscellaneous experiences of this year have taught me that I can pretty much cope with whatever life throws my way, even if it's at 7 o'clock in the morning. I'm proud of myself too, because I think the Georgie of a couple of years back wouldn't have been able to do something like this at all. I consider coping with this year to be one of my greatest achievements; it's testimony that I'm finally independent and, in the majority of respects anyway, an adult. But, life-enhancing rubbish aside, the main thing is that I have enjoyed every single solitary second of this experience. Every last bit of it. The job, the travelling, the parties and especially the people... it's been one hundred percent incredible. I'm going to miss it very, very much.
And that's it. I have (at last) nothing left to write. But 'WTW?' is by no means dead. The year abroad side of its existence may have drawn to a close but it will still operate, and frequently, with reviews, views and any other rubbish I may need to get off my chest. This is not the end. I'll be back very soon so, as always, stay tuned. In terms of my year abroad, though, I will leave you with one last thought: I thought that this year would be awful. I thought that I would hate it. I thought I would be lonely and friendless and counting down the days until May 31st. Instead, I've ended up loving it more that I could possibly articulate, I've met the most incredible people and these last few days I've wanted time to back-pedal so I can stay here just that little bit longer.
Isn't it amazing just how wrong a person can be?
Monday 9 May 2011
YA: To Miss Or Not To Miss...
Considering I´ve got less than a month in Germany left to go, I´ve been spending a considerable amount of time thinking about all the things I´m going to miss when I go home and all the other things I won´t be so sad to leave behind. There´s a considerable amount in both catorgories and I thought, mostly because I´ve got vast reserves of time to bun at work today, that I would share these thoughts with you all.
First, I will be thoroughly glad to get rid of the early mornings. German school starts ludicrously early; the first lesson commences at 8.15, but some clever-dick also invented the 0te Stunde (a lesson ususally used only when the school are unable to fit certain sixth form classes into an ordnary timetable) which begins a whole 50 minutes earlier at 7.25. I´ve just about got used to the 6am wake up calls on ordinary school days but it´s excruitating for my student brain to be forced out of bed at 5.15 every Tuesday and expected to be awake and alert two hours later. It´s especially excruitating when, after two weeks off, you drag yourself into work at this oscenely early hour to find that the teacher you´re supposed to be working with is, in fact, away, and the class is cancelled. Like today. However, I will miss the job itself. I am by no means a natural teacher and I'm fairly confident it will not be a career I will be pursuing once my degree is over, but I can't deny that's it's been fun and there have been moments when I have been immensely proud of the classes I've helped to teach. Then there's the wage, which is bangin'. I will also miss playing my fun game, "Spot The Mini-Versions Of My Friends Among The Kids". A surprising number of you do have miniature HHG counterparts.
Another thing I will not miss is the pedantic fining system employed on German public transport. Buying a train ticket is a complex and confusing process as it is, never mind in another language, and god-forbid you should get it wrong because if you have the wrong ticket, or have forgotten your ticket, or have incorrectly stamped your ticket and you get caught, it means you will have to cough up 40 of your hard-earned Euros. Don´t have 40Euros on you? No problem! We´ll print out a ticket for you and you can pay us later at your convenience, providing your convenience is within fourteen days of issue, of course. And don´t even think about ducking out of paying it, because we´ve got your address now, Sonny Jim, we popped it into our little machine during your humiliating dress-down on the train not moments ago, and we'll be taking further action if you do not GIVE US THE MONEY. Saying that, the German train system, as frustrating as I may find it at times, is actually a vast improvement on the Britsh one (I am aware that this is not a difficult feat to achieve). As a paid-up member of a University, you can enjoy free public transport throughtout your Bundesland, and living on the continent does allow cheap and easy access via train to the rest of Europe. Me and my friends have just scored over-night tickets driect from Duisburg to Prague for 70Euros a piece, a whole 50Euros cheaper than the lowest-priced flight. I will certainly miss these low-cost travelling opportunities when back on my little island. The variety of places that have been so easily within my reach this year continually blows my mind; not only Czechoslovakia, but also Holland, France, Denmark and the east of Germany (which is actually pretty far away). And that´s only the places I´ve decided to visit. It would havebeen abundantly simple to hop on a train to Austira or Italy should the fancy have taken me. Not only that, but I love the fact that I can take a train to visit my friends who live over an hour away in Münster and it´s still free. Getting a train at home always seems like such a hassle, but here it´s a way of life. If I want to go for night out in, say, Leeds, then the trip from Sheffield will require careful planning, estimated arrival times and a place to stay. Here, we go on nighs out to Düsseldorf all the time, because the trains run every fifteen minutes, it´s free for us and, because the trains run through the night, we know there´ll always be a way to get home again later.
Another area I have mixed feelings towards is the food; I both love and abhor German food in equal measure. The biscuits, for example, are exquisit, as is the abundance of different flavours of Milka and Ritter Sport (though since I found out you can now buy caramel Milka in Sainsburys I´m less distrught about leaving German chocolate behind.) I like that my wages allow me to buy smoked salmon on a regular basis, a product which my expensive tastes have unfotunately contirved to make me addicted to and as a student in Britain I can never afford. I believe Vapiano is the greatest chain restaurant in history and can´t believe we don´t have it at home. I enjoy Bratwurst and Currywurst and revel in the seemingly limitless varities of ice cream availible from the many Eiscafes than adorn Germany´s streets. Seriously, I cannot understand why we have not yet introduced the concept of the ice-cream parlour to Britain - none of you are going to want a Magnum when you can get Nutella, Tirimasu and Biscotti flavour at 80p a scoop. But then, there´s all the things that Germany lacks: marmite, proper tea, good bread, chedder cheese, chocolate digestives, non-processed sandwich meat, fresh milk (don´t give me that, the stuff you guys have is NOT fresh), decent chinese takeaways, fresh soups, baking potatoes, Jazz apples... I could go on. I rarely cook properly here either, due to a dramatic lack of freezer space in my flat, meaning that on the rare occasions I do buy fresh meat I have to have huuuuge meals to get rid of it all before the use-by date. I'm quite looking forward to making real meals again once I am safely ensconced in my new student house. Additionally, I plan to have a very emotional reunion with my toasty-maker. Man, I have missed toasties.
German alcohol I am going to miss rather less than German eidble delicacies. Here, my usual spirit-tipples are, though not unavailible, ludicrously expensive, so I have trained myself into liking beer. Unfortuantly, I have been rather too successful. I now love all the varities of German beer, from Alt to Weiss and from Kölsch to Pils. I think it´s brilliant that different cities have their own brands of beer, and ordering Kölsch in Düsseldorf will lead you to being shouted down by the barman. However, this new found liking for beer has made me, to quote my mother, "whack it on". So now I am on a stirct diet and exercise regime to try and lose that half-stone before bikini season. Also, it´s difficult to miss it when I know that I will be able to hunt out my favourite varieties back home; other than Düsseldorf Altbeir, I´ve succeed in finding all the best ones on the continental beer shelf at Tesco. So really, I won't be losing out at all on the beer front back in England and therefore I'm just quite excited about being able to get back to nights out when I will not have to expend over a fiver to get a single vodka and lemonade.
I'm also looking forward to getting back the the British music scene. Germany is OK as far as music goes, but the local radio stations are frankly dire and as a country they are seriously lacking in record shops, even large ones (no HMV equivalent in sight because, no, I'm sorry, Saturn is incomparable). With my limited internet allowance, using Spotify and streaming radio stations has had to be kept to an absolute minimum, and whilst I'm immensely grateful to Charlie for letting me scam her music collection every couple of months, I want to be back in the thick of it, going to gigs, buying albums and discovering new music for myself. And it isn't just music-shopping possibilities that are thin on the ground and generally shopping in Germany is a bit of a chore. It will be nice to be able to go out to buy a new jumper and not know for an absolute certainty that you will buy it from H&M.
One thing I will certainly not miss is my flat. With it´s cold white walls and grey, dust-collecting lino floor it was always distinctly unloveable, and though I spruced my room up with photos and large amounts of cushions, the fact remains that I don´t really get on with my flatmates. The fault is partly mine, I never really made an effort to get to know them, but if they will persist in speaking Russian to eachother then I´m not really sure how I´m meant to. The new girl that moved in just before I went home for Easter is lovely, but it doesn´t change the fact that I´ve spent the majority of the year risiding with people who I´m fairly convinced don´t like me all that much.
So, I won´t miss Ruhrorterstrasse, but I certainly will miss Duisburg. I´m not going to lie, it is a bit of a dump. Very industrial, little culture and not much going on. However, I seemed to have developed the same bond with it as I have with my hometown of Nottingham. It´s crap and I know it and I say it a lot, but it´s still mine and if anyone else tried to say anything even remoteoy unflatterng I will defend it to the hilt. I don´t regard it with anywhere near the level of affection that I have for Sheffield, and the list of haunts that I can reel off is comparitively short, but there are still places that I´ve enjoyed visitng and will miss not being within a stones-throw of: Djazz, the bar near Kate´s with the funky toilet walls, the Innenhafen, the park where we had our little barbecue, the amazing tapas place, Carol´s flat (the site of so many laptop parties), Golden Grün, the statue of the naked man dealt a rough hand by Mother Nature... Then there's all the places we've frequented outside of Duisburg, like the Irish pub in Düsseldorf and Piano in Münster. All of these places and the others besides hold a great wealth of happy memories and it will be a shame not to be able to visit them again, at least not for a very long time.
Most of all, I will miss my way of life here. I've had it extremely cushy. I work for less than twelve hours a week and spend the rest of my time swanning about Europe with my friends, not a bad ol' life. I have met a truly fantastic bunch of people out here and it has been an absolute pleasure to share a year's worth of increible experiences with them. So, I think, it's not hard to see why now, at three weeks before I leave, I am a bit of a conflicted soul. Who wouldn't love my current low work, high play lifestyle? I party, I travel, I have an absolute ball. The amazing stuff about living in Europe and the wonderful people I share it with far outweighs any niggles I have about less-than-enthusiastic flatmates and crumbly bread. But I love my life back in England too, you all know how much. There is so much of me yearning to get back the UK, with my degree and my music and my favourite places, and yet so much of me that wants to stay behind. Because missing my life at home does not mean I don't love my life here. I love them both. And to be honest, right now, I couldn't tell you which one I love more.
First, I will be thoroughly glad to get rid of the early mornings. German school starts ludicrously early; the first lesson commences at 8.15, but some clever-dick also invented the 0te Stunde (a lesson ususally used only when the school are unable to fit certain sixth form classes into an ordnary timetable) which begins a whole 50 minutes earlier at 7.25. I´ve just about got used to the 6am wake up calls on ordinary school days but it´s excruitating for my student brain to be forced out of bed at 5.15 every Tuesday and expected to be awake and alert two hours later. It´s especially excruitating when, after two weeks off, you drag yourself into work at this oscenely early hour to find that the teacher you´re supposed to be working with is, in fact, away, and the class is cancelled. Like today. However, I will miss the job itself. I am by no means a natural teacher and I'm fairly confident it will not be a career I will be pursuing once my degree is over, but I can't deny that's it's been fun and there have been moments when I have been immensely proud of the classes I've helped to teach. Then there's the wage, which is bangin'. I will also miss playing my fun game, "Spot The Mini-Versions Of My Friends Among The Kids". A surprising number of you do have miniature HHG counterparts.
Another thing I will not miss is the pedantic fining system employed on German public transport. Buying a train ticket is a complex and confusing process as it is, never mind in another language, and god-forbid you should get it wrong because if you have the wrong ticket, or have forgotten your ticket, or have incorrectly stamped your ticket and you get caught, it means you will have to cough up 40 of your hard-earned Euros. Don´t have 40Euros on you? No problem! We´ll print out a ticket for you and you can pay us later at your convenience, providing your convenience is within fourteen days of issue, of course. And don´t even think about ducking out of paying it, because we´ve got your address now, Sonny Jim, we popped it into our little machine during your humiliating dress-down on the train not moments ago, and we'll be taking further action if you do not GIVE US THE MONEY. Saying that, the German train system, as frustrating as I may find it at times, is actually a vast improvement on the Britsh one (I am aware that this is not a difficult feat to achieve). As a paid-up member of a University, you can enjoy free public transport throughtout your Bundesland, and living on the continent does allow cheap and easy access via train to the rest of Europe. Me and my friends have just scored over-night tickets driect from Duisburg to Prague for 70Euros a piece, a whole 50Euros cheaper than the lowest-priced flight. I will certainly miss these low-cost travelling opportunities when back on my little island. The variety of places that have been so easily within my reach this year continually blows my mind; not only Czechoslovakia, but also Holland, France, Denmark and the east of Germany (which is actually pretty far away). And that´s only the places I´ve decided to visit. It would havebeen abundantly simple to hop on a train to Austira or Italy should the fancy have taken me. Not only that, but I love the fact that I can take a train to visit my friends who live over an hour away in Münster and it´s still free. Getting a train at home always seems like such a hassle, but here it´s a way of life. If I want to go for night out in, say, Leeds, then the trip from Sheffield will require careful planning, estimated arrival times and a place to stay. Here, we go on nighs out to Düsseldorf all the time, because the trains run every fifteen minutes, it´s free for us and, because the trains run through the night, we know there´ll always be a way to get home again later.
Another area I have mixed feelings towards is the food; I both love and abhor German food in equal measure. The biscuits, for example, are exquisit, as is the abundance of different flavours of Milka and Ritter Sport (though since I found out you can now buy caramel Milka in Sainsburys I´m less distrught about leaving German chocolate behind.) I like that my wages allow me to buy smoked salmon on a regular basis, a product which my expensive tastes have unfotunately contirved to make me addicted to and as a student in Britain I can never afford. I believe Vapiano is the greatest chain restaurant in history and can´t believe we don´t have it at home. I enjoy Bratwurst and Currywurst and revel in the seemingly limitless varities of ice cream availible from the many Eiscafes than adorn Germany´s streets. Seriously, I cannot understand why we have not yet introduced the concept of the ice-cream parlour to Britain - none of you are going to want a Magnum when you can get Nutella, Tirimasu and Biscotti flavour at 80p a scoop. But then, there´s all the things that Germany lacks: marmite, proper tea, good bread, chedder cheese, chocolate digestives, non-processed sandwich meat, fresh milk (don´t give me that, the stuff you guys have is NOT fresh), decent chinese takeaways, fresh soups, baking potatoes, Jazz apples... I could go on. I rarely cook properly here either, due to a dramatic lack of freezer space in my flat, meaning that on the rare occasions I do buy fresh meat I have to have huuuuge meals to get rid of it all before the use-by date. I'm quite looking forward to making real meals again once I am safely ensconced in my new student house. Additionally, I plan to have a very emotional reunion with my toasty-maker. Man, I have missed toasties.
German alcohol I am going to miss rather less than German eidble delicacies. Here, my usual spirit-tipples are, though not unavailible, ludicrously expensive, so I have trained myself into liking beer. Unfortuantly, I have been rather too successful. I now love all the varities of German beer, from Alt to Weiss and from Kölsch to Pils. I think it´s brilliant that different cities have their own brands of beer, and ordering Kölsch in Düsseldorf will lead you to being shouted down by the barman. However, this new found liking for beer has made me, to quote my mother, "whack it on". So now I am on a stirct diet and exercise regime to try and lose that half-stone before bikini season. Also, it´s difficult to miss it when I know that I will be able to hunt out my favourite varieties back home; other than Düsseldorf Altbeir, I´ve succeed in finding all the best ones on the continental beer shelf at Tesco. So really, I won't be losing out at all on the beer front back in England and therefore I'm just quite excited about being able to get back to nights out when I will not have to expend over a fiver to get a single vodka and lemonade.
I'm also looking forward to getting back the the British music scene. Germany is OK as far as music goes, but the local radio stations are frankly dire and as a country they are seriously lacking in record shops, even large ones (no HMV equivalent in sight because, no, I'm sorry, Saturn is incomparable). With my limited internet allowance, using Spotify and streaming radio stations has had to be kept to an absolute minimum, and whilst I'm immensely grateful to Charlie for letting me scam her music collection every couple of months, I want to be back in the thick of it, going to gigs, buying albums and discovering new music for myself. And it isn't just music-shopping possibilities that are thin on the ground and generally shopping in Germany is a bit of a chore. It will be nice to be able to go out to buy a new jumper and not know for an absolute certainty that you will buy it from H&M.
One thing I will certainly not miss is my flat. With it´s cold white walls and grey, dust-collecting lino floor it was always distinctly unloveable, and though I spruced my room up with photos and large amounts of cushions, the fact remains that I don´t really get on with my flatmates. The fault is partly mine, I never really made an effort to get to know them, but if they will persist in speaking Russian to eachother then I´m not really sure how I´m meant to. The new girl that moved in just before I went home for Easter is lovely, but it doesn´t change the fact that I´ve spent the majority of the year risiding with people who I´m fairly convinced don´t like me all that much.
So, I won´t miss Ruhrorterstrasse, but I certainly will miss Duisburg. I´m not going to lie, it is a bit of a dump. Very industrial, little culture and not much going on. However, I seemed to have developed the same bond with it as I have with my hometown of Nottingham. It´s crap and I know it and I say it a lot, but it´s still mine and if anyone else tried to say anything even remoteoy unflatterng I will defend it to the hilt. I don´t regard it with anywhere near the level of affection that I have for Sheffield, and the list of haunts that I can reel off is comparitively short, but there are still places that I´ve enjoyed visitng and will miss not being within a stones-throw of: Djazz, the bar near Kate´s with the funky toilet walls, the Innenhafen, the park where we had our little barbecue, the amazing tapas place, Carol´s flat (the site of so many laptop parties), Golden Grün, the statue of the naked man dealt a rough hand by Mother Nature... Then there's all the places we've frequented outside of Duisburg, like the Irish pub in Düsseldorf and Piano in Münster. All of these places and the others besides hold a great wealth of happy memories and it will be a shame not to be able to visit them again, at least not for a very long time.
Most of all, I will miss my way of life here. I've had it extremely cushy. I work for less than twelve hours a week and spend the rest of my time swanning about Europe with my friends, not a bad ol' life. I have met a truly fantastic bunch of people out here and it has been an absolute pleasure to share a year's worth of increible experiences with them. So, I think, it's not hard to see why now, at three weeks before I leave, I am a bit of a conflicted soul. Who wouldn't love my current low work, high play lifestyle? I party, I travel, I have an absolute ball. The amazing stuff about living in Europe and the wonderful people I share it with far outweighs any niggles I have about less-than-enthusiastic flatmates and crumbly bread. But I love my life back in England too, you all know how much. There is so much of me yearning to get back the UK, with my degree and my music and my favourite places, and yet so much of me that wants to stay behind. Because missing my life at home does not mean I don't love my life here. I love them both. And to be honest, right now, I couldn't tell you which one I love more.
Tuesday 3 May 2011
Music: Please Provide Clear Evidence Of Your Knowledge And Passion For Music
I've started applying for work experience for the summer, and as unlikely as getting a place will be, I'm going for a couple of BBC ones. I've just written an answer to a question for a one week placement at Radio 1 (well, you've got to be in it to win it) but I'm actually quite pleased with how it sounds so I thought I'd pop it on here. I'm not sure if it's the kind of answer they were after, but it's how I'm interpreting the question, and as I once told a literature lecturer, an interpretation can never be wrong.
Question: Please provide clear evidence of your knowledge and passion for music.
I cannot remember a time when I was not entirely committed to music. Every Christmas present I ever asked for as a child was a device upon which I could play music: a cassette player, a CD walkman, my battered and much used ipod, a digital radio alarm clock so that music could be the first thing I heard when I woke up in the morning. Whilst other students spend a fortune on nights out or expensive vintage clothing, I blow all my spare cash on concerts, CDs and unusual musical merchandise (my favourite piece of merch by far is my Stornoway camping tin water bottle). I am aware that buying CDs may be considered a tad unusual for someone of the internet generation. I know we live in a digital age and I’ll admit that the internet has been a fantastic medium for exposing us to music we may never otherwise have discovered, but I still think there’s something much more magical about popping the hard copy in the hi-fi and settling down and really listening to the music. Or standing up and really dancing to it. When you download an album you get the songs, yes, but with a physical album you can look at the artwork, read the lyrics and the thank yous and feel properly connected to the band and the wonderful sound that they have produced. That’s why I think illegal downloading is so terrible; it’s being unbelievably disrespectful to something so many people have worked so hard to create. I believe anyone who downloads illegally is essentially saying that they aren’t interested in the production of new and exciting music, because without money, how are bands ever going to be able to afford to produce it? Music is beautiful and is thoroughly worth paying for.
I research music for fun. There’s nothing I like more than delving into soundcloud or last.fm armed with nothing but a cup of tea and a notebook. I get indecently excited when I can recommend new music that I’ve found to friends, even more so when they recommend new stuff to me. I write articles about new music I have discovered, about albums I’ve heard and about gigs I have seen, not because anyone has told me to or because there is a deadline is hanging over my head, but because I simply want to let other people know that I have heard something marvellous and think they should know about it too. I have been lucky enough to have had a little taste of what working with music is like. I have reviewed gigs and albums and had my articles published, I have interviewed reasonably famous bands (the Futureheads and the Holloways included), and every time I get close to the music industry in this way I feel privileged that, even just for a second, I’ve been able to be a part of it. It’s similar every time I watch a band perform; be it the clear, crisp, heartfelt vocals of Emmy The Great or Twin Atlantic smashing out chords until the audience’s ears bleed, I feel inextricably happy to be there, connected to everyone else in the room who feels just like me and knowing that I want to be able to do this every single day of my life.
I wasn’t quite sure what response was expected for this question. I think perhaps I was supposed to give a bit more of a technical answer. However, I don’t think it’s possible to deny my true and unrelenting passion for music, nor my knowledge and willingness to extend it even further. Everything written above is exactly how I feel about music, and, if you think about it, that’s exactly what music is for: to make you feel.
Question: Please provide clear evidence of your knowledge and passion for music.
I cannot remember a time when I was not entirely committed to music. Every Christmas present I ever asked for as a child was a device upon which I could play music: a cassette player, a CD walkman, my battered and much used ipod, a digital radio alarm clock so that music could be the first thing I heard when I woke up in the morning. Whilst other students spend a fortune on nights out or expensive vintage clothing, I blow all my spare cash on concerts, CDs and unusual musical merchandise (my favourite piece of merch by far is my Stornoway camping tin water bottle). I am aware that buying CDs may be considered a tad unusual for someone of the internet generation. I know we live in a digital age and I’ll admit that the internet has been a fantastic medium for exposing us to music we may never otherwise have discovered, but I still think there’s something much more magical about popping the hard copy in the hi-fi and settling down and really listening to the music. Or standing up and really dancing to it. When you download an album you get the songs, yes, but with a physical album you can look at the artwork, read the lyrics and the thank yous and feel properly connected to the band and the wonderful sound that they have produced. That’s why I think illegal downloading is so terrible; it’s being unbelievably disrespectful to something so many people have worked so hard to create. I believe anyone who downloads illegally is essentially saying that they aren’t interested in the production of new and exciting music, because without money, how are bands ever going to be able to afford to produce it? Music is beautiful and is thoroughly worth paying for.
I research music for fun. There’s nothing I like more than delving into soundcloud or last.fm armed with nothing but a cup of tea and a notebook. I get indecently excited when I can recommend new music that I’ve found to friends, even more so when they recommend new stuff to me. I write articles about new music I have discovered, about albums I’ve heard and about gigs I have seen, not because anyone has told me to or because there is a deadline is hanging over my head, but because I simply want to let other people know that I have heard something marvellous and think they should know about it too. I have been lucky enough to have had a little taste of what working with music is like. I have reviewed gigs and albums and had my articles published, I have interviewed reasonably famous bands (the Futureheads and the Holloways included), and every time I get close to the music industry in this way I feel privileged that, even just for a second, I’ve been able to be a part of it. It’s similar every time I watch a band perform; be it the clear, crisp, heartfelt vocals of Emmy The Great or Twin Atlantic smashing out chords until the audience’s ears bleed, I feel inextricably happy to be there, connected to everyone else in the room who feels just like me and knowing that I want to be able to do this every single day of my life.
I wasn’t quite sure what response was expected for this question. I think perhaps I was supposed to give a bit more of a technical answer. However, I don’t think it’s possible to deny my true and unrelenting passion for music, nor my knowledge and willingness to extend it even further. Everything written above is exactly how I feel about music, and, if you think about it, that’s exactly what music is for: to make you feel.
Sunday 1 May 2011
YA: Friends > Chocolate
I am not religious. You probably know this; I am extremely vocal about this fact, and it means, of course, that at Easter time I'm only in it for the chocolate. Except, this year, I was less about the chocolate* and more about that 18.55 flight out of Cologne, destination England after three month absence. I was so excited I fidgeted and bounced around in my seat for the entire flight and fairly flattened old ladies in my attempts to get through the Manchester arrivals gate first to throw myself on my waiting parents.
To say I hadn't been in Nottingham for a while, I didn't really hang around. We got back fairly late on the Thursday night, leaving little time for anything other than a quick cuppa before I took an almighty running jump onto my beautiful, soft, squidgy, comfortable mattress. As for Friday, I spent a day catching up with my cousin and my adorable little second-cousin and partaking in a nice meal for my grandma's birthday (a night ever cemented in my mind as the night my eighty-three-year-old grandmother downed a flaming sambucca) before hitting the road for a weekend in Edinburgh early Saturday morning.
Edinburgh is a city that does know how to blow my mind. I love it there; the buildings, the culture, the abundance of Scottish people.** Katie and myself arrived mid-afternoon which gave us plenty of time to drop our stuff at the hostel (where we were deeply disappointed that we didn't get put in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles room), grab a meal and wander up the Royal Mile in search of a drink before Charlie rocked up around 11, hyper and over-tired from 13 hours of flying. We tried a bit of a night out, but the club, to coin a popular phrase I believe the kids are using nowadays, blew the big time and we gave it up as a bad job. The next day we sauntered around the sunny streets, lunched in one of mine and Charlie's favourite cafe-discoveries from last summer and caught some rays in the park. Sounds nice enough all by itself, no? Yeah, well, it gets better.
You see, I didn't decide just to take a trip to Scotland purely to swan about and drink coffee (as much as I enjoy this pastime). Me and Katie had an ultra-awesome reason for being in the 'Burgh that weekend, and that reason was a chap named Tim Minchin. I had been nothing short of gutted that I had missed all his more local dates before Christmas (you guessed it, I was in Germany), especially as this new tour saw Tim sporting a full orchestra and a host of new and remastered songs. I'd been just able to cope with missing hosts of gigs from my other favourite musicians and comedians, but I decided this was one too many, and when I found out that his Scotland dates coincided with my Easter holidays I thought "bugger it" and booked. The fact that Katie came with me only proves her great commitment to comedy. So, we left Charlie (who had already seen Tim's tour) to go and route out a Chinese takeaway and an obscure poetry reading, and went for a night at the theatre. It. Was. Incredible! Minchin was on fantastic form, his old songs sounding unbelievably good in orchestral score and his new material making me laugh until tears rolled down my cheeks. One for my top ten comedy gigs, certainly. Once Tim had performed his second encore (White Wine In The Sun - I cried) and we had purchased our Rock 'N Roll Nerd mugs, we went to meet up with Charlie again, catching a bit of light folk music at Sandy Bell's before turning in. Monday saw yet more coffee and wanderings and also the bizarre occurrence of someone throwing an egg at me our of a car window. It didn't smash, fortunately, but rather bounced off my thigh with some force and cracked when it hit the road. But seriously, a drive by egging? Who does that? After this ridiculous event, me and Katie dropped Charlie at the station for her journey onwards to St Andrews and went and spent silly amounts of money on dresses. Whoops. Then there was just time for a quick baked potato (enormous, it was) before jumping on the train back down south. See you in August, Edinburgh.
The next few days were indeed Nottingham time. I caught up with Bex and Ruth over lunch on the Tuesday, before Bex dragged us round 'most every shop in town before letting us have a breather in Starbucks. We had a healthy dinner of chicken salad and curled up in Bex's bed to watch Harry Potter. The next few days were devoted family time; my mum and me took a trip to Market Harborough to see our cousin, we went shopping and on Easter Sunday we had a good ol' fashioned slap-up family lunch. Saying that, on the Thursday night I absented myself from relative shindigs to hit up the Rebel and Bar 11 launch night with Becky. There was wine and excellent music and a good time was had by all. I think.
With my holidays ticking away, it was time to hit my favourite city of the them all, my uni-town, my place: SHEFFIELD, BABY! I tell you, it felt so good to be back after such a long absence. Speshy met me at the station on Monday night and we dragged all my bags up the hill to the house that will be mine in less than two months. We had long over-due tea and chats which went on far too late considering we had to get up super-early the next day and travel to Manchester. Spesh had somehow managed to get herself conned into booking a fancy photo-shoot and we had to go and partake in order to get her deposit back. With a pact to buy no photos in place, we enjoyed having our hair and make-up done and stocking up on free snacks before being be shepherded into the studio where we were ordered to pose in various positions that made us look like wanky twats. When it came to the photo viewing, the girl was very much on the hard-sell and we struggled to stick to our pact just because of all the pressure. However, then we remembered that they wanted to charge SEVENTY POUNDS PER PRINT, stuck to our guns and legged it.
Back in Sheffield, I picked up my stuff and headed down the hill again to Rosie's where I was stopping the next two nights with Charlie. There was time for a quick cup of tea and a catch up before we headed out for the Folk Train. If you live in Sheffield and you've never been on the Folk Train, then I heartily recommend it. The last Tuesday of every month, lovers of folk board the 7.14 from Sheffield to Edale to enjoy three hours of beautiful music and scenery. The band play on the train, in the pub upon arrival at Edale and all the way on the train back again. A different band every month, April's was Happy Red Tractors and they were superb, playing a mix of traditional English, Greek and Russian folk. As the train arrived back into Sheffield just after 10, we considered the night to be still young and nipped into the Lescar on Sharrowvale Road for a cider. We got slightly more tipsy than we intended, danced New York, New York all the way back to Rosie's after last orders and when me, Charlie and Katie all tried to cram into Richie's already very broken bed we made it collapse and had to drunkenly try and piece it back together again.
Wednesday was a celebration of my second year haunts. First, Katie in tow, I went and got my hair cut and picked up my new Ucard (I can get into the IC again - hooray?) and then went and met Rosie, Charlie and Louise in town. We took a slow stroll down Division Street visiting all the little boutiques before grabbing lunch from Zooby's (the fairtrade cafe in the Winter Gardens), dodging the snooker commentators as we went. The afternoon saw sunbathing in the Peace Gardens and coffee at Bungalows and Bears, the evening dinner at the Old House and cocktails at the Wick At Both Ends and I spent the whole time wishing I was back for good already instead of having to wait another six or seven weeks.
I hit the road home on Thursday afternoon for one last evening with my parents, an evening which seem to flash by, and all too soon I was pulling my suitcase through the arrivals gate at Cologne airport. Three and a half hours of frustrating train journeys later I was pulling that same case through my front door in Duisburg. It's hard to believe that I've come back for my final four weeks. In some ways my wonderful Easter trip to the UK has made me long to be back there more than ever; I miss my life in Sheffield, and even these few short weeks seem to be too long to wait before I can get back to it. I miss my family and my friends, and would once again like to thank them for being so brilliant and for giving me yet another wonderful holiday to remember. That said, I've have such a fantastic time here that I'm not sure I can quite face the idea of it being over so soon. But it's not over quite yet; I've got exactly one month to tear up Germany and make the end of my year abroad as epic as the preceding seven or so months. There's Berlin. There's Eurovision. There's (hopefully) Prague. So all in all, it looks set to be a bit of a corker. And, as always, I'll be sure to let you know all about it.
-------------
* Not least because my mother has now decided that after the age of eighteen all Easter gifts should come in the form of nightwear; this year, a dressing gown.
** That accent. Hommanaah.
To say I hadn't been in Nottingham for a while, I didn't really hang around. We got back fairly late on the Thursday night, leaving little time for anything other than a quick cuppa before I took an almighty running jump onto my beautiful, soft, squidgy, comfortable mattress. As for Friday, I spent a day catching up with my cousin and my adorable little second-cousin and partaking in a nice meal for my grandma's birthday (a night ever cemented in my mind as the night my eighty-three-year-old grandmother downed a flaming sambucca) before hitting the road for a weekend in Edinburgh early Saturday morning.
Edinburgh is a city that does know how to blow my mind. I love it there; the buildings, the culture, the abundance of Scottish people.** Katie and myself arrived mid-afternoon which gave us plenty of time to drop our stuff at the hostel (where we were deeply disappointed that we didn't get put in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles room), grab a meal and wander up the Royal Mile in search of a drink before Charlie rocked up around 11, hyper and over-tired from 13 hours of flying. We tried a bit of a night out, but the club, to coin a popular phrase I believe the kids are using nowadays, blew the big time and we gave it up as a bad job. The next day we sauntered around the sunny streets, lunched in one of mine and Charlie's favourite cafe-discoveries from last summer and caught some rays in the park. Sounds nice enough all by itself, no? Yeah, well, it gets better.
You see, I didn't decide just to take a trip to Scotland purely to swan about and drink coffee (as much as I enjoy this pastime). Me and Katie had an ultra-awesome reason for being in the 'Burgh that weekend, and that reason was a chap named Tim Minchin. I had been nothing short of gutted that I had missed all his more local dates before Christmas (you guessed it, I was in Germany), especially as this new tour saw Tim sporting a full orchestra and a host of new and remastered songs. I'd been just able to cope with missing hosts of gigs from my other favourite musicians and comedians, but I decided this was one too many, and when I found out that his Scotland dates coincided with my Easter holidays I thought "bugger it" and booked. The fact that Katie came with me only proves her great commitment to comedy. So, we left Charlie (who had already seen Tim's tour) to go and route out a Chinese takeaway and an obscure poetry reading, and went for a night at the theatre. It. Was. Incredible! Minchin was on fantastic form, his old songs sounding unbelievably good in orchestral score and his new material making me laugh until tears rolled down my cheeks. One for my top ten comedy gigs, certainly. Once Tim had performed his second encore (White Wine In The Sun - I cried) and we had purchased our Rock 'N Roll Nerd mugs, we went to meet up with Charlie again, catching a bit of light folk music at Sandy Bell's before turning in. Monday saw yet more coffee and wanderings and also the bizarre occurrence of someone throwing an egg at me our of a car window. It didn't smash, fortunately, but rather bounced off my thigh with some force and cracked when it hit the road. But seriously, a drive by egging? Who does that? After this ridiculous event, me and Katie dropped Charlie at the station for her journey onwards to St Andrews and went and spent silly amounts of money on dresses. Whoops. Then there was just time for a quick baked potato (enormous, it was) before jumping on the train back down south. See you in August, Edinburgh.
The next few days were indeed Nottingham time. I caught up with Bex and Ruth over lunch on the Tuesday, before Bex dragged us round 'most every shop in town before letting us have a breather in Starbucks. We had a healthy dinner of chicken salad and curled up in Bex's bed to watch Harry Potter. The next few days were devoted family time; my mum and me took a trip to Market Harborough to see our cousin, we went shopping and on Easter Sunday we had a good ol' fashioned slap-up family lunch. Saying that, on the Thursday night I absented myself from relative shindigs to hit up the Rebel and Bar 11 launch night with Becky. There was wine and excellent music and a good time was had by all. I think.
With my holidays ticking away, it was time to hit my favourite city of the them all, my uni-town, my place: SHEFFIELD, BABY! I tell you, it felt so good to be back after such a long absence. Speshy met me at the station on Monday night and we dragged all my bags up the hill to the house that will be mine in less than two months. We had long over-due tea and chats which went on far too late considering we had to get up super-early the next day and travel to Manchester. Spesh had somehow managed to get herself conned into booking a fancy photo-shoot and we had to go and partake in order to get her deposit back. With a pact to buy no photos in place, we enjoyed having our hair and make-up done and stocking up on free snacks before being be shepherded into the studio where we were ordered to pose in various positions that made us look like wanky twats. When it came to the photo viewing, the girl was very much on the hard-sell and we struggled to stick to our pact just because of all the pressure. However, then we remembered that they wanted to charge SEVENTY POUNDS PER PRINT, stuck to our guns and legged it.
Back in Sheffield, I picked up my stuff and headed down the hill again to Rosie's where I was stopping the next two nights with Charlie. There was time for a quick cup of tea and a catch up before we headed out for the Folk Train. If you live in Sheffield and you've never been on the Folk Train, then I heartily recommend it. The last Tuesday of every month, lovers of folk board the 7.14 from Sheffield to Edale to enjoy three hours of beautiful music and scenery. The band play on the train, in the pub upon arrival at Edale and all the way on the train back again. A different band every month, April's was Happy Red Tractors and they were superb, playing a mix of traditional English, Greek and Russian folk. As the train arrived back into Sheffield just after 10, we considered the night to be still young and nipped into the Lescar on Sharrowvale Road for a cider. We got slightly more tipsy than we intended, danced New York, New York all the way back to Rosie's after last orders and when me, Charlie and Katie all tried to cram into Richie's already very broken bed we made it collapse and had to drunkenly try and piece it back together again.
Wednesday was a celebration of my second year haunts. First, Katie in tow, I went and got my hair cut and picked up my new Ucard (I can get into the IC again - hooray?) and then went and met Rosie, Charlie and Louise in town. We took a slow stroll down Division Street visiting all the little boutiques before grabbing lunch from Zooby's (the fairtrade cafe in the Winter Gardens), dodging the snooker commentators as we went. The afternoon saw sunbathing in the Peace Gardens and coffee at Bungalows and Bears, the evening dinner at the Old House and cocktails at the Wick At Both Ends and I spent the whole time wishing I was back for good already instead of having to wait another six or seven weeks.
I hit the road home on Thursday afternoon for one last evening with my parents, an evening which seem to flash by, and all too soon I was pulling my suitcase through the arrivals gate at Cologne airport. Three and a half hours of frustrating train journeys later I was pulling that same case through my front door in Duisburg. It's hard to believe that I've come back for my final four weeks. In some ways my wonderful Easter trip to the UK has made me long to be back there more than ever; I miss my life in Sheffield, and even these few short weeks seem to be too long to wait before I can get back to it. I miss my family and my friends, and would once again like to thank them for being so brilliant and for giving me yet another wonderful holiday to remember. That said, I've have such a fantastic time here that I'm not sure I can quite face the idea of it being over so soon. But it's not over quite yet; I've got exactly one month to tear up Germany and make the end of my year abroad as epic as the preceding seven or so months. There's Berlin. There's Eurovision. There's (hopefully) Prague. So all in all, it looks set to be a bit of a corker. And, as always, I'll be sure to let you know all about it.
-------------
* Not least because my mother has now decided that after the age of eighteen all Easter gifts should come in the form of nightwear; this year, a dressing gown.
** That accent. Hommanaah.
Thursday 14 April 2011
Music (Live): Stornoway @ Gebäude 9 (Cologne)
There are moments in life that remind you why we, all of us, hold that special place in our hearts just for music. Watching Stornoway's lead singer and guitarist Brian Briggs, without amps or microphones or any other technical wizardry, hold a room of hundreds of people completely spellbound using nothing but an acoustic guitar and his voice was exactly one of those moments.
From the sheer numbers that packed the venue, it was clear that Stornoway have quite the German following. After a short but electric set from local Cologne group Lingby, who give traditional indie music a kick by incorporating mellow brass-tones alongside their harmonised male and female vocals, the band took to the stage. The round of whoops and claps that greeted them was almost deafening.
Straight down to business, Stornoway launched into their first number, their upbeat and first-released demo track 'I Saw You Blink'. However, not that it was possible to notice as a member of the audience, it soon became clear that the band were experiencing some slight technical difficulties. Briggs complained (in the politest English tones imaginable) of "ghosts in the machines" and there was some technical faffing and much swapping of leads in the intervals between their next two numbers, 'The Coldharbour Road' and 'Boats and Trains', before he announced that they had finally been "banished".
The rest of the gig went without hitch, despite a brief reappearance of the ghosts, causing Briggs to throw away the lead connecting his guitar to his amp for his truly stunning solo performance of 'November Song', joking that if he unplugged everything then nothing could go wrong. Every single number they played was exquisite, with the multi-instrumental group dashing between keyboards, trumpet, glock, banjo, double bass and various percussion instruments (including, at one point, a saw and a block of wood) as Briggs' clear, crisp, beautiful vocals rang out over a crowd in rapture.
Stornoway played a long and varied set, mixing the new with the old and their faster, guitar heavy tracks with their more melodious ballad-like songs. High points in particular were the heart-wrenching 'Long Distance Lullaby' and the seamless transition from soft and gentle "On The Rocks" to the much more up-tempo and danceable "Watching Birds". Unsurprisingly and to much delight they finished up their set with their first single "Zorbing" before departing the stage with big smiles and many words of thanks and to tumultuous applause.
Of course, there had to be an encore. But it was an encore like no other; upon request of the crowd they once again set aside technology and played the whole thing acoustic, first a captivating rendition of old song, 'Gondwanaland' and then their protest anthem against the modern, drudging lifestyle 'We Are The Battery Human'. It was breathtaking.
Beautiful is perhaps an over-used term when it comes to describing music. But if there is contemporary band that ever deserved that title then it is Stornoway. Their music soars, with and without the aid of modern technology, and if you ever get the chance to see them live, take it. You'll be blown away.
Monday 11 April 2011
YA: Procrastoblogging
Hello, folks of the internet! Guess who should be planning a lesson right now but instead is going to write a super-smashing round-up of their life over the past few weeks in the hope that someone will read it and say nice things? If you said answered anything other than "erm, you, Georgie?" then I'm sorry but you're wrong. No celebratory chocolate digestives for you.
To business. This time round, I essentially have the stories of four weekends to impart, as I have once again not updated this page for a disgustingly long time. Let us start, sensibly, with the first weekend: The One Where Georgie Drank A Leetle Too Many Milk-Based Cocktails And Ended Up With A Rotten Hangover. It occurred, as all great weekends seem to, in Münster. Cerys' friends from uni had travelled from Rheinland-Pfalz to visit her and of course a night-out had to be had. We pre-lashed in typical fashion by playing "Most Likely To..." (for those of you who don't know, this is a variant on "I've Never..." but instead of drinking if you've done something, everyone in the circle has to point at the person they consider to be the person most likely to do the named thing, and the person with the most fingers pointed their way has to drink) in which I learnt that, out of all my friends, I am the one considered most likely to be eaten by a penguin. I cannot imagine when this situation would arise, but apparently if a carnivorous penguin with a taste for human flesh is ever bred, I'm the one it's going to go for. But anyway, I digress. After prinks, we went off to Piano Bar for karaoke and cocktails and it was here that I discovered the Milchbar 45. Now, after the White Russian Experience of last summer (a story for another time) I should have known to stay away from milk cocktails, but oh no. The taste of liquid Milky Bar was too tempting for me and I guzzled at least three before we moved onto Go Go Lounge for some dancin' and, from what I remember, a really fun evening which climaxed with me eating an entire pizza on my own. Don't worry, I disgust myself as well. The next morning I was not a pretty sight. Unable to eat for queasiness, I lay around feeling sorry for myself and generally giving a terrible impression of myself to strangers whilst Cerys fretted and Kelsey laughed at me. I'll say this for the whole experience though, it did result in the discovery of the world's best hangover cure: Toy Story.
On to weekend two: The One Where We Watched A Lot Of Films And Ate A Lot Of Biscuits (And Also Went To The Zoo). Don't faint, right, but I actually didn't touch alcohol this weekend at all. Instead, me and Kelsey went to stay with Cerys for some baking and a Disney fest, the plan for which was hatched during the watching of Toy Story/ The Emperor's New Groove the weekend before. We arrived fairly late on Friday armed with Cathedral City cheese, with which Cerys later made scrummy cheese and potato pie (potatoes which I totally peeled despite the presence of potato eyes, which, as several of my friends know - and delight in laughing about - I have a slight irrational fear of. I only made a mild fuss. Yeah, I'd be the first to call me a freak, too). Before this, though, we took a wee trip to the Aasee (the park near the lake in Münster) where some of the others were finishing up a picnic. I lay in the grass as it got darker, listening to the acoustic guitar which another group of people had had the presence of mind to bring with them and occasionally joining in the American English vs British English debate which is ever present among my friends. It was one of those moments when you realise just how good you've got it. Then we went back to Cerys' for pie and Toy Story 2. Bliss. The next day we made use of some of the good weather in Germany recently and went to the zoo. I've been to Münster Zoo three times, but never before have I had chance to feed the penguins. Rest assured, none of them tried to eat me. The penguins are still on our side. That evening was all about baking and shameless Glee binge-watching. My cookies were slightly disappointing, but the crispy cakes went well and I am now fully up to date with the hormonal song-and-dance ridden New Directions. Oh, and then we watched Toy Story 3. We had to complete the set, no?
In total contrast to this relaxing detox weekend, I bring you speedily on to weekend number three: The One Where We All Went To Amsterdam For The Birthdays Of Lyndsay And Kelsey (Alternatively Known As "Der Kater" And "The Funniest Weekend Of All Time"). Oh, man, where do I begin? What can I divulge? After all, what happened in Amsterdam is supposed to stay in Amsterdam. Well, first of all I should say that it was amazing to see Lyndsay and Matt again after so long. I'd really missed them both and had forgotten how much they both make me laugh. Secondly, I feel I should describe the "hotel" where we stayed, except that I don't think anything I say will quite be able to do it justice. So I say this instead: watch the following video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKA0EqVZu_o&feature=channel_video_title. It sums it up perfectly. Then there was everything we did. I realise that Amsterdam is one of the most cultural and beautiful cities in Europe, a fact which I have truly experienced on my last two visits. However, this time, we set out to have a weekend like "The Hangover", so I'm afraid I treated it like many the British tourist and just got pissed and ogled at hookers. There was Waldgeist, there was Nuwang, there was Vodka Ahoi. There were things done and things said that will never be known except by those who already know about them. There were two collapsed beds. There was a creepy man called Rick who followed our group to a bar and whom I rightly (and tipsily) told off for being a weird stalker. There was a trip to the Vondelpark with a picnic and talking to real-life Dutch people. There was a points-based kissing game. There was "Truth Or Dare" in pyjamas. There was ice cream in the sun and a great appreciation of the variety of Dutch fast-food. There were mice. There was frankly more fun and more giggles than you could shake a stick at, and once again I was struck by how lucky I have been this year to meet so many lovely, hilarious, downright wonderfully mental people.
Last one now, let's keep the ball rolling! Weekend four: The One Of Barbecues In The Park And Mini-Laptop Parties. Now, you mustn't think I'm a piss-head (I am) but this is yet another recount of drunken escapades. I promise I do other things and have many non-alcoholic strings to my bow, it's just been a heavy couple of months, yeah? Friday started off in somewhat classy style; Carol, Kelsey and I went to enjoy some of the new-found German sunshine by getting obscenely large ice creams in the centre of town. We then went home, got changed, reconvened for a couple of glasses of wine and headed up to Düsseldorf to meet Kate and her two friends from Wales. We continued to keep it light with just three Vodka Ahois (I'm being sarcastic - a Vodka Ahoi is a shot of vodka drank through sherbet and is a sure fire way of killing several of your most precious brain cells) before going to Stone on Rattingerstrasse, an indie club which I loved though I'm not sure everyone else was as impressed as I was. We got back to Duisburg about 3.30am, early by German standards, but not before I broke my lent in spectacular fashion by inhaling a McDonalds. We slept in late on Saturday and me and Kelsey headed back to mine for a bit of Russell Howard's Good News (it's my only connection to the world of current affairs) and some better-than-sex cheese on toast. We met up with Carol later, hit up Kaufland for sausages, buns and a disposable BBQ and headed off to the Innenhafen for the very first barbecue of 2011. Unfortunately, we forgot to pick up and knives or forks, so our sole cooking utensil was my keys (FYI: my staff-room key makes an excellent bread knife). That aside, our little outdoor feast was a grand success and the charcoal-smoked bratwursts were nothing short of heavenly. We then headed on back to Carol's for a little pre-lashing (into which we somehow managed to incorporate Vodka Ahoi AGAIN) complete with the flashing fairy lights and cheesy dance music that must accompany any of out laptop parties. What followed was a standard night in Duisburg: Golden Grün and Hundertmeister. Who says there are no good clubs in Duisburg?
So far, I've limited myself to recounting the only the partying. To avoid making this post too much longer (I know you're all busy people), I shall cover everything else in the briefest possible fashion and bullet point it.
- My Kl. 6 cover-class last week went extremely well. They're a really nice group and got on with the work well, and one girl looked really sad when I said I wasn't covering their English classes for the whole week that Herr Wüsthoff was in London.
- I also had surprise Vertretung with Kl. 5 on Tuesday (the actual Vertretung didn't turn up) which also went really well, even if I did only have to give them the exercises as written down in the Klassenbuch. It made me realise I really miss teaching Jahrgangstufe 5, and I've made the executive decision to try and get another group for my last four weeks after the Easter holidays.
- At the beginning of April I got myself elected as Forge Radio Secretary/ Inclusions Officer for the coming academic year. I'm immensely excited about this and can't wait to get back to the society that was such an enjoyable part of my second year in Sheffield.
- The first pictures from the English-Abend and Grundschultheatertag are now on the school website: http://www.hhg-ob.de/ (the link to the album is on the home page). There is unfortunately only one of the Robin Hood play, but there are lots of the others, and you can get a good idea of what good events they both were.
- I've hooked this blog up to my twitter feed (see? -->). If you have twitter and fancy boosting my follower quota, I'd be most grateful. I'll endeavour to be amusing.
- It's currently Motto-Woche at HHG. It's the last week for Kl. 13 and they're using their time, most wisely in my opinion, for dressing up, drinking beer in class and not playing the blindest bit of attention to school rules. I think this is brilliant and deeply regret not having had something similar when I left school. I am also having to fight my deeply-inbuilt student nature so as I don't ask to join in.
And that's it for now, I think. I am heading home for the Easter holidays this coming Thursday (though not before taking in Stornoway in Cologne on Wednesday night) and I am ludicrously excited about it. It feels like such a long time since I have seen my lovely family and friends back in England and I cannot wait to throw my arms around you all. Expect a blog in a couple of weeks detailing what is sure to be a fantastic couple of weeks, complete with a trip to Edinburgh, crashing in Sheffield and many, many catch-up cups of tea. Till then, ma homies. Happy blogging.
To business. This time round, I essentially have the stories of four weekends to impart, as I have once again not updated this page for a disgustingly long time. Let us start, sensibly, with the first weekend: The One Where Georgie Drank A Leetle Too Many Milk-Based Cocktails And Ended Up With A Rotten Hangover. It occurred, as all great weekends seem to, in Münster. Cerys' friends from uni had travelled from Rheinland-Pfalz to visit her and of course a night-out had to be had. We pre-lashed in typical fashion by playing "Most Likely To..." (for those of you who don't know, this is a variant on "I've Never..." but instead of drinking if you've done something, everyone in the circle has to point at the person they consider to be the person most likely to do the named thing, and the person with the most fingers pointed their way has to drink) in which I learnt that, out of all my friends, I am the one considered most likely to be eaten by a penguin. I cannot imagine when this situation would arise, but apparently if a carnivorous penguin with a taste for human flesh is ever bred, I'm the one it's going to go for. But anyway, I digress. After prinks, we went off to Piano Bar for karaoke and cocktails and it was here that I discovered the Milchbar 45. Now, after the White Russian Experience of last summer (a story for another time) I should have known to stay away from milk cocktails, but oh no. The taste of liquid Milky Bar was too tempting for me and I guzzled at least three before we moved onto Go Go Lounge for some dancin' and, from what I remember, a really fun evening which climaxed with me eating an entire pizza on my own. Don't worry, I disgust myself as well. The next morning I was not a pretty sight. Unable to eat for queasiness, I lay around feeling sorry for myself and generally giving a terrible impression of myself to strangers whilst Cerys fretted and Kelsey laughed at me. I'll say this for the whole experience though, it did result in the discovery of the world's best hangover cure: Toy Story.
On to weekend two: The One Where We Watched A Lot Of Films And Ate A Lot Of Biscuits (And Also Went To The Zoo). Don't faint, right, but I actually didn't touch alcohol this weekend at all. Instead, me and Kelsey went to stay with Cerys for some baking and a Disney fest, the plan for which was hatched during the watching of Toy Story/ The Emperor's New Groove the weekend before. We arrived fairly late on Friday armed with Cathedral City cheese, with which Cerys later made scrummy cheese and potato pie (potatoes which I totally peeled despite the presence of potato eyes, which, as several of my friends know - and delight in laughing about - I have a slight irrational fear of. I only made a mild fuss. Yeah, I'd be the first to call me a freak, too). Before this, though, we took a wee trip to the Aasee (the park near the lake in Münster) where some of the others were finishing up a picnic. I lay in the grass as it got darker, listening to the acoustic guitar which another group of people had had the presence of mind to bring with them and occasionally joining in the American English vs British English debate which is ever present among my friends. It was one of those moments when you realise just how good you've got it. Then we went back to Cerys' for pie and Toy Story 2. Bliss. The next day we made use of some of the good weather in Germany recently and went to the zoo. I've been to Münster Zoo three times, but never before have I had chance to feed the penguins. Rest assured, none of them tried to eat me. The penguins are still on our side. That evening was all about baking and shameless Glee binge-watching. My cookies were slightly disappointing, but the crispy cakes went well and I am now fully up to date with the hormonal song-and-dance ridden New Directions. Oh, and then we watched Toy Story 3. We had to complete the set, no?
In total contrast to this relaxing detox weekend, I bring you speedily on to weekend number three: The One Where We All Went To Amsterdam For The Birthdays Of Lyndsay And Kelsey (Alternatively Known As "Der Kater" And "The Funniest Weekend Of All Time"). Oh, man, where do I begin? What can I divulge? After all, what happened in Amsterdam is supposed to stay in Amsterdam. Well, first of all I should say that it was amazing to see Lyndsay and Matt again after so long. I'd really missed them both and had forgotten how much they both make me laugh. Secondly, I feel I should describe the "hotel" where we stayed, except that I don't think anything I say will quite be able to do it justice. So I say this instead: watch the following video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKA0EqVZu_o&feature=channel_video_title. It sums it up perfectly. Then there was everything we did. I realise that Amsterdam is one of the most cultural and beautiful cities in Europe, a fact which I have truly experienced on my last two visits. However, this time, we set out to have a weekend like "The Hangover", so I'm afraid I treated it like many the British tourist and just got pissed and ogled at hookers. There was Waldgeist, there was Nuwang, there was Vodka Ahoi. There were things done and things said that will never be known except by those who already know about them. There were two collapsed beds. There was a creepy man called Rick who followed our group to a bar and whom I rightly (and tipsily) told off for being a weird stalker. There was a trip to the Vondelpark with a picnic and talking to real-life Dutch people. There was a points-based kissing game. There was "Truth Or Dare" in pyjamas. There was ice cream in the sun and a great appreciation of the variety of Dutch fast-food. There were mice. There was frankly more fun and more giggles than you could shake a stick at, and once again I was struck by how lucky I have been this year to meet so many lovely, hilarious, downright wonderfully mental people.
Last one now, let's keep the ball rolling! Weekend four: The One Of Barbecues In The Park And Mini-Laptop Parties. Now, you mustn't think I'm a piss-head (I am) but this is yet another recount of drunken escapades. I promise I do other things and have many non-alcoholic strings to my bow, it's just been a heavy couple of months, yeah? Friday started off in somewhat classy style; Carol, Kelsey and I went to enjoy some of the new-found German sunshine by getting obscenely large ice creams in the centre of town. We then went home, got changed, reconvened for a couple of glasses of wine and headed up to Düsseldorf to meet Kate and her two friends from Wales. We continued to keep it light with just three Vodka Ahois (I'm being sarcastic - a Vodka Ahoi is a shot of vodka drank through sherbet and is a sure fire way of killing several of your most precious brain cells) before going to Stone on Rattingerstrasse, an indie club which I loved though I'm not sure everyone else was as impressed as I was. We got back to Duisburg about 3.30am, early by German standards, but not before I broke my lent in spectacular fashion by inhaling a McDonalds. We slept in late on Saturday and me and Kelsey headed back to mine for a bit of Russell Howard's Good News (it's my only connection to the world of current affairs) and some better-than-sex cheese on toast. We met up with Carol later, hit up Kaufland for sausages, buns and a disposable BBQ and headed off to the Innenhafen for the very first barbecue of 2011. Unfortunately, we forgot to pick up and knives or forks, so our sole cooking utensil was my keys (FYI: my staff-room key makes an excellent bread knife). That aside, our little outdoor feast was a grand success and the charcoal-smoked bratwursts were nothing short of heavenly. We then headed on back to Carol's for a little pre-lashing (into which we somehow managed to incorporate Vodka Ahoi AGAIN) complete with the flashing fairy lights and cheesy dance music that must accompany any of out laptop parties. What followed was a standard night in Duisburg: Golden Grün and Hundertmeister. Who says there are no good clubs in Duisburg?
So far, I've limited myself to recounting the only the partying. To avoid making this post too much longer (I know you're all busy people), I shall cover everything else in the briefest possible fashion and bullet point it.
- My Kl. 6 cover-class last week went extremely well. They're a really nice group and got on with the work well, and one girl looked really sad when I said I wasn't covering their English classes for the whole week that Herr Wüsthoff was in London.
- I also had surprise Vertretung with Kl. 5 on Tuesday (the actual Vertretung didn't turn up) which also went really well, even if I did only have to give them the exercises as written down in the Klassenbuch. It made me realise I really miss teaching Jahrgangstufe 5, and I've made the executive decision to try and get another group for my last four weeks after the Easter holidays.
- At the beginning of April I got myself elected as Forge Radio Secretary/ Inclusions Officer for the coming academic year. I'm immensely excited about this and can't wait to get back to the society that was such an enjoyable part of my second year in Sheffield.
- The first pictures from the English-Abend and Grundschultheatertag are now on the school website: http://www.hhg-ob.de/ (the link to the album is on the home page). There is unfortunately only one of the Robin Hood play, but there are lots of the others, and you can get a good idea of what good events they both were.
- I've hooked this blog up to my twitter feed (see? -->). If you have twitter and fancy boosting my follower quota, I'd be most grateful. I'll endeavour to be amusing.
- It's currently Motto-Woche at HHG. It's the last week for Kl. 13 and they're using their time, most wisely in my opinion, for dressing up, drinking beer in class and not playing the blindest bit of attention to school rules. I think this is brilliant and deeply regret not having had something similar when I left school. I am also having to fight my deeply-inbuilt student nature so as I don't ask to join in.
And that's it for now, I think. I am heading home for the Easter holidays this coming Thursday (though not before taking in Stornoway in Cologne on Wednesday night) and I am ludicrously excited about it. It feels like such a long time since I have seen my lovely family and friends back in England and I cannot wait to throw my arms around you all. Expect a blog in a couple of weeks detailing what is sure to be a fantastic couple of weeks, complete with a trip to Edinburgh, crashing in Sheffield and many, many catch-up cups of tea. Till then, ma homies. Happy blogging.
Tuesday 5 April 2011
YA: Party Machen? (The German Party Playlist)
It's occurred to me that we've all come to appreciate many wonderful pieces of German music since being here, and yet they've never been put down together all in one place. Well, THAT TIME IS NOW. Here, for your listening pleasure, is the German Party Playlist, a comprehensive list of all the badass tunes we've got our groove on to over the past few months. Hit it!
Nein Mann - Lazerkraft 3D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcPXVPXAA-8
Viva Colonia - De Höhner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37RPcWyHxLE
Schenk Mir Dein Herz - De Höhner (we like them.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTjlw_8gGLU
Das Geht Ab (Wir Feiern Die Ganze Nacht) - Frauenartz & Manny Marc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZulHCr1o5XA
Traum Von Amsterdam [Party Version] - Axel Fischer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aZcZ2Um2Yg
Ich Bin Ein Döner - Tim Toupet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taUfZRsZ0qU
(Yes - this is a song about kebabs, and the chorus does indeed translate as "I have onions on my head, I am a donner [kebab]")
Tears Don't Lie - Mark'Oh
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChPV9ua6HII
(This was a 90s German pop hit and is essentially a techno remix of "When A Child Is Born". No, really.)
Danke - Die Fantastischen Vier
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChLtLzZBYrY
Fluch Der Karibik [Remix] - DJ Tiesto
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBckj_Wkc0w
(I think this is the right version)
Remmidemmi - Deichkind
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch2GgrfSblQ&feature=related
I hope you enjoyed the German pop party. Same time next week?
Nein Mann - Lazerkraft 3D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcPXVPXAA-8
Viva Colonia - De Höhner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37RPcWyHxLE
Schenk Mir Dein Herz - De Höhner (we like them.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTjlw_8gGLU
Das Geht Ab (Wir Feiern Die Ganze Nacht) - Frauenartz & Manny Marc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZulHCr1o5XA
Traum Von Amsterdam [Party Version] - Axel Fischer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aZcZ2Um2Yg
Ich Bin Ein Döner - Tim Toupet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taUfZRsZ0qU
(Yes - this is a song about kebabs, and the chorus does indeed translate as "I have onions on my head, I am a donner [kebab]")
Tears Don't Lie - Mark'Oh
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChPV9ua6HII
(This was a 90s German pop hit and is essentially a techno remix of "When A Child Is Born". No, really.)
Danke - Die Fantastischen Vier
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChLtLzZBYrY
Fluch Der Karibik [Remix] - DJ Tiesto
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBckj_Wkc0w
(I think this is the right version)
Remmidemmi - Deichkind
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch2GgrfSblQ&feature=related
I hope you enjoyed the German pop party. Same time next week?
Wednesday 16 March 2011
YA: More Civilised Pursuits
You've heard the tales of the most recent debauchery, but I feel it's only right to inform you of all the stuff I've been doing that didn't involve alcohol, just to prove that they did, in fact, happen.
So, first things first, the Cambridge Exams have now been and gone. The speaking exams came first, with two pairs of very British examiners setting up camp at HHG a couple of Saturdays ago and ploughing through seventeen or so groups. I spent the first half of my day delivering plates of sandwiches and bottles of juice, the middle part trying to warm up the kids with English conversation and the final part taking away the now-empty platters and coffee pots. The feedback was positive; everyone was apparently of a very high standard, and I breathed a sigh of relief. My doubts, by the way, were by no means with the students - in my opinion they're all brilliant English speakers, they knock spots off my German. However, I was full of niggling doubts that I wouldn't have prepared them properly and if something went wrong it would be my fault.
The written exams followed the weekend after, with the higher level CAE taking place on the Friday and the FCE on the Saturday. Both these days were long and exhausting. There are four papers to the written part of a Cambridge English Award: reading, writing, use of English, and listening. In total and with breaks in between, the time taken to write all four papers was about five hours for FCE and six for CAE. And it wasn't only exhausting for the students; I was personally knackered by the time it got to Saturday night and ended up crashing out at quarter past eight. How very rock and roll. Additionally, I have new sympathies with exam invigilators around with the world for the hours of boredom they must endure plodding up and down the rows of desks. At least I could do the exam papers to pass the time and hence provide a bit of feedback to the students during the breaks, but I also spent a lot of my time doodling, wandering aimlessly around and watching the clock. And if I wasn't entirely sure I was integrated into the school, I am now, because after the last exam I was entrusted with the school keys to look after over the weekend (my mentor teacher joking that I wasn't to hold any parties before Monday morning). It felt very similar to being asked to take care of the class hamster over the holidays. Now everything is over completely, with no lessons to plan or papers to mark, I'm at a bit of a loss of what to do with myself. No fear though, I have Abi-Vorbereitung (A Level preparation) starting with the Klasse 13 Grundkurs next week, so I'll be back to planning and panicking in no time.
The play I was working on with Klasse 6 has also been and gone. Final rehearsals came together, people finally learnt their lines and the six small boys playing Robin Hood and his Merry Men were talked into wearing their costumes. If you ever want to make a ten year old boy furious with you tell him that a) he's got to wear tights and b) he has to do a dance whilst wearing those tights (yes, you guessed it, the dance was indeed to "Men In Tights"). The conversation shouted through the door of the boys toilets whilst they were changing into the dreaded tights went something like this:
Boy: We can't wear these!
Franzi (the teacher): Why?
Boy: Well, they're very tight!
Franzi. Yes. They're tights...
It was thunderous expressions all round and I'm not sure Franzi and myself will ever be forgiven. Still, the play itself went down an absolute storm, both at the Bilingual Night and and the Grundschultheatertag (the day(s) when the pupils from the nearby primary schools are invited into their prospective "big school" to watch a few plays, in both English and German). With the set, the lighting and the music everything came together nicely, and I barely had to say "sssssh!" at all when I was hovering around behind the scenes. The other plays were very enjoyable too. I'd helped a little with the other Klasse 6 production, one they had written themselves of the 'Hound Of the Baskervilles', but no where near as much as with 'Robin Hood', so I could sit in the audience and watch that one with little idea beforehand of how the finished version would look. The other play at the Bilingual Night, 'The Hysterical History Of The Trojan War', in which some of my FCE students were participating, had me in absolute stitches. Once they included the subtle Star Wars joke I was sold, but casting half of Kl 5d (my former Klasse 5 group who I miss teaching terribly) as the entire Spartan army, having the Greek gods chat to each other on their mobiles and wheeling the tiny toy rocking horse onto the stage to represent the gigantic wooden structure of folklore were stokes of genius.
In terms of the more classy social activities, there have been a couple, mostly involving food. A couple of weeks ago we went out for Thai food as a sort of unofficial goodbye meal for Lara and a few nights ago I went to the cinema to see my second non-subtitled film in German; "Unknown Identity", set in Berlin and starring Liam Neeson. There were a lot of German actors in it, and I would be interested in seeing it in English to see which bits were spoken in German originally and which bits weren't. The night before the CAE written exams, Petra took me to the Scottish restaurant in Mülheim to watch a gig by The Paul McKenna Band, a traditional Scottish folk group who are just embarking on a European tour. The music was right up my street and the first lot of live folk I've seen in a long time, so I had a fantastic evening enjoying beautiful food whilst listening to beautiful melodies, and have a new folk CD to boot. I then stopped the night at her flat before the exams the next day. We slept in, had a very nice breakfast and were late. Ah, well. Petra also took me to another quirky little restaurant (apparently Germany is full of them) the next day after the CAE exams were over. It serves schnitzel and pancakes and is called "Hexenhaus". Hex means 'witch' in German and the entire place is decked out in little models of witches, whilst your drinks are brought to you by a little model train that travels around the room. I'm a big kid at heart and I thought this was brilliant. Especially the train.
Phew! What a month it's been. What with Cambridge, the play(s), Karneval and all my other crazy commitments now in the past, I feel at a bit of a loose end. Saying that, it has been nice to get some sleep and to enjoy the goodies that seem to be being sent to me unceasingly at the moment by my wonderful friends and family. I've actually sat down and watched some TV, cooked meals in my flat, and I've been getting a regular eight hours a night again. I might even actually now be able to find the time to send another batch of letters out.
You know it's going to get hectic again soon. But, just for now, I'm enjoying my couple of days off.
So, first things first, the Cambridge Exams have now been and gone. The speaking exams came first, with two pairs of very British examiners setting up camp at HHG a couple of Saturdays ago and ploughing through seventeen or so groups. I spent the first half of my day delivering plates of sandwiches and bottles of juice, the middle part trying to warm up the kids with English conversation and the final part taking away the now-empty platters and coffee pots. The feedback was positive; everyone was apparently of a very high standard, and I breathed a sigh of relief. My doubts, by the way, were by no means with the students - in my opinion they're all brilliant English speakers, they knock spots off my German. However, I was full of niggling doubts that I wouldn't have prepared them properly and if something went wrong it would be my fault.
The written exams followed the weekend after, with the higher level CAE taking place on the Friday and the FCE on the Saturday. Both these days were long and exhausting. There are four papers to the written part of a Cambridge English Award: reading, writing, use of English, and listening. In total and with breaks in between, the time taken to write all four papers was about five hours for FCE and six for CAE. And it wasn't only exhausting for the students; I was personally knackered by the time it got to Saturday night and ended up crashing out at quarter past eight. How very rock and roll. Additionally, I have new sympathies with exam invigilators around with the world for the hours of boredom they must endure plodding up and down the rows of desks. At least I could do the exam papers to pass the time and hence provide a bit of feedback to the students during the breaks, but I also spent a lot of my time doodling, wandering aimlessly around and watching the clock. And if I wasn't entirely sure I was integrated into the school, I am now, because after the last exam I was entrusted with the school keys to look after over the weekend (my mentor teacher joking that I wasn't to hold any parties before Monday morning). It felt very similar to being asked to take care of the class hamster over the holidays. Now everything is over completely, with no lessons to plan or papers to mark, I'm at a bit of a loss of what to do with myself. No fear though, I have Abi-Vorbereitung (A Level preparation) starting with the Klasse 13 Grundkurs next week, so I'll be back to planning and panicking in no time.
The play I was working on with Klasse 6 has also been and gone. Final rehearsals came together, people finally learnt their lines and the six small boys playing Robin Hood and his Merry Men were talked into wearing their costumes. If you ever want to make a ten year old boy furious with you tell him that a) he's got to wear tights and b) he has to do a dance whilst wearing those tights (yes, you guessed it, the dance was indeed to "Men In Tights"). The conversation shouted through the door of the boys toilets whilst they were changing into the dreaded tights went something like this:
Boy: We can't wear these!
Franzi (the teacher): Why?
Boy: Well, they're very tight!
Franzi. Yes. They're tights...
It was thunderous expressions all round and I'm not sure Franzi and myself will ever be forgiven. Still, the play itself went down an absolute storm, both at the Bilingual Night and and the Grundschultheatertag (the day(s) when the pupils from the nearby primary schools are invited into their prospective "big school" to watch a few plays, in both English and German). With the set, the lighting and the music everything came together nicely, and I barely had to say "sssssh!" at all when I was hovering around behind the scenes. The other plays were very enjoyable too. I'd helped a little with the other Klasse 6 production, one they had written themselves of the 'Hound Of the Baskervilles', but no where near as much as with 'Robin Hood', so I could sit in the audience and watch that one with little idea beforehand of how the finished version would look. The other play at the Bilingual Night, 'The Hysterical History Of The Trojan War', in which some of my FCE students were participating, had me in absolute stitches. Once they included the subtle Star Wars joke I was sold, but casting half of Kl 5d (my former Klasse 5 group who I miss teaching terribly) as the entire Spartan army, having the Greek gods chat to each other on their mobiles and wheeling the tiny toy rocking horse onto the stage to represent the gigantic wooden structure of folklore were stokes of genius.
In terms of the more classy social activities, there have been a couple, mostly involving food. A couple of weeks ago we went out for Thai food as a sort of unofficial goodbye meal for Lara and a few nights ago I went to the cinema to see my second non-subtitled film in German; "Unknown Identity", set in Berlin and starring Liam Neeson. There were a lot of German actors in it, and I would be interested in seeing it in English to see which bits were spoken in German originally and which bits weren't. The night before the CAE written exams, Petra took me to the Scottish restaurant in Mülheim to watch a gig by The Paul McKenna Band, a traditional Scottish folk group who are just embarking on a European tour. The music was right up my street and the first lot of live folk I've seen in a long time, so I had a fantastic evening enjoying beautiful food whilst listening to beautiful melodies, and have a new folk CD to boot. I then stopped the night at her flat before the exams the next day. We slept in, had a very nice breakfast and were late. Ah, well. Petra also took me to another quirky little restaurant (apparently Germany is full of them) the next day after the CAE exams were over. It serves schnitzel and pancakes and is called "Hexenhaus". Hex means 'witch' in German and the entire place is decked out in little models of witches, whilst your drinks are brought to you by a little model train that travels around the room. I'm a big kid at heart and I thought this was brilliant. Especially the train.
Phew! What a month it's been. What with Cambridge, the play(s), Karneval and all my other crazy commitments now in the past, I feel at a bit of a loose end. Saying that, it has been nice to get some sleep and to enjoy the goodies that seem to be being sent to me unceasingly at the moment by my wonderful friends and family. I've actually sat down and watched some TV, cooked meals in my flat, and I've been getting a regular eight hours a night again. I might even actually now be able to find the time to send another batch of letters out.
You know it's going to get hectic again soon. But, just for now, I'm enjoying my couple of days off.
Sunday 13 March 2011
YA: Rated 18+ (Do Not Read If You Are Of A Sensitive Disposition)
I've decided to split my blog this time round, writing a nice one about work and classy social commitments which I will be able to show to my grandmother, and this one which will be about, erm... none of that. Brace yourself, readers, for scenes of pillage, plunder and parrot costumes. Let the debauchery commence!
The first tale of alcohol-fuelled frolics I feel I should impart is that of the fateful trip to Djazz about a month ago. Except I can't impart too much because I don't remember too much. I'll tell you about what I do recall. We pre-lashed at Kate's on a dangerous mix of vodka and Nuwang* before tottering off to the club around 11.30. Upon arriving at the club, we went to dump our stuff in the unmanned cloakroom, where there was a piano that I drunkenly attempted to play, and a tambourine, which I stole.** I believe some dancing may have followed this, though what we were dancing to I cannot say. Then came the clincher, the point of the evening from which all that follows has been entirely wiped from my knoweldge; somebody, and I name no names (Kate), got the shots in. That one drop of sambucca destroyed whatever chance any of us had of knowing what the hell happened that night, and between that point and finding Kelsey at 7am sat in Starbucks (drinking a frappé and babbling about some bloke named Samsung), I only recall a total five minutes worth of events. The rest of the night we have subsequently attempted to piece together through photographic evidence, but that in itself is so bizarre that it hasn't helped much: photos in front of the Naked Man statue, photos outside Kate's building, photos outside Kate's school... they track our drunken trail across Duisburg and still we have no recollection of any of it. I guess we'll never know.
You would have thought that after that little escapade I would have left it at least a week before daring to touch the Devil Drink again. Not a bit of it. Try less than 24 hours. For it was the good Matthew Endersby's leaving party and there was no way he was going to let us get away with spending the night on only lemonade and water. The night kicked off in very British style with a wonderful traditional roast dinner courtesy of Cerys. Yum. Then there were cornflake crispy cakes for dessert courtesy of Sammy. Double yum. Then, after a handing over of pressies and cards, not to mention a speech written by Lyndsay which, in her absence, I attempted to deliver with a straight face, we just got smashed. I'm pleased to say I curbed myself on the previous night and just got moderately merry, but not so Kelsey, who somehow acquired an odd mix of a someone else's wine and cherry liquor, before bumbling off out the flat in search of God knows what and causing a full-scale panic among the rest of us who had no idea where she'd gone. Apparently she'd been talking to some people from Manchester, but whatever, she gave me a heart-attack. When we did eventually decide to go out, we left one of our number, a little worse-for-wear, behind and set about buying cocktails-to-go from a nearby bar to get us through the oh-so-arduous walk to the club. Which we reached, eventually, in varying degrees of a state. I think the rest of the night passed without drama (except a truly foul cheeseburger at 4am) and, needless to say, my body was not thanking me for that weekend for some days to come.
You'll be pleased to know that I take a break from heavy drinking for a couple of weeks after this. My ravaged liver needed a bit of a holiday in order to prepare itself for the party-highlight of the Germany calender: Karneval.
Yes, Karneval. Commencing at 11.11 on the Thursday before the start of Lent, it lasts until the wee hours of Tuesday morning, with everybody wearing crazy costumes and boozing considerably throughout. Each day has a different significance, with the most important being the Thursday, Wieberfastnacht (which has something to do with female empowerment and means women can chop off men's ties and kiss whoever they want) and Rosenmontag (which features great big parades of thousands of people in all the major cities with floats and throwing goodies to the crowds). In NRW, the best place to go to party is definitely Cologne, although having sampled Düsseldorf I can tell you that that's pretty damn awesome as well. This is my Karneval story...
Thursday: Due to having to work until 3pm on Thursday I was unable to attend the big celebration kick-off. However, I raced over to Kelsey's after work to transform myself into a parrot*** and we managed to make it to Cologne for around 7. We even made sure we caught the others up on the train, snaffling on a couple of bottles of (awful) wine and playing the best (or most stupid) drinking game even invented: Drink Whenever You See Somebody In A Costume. We then found Kate and Lara somewhere around Clodwigplatz and proceeded to have a good ol' party. And it really was lots of fun for a while. A generous man kept buying all four of us drinks, Lara found a tambourine, we drew face-paint flags on each other and we sang riotously to the German Karneval tunes. When Kate and Lara, who after all had been on it far longer than Kelsey and myself decided to head home, we kept the party going, following two blokes dressed as pigs to some scrappy little club in Barbarossaplatz. Fun was still being had. In fact, fun was had right up until around 2.30am, whereupon fun very rapidly stopped being had because I discovered the absence of my purse; it had been stolen out of my bag. The rest of the night was given over to a trip to the police station, my hysterical tears and a prolonged sit in McDonalds until we could get the first train home on Friday morning. I got home at 7am, showered and went straight out again to the bank to cancel my cards and generally fix my life. I think I finally got to bed at bout 11.30am, after having been up for 26 hours.
Saturday: Saturday was Düsseldorf day. Well, night, really as we didn't get there until gone 9pm. I'm in love with Düsseldorf Altstadt normally, but that night it was magical. They'd rigged up a speaker system all down the main streets playing out a truly eclectic mix of tunes (The Killers, Status Quo, Viva Colonia, Whitney Huston...) and there were stalls every few meters supplying all your Karneval needs, from funny hats to beer, from Kanye sunglasses to "Karneval Kocktail". The atmosphere was infectious. We hit out favourite Irish pub before partying in the streets and then headed to Ratingerstrasse to dance the rest of the night away in Goldener Einhorn, where we met some true legends, baffled at the fact that "When A Child Is Born" is apparently a party tune in this country, and I stole a builder's hat.
Monday: 22 whole hours of party time. Everything commenced at 8.42 when, armed with a bottle of wine and dressed like twats, we grabbed the 8.42 to Cologne. We stocked up with more beer on arrival and, avoiding the attentions of an extremely pissed bloke dressed as pink bunny rabbit, we headed off to the... well, we headed off somewhere and found ourselves a good spot to watch the parade. By this time, however, I was experiencing a call of nature and all the toilets seemed to be some kind of VIP only affair. So, Kelsey, master of crime, busted me into a locked set using her own house key. Amazing. Until, that is, we got shouted at and had to run away (fortunately, I'd already made use of the facilities, so this wasn't too much of a problem). The parade itself was crackers; hours and hours of people and floats trooping by, pelting the baying crowds with biscuits, chocolate and sweeties. As Ally was dressed as a racial-stereotype Mexican, we used his hat as a container and got down to some dirty fighting in a quest to amass as much Haribo as we could. We were so good we decided to form a band of Superhero crime fighters called the "Süssigkeiten Ninjas, and then pigged out on all our spoils until we felt sick.
-------------------
*It's ALWAYS the Nuwang. For those of you that don't know, it's a cheep pear-favoured wine coloured nuclear-green. At 10% volume, you'd wonder how it manages to do such terrible things to people, but it does.
** I still have it. It's on my desk right now. You know when you wake up alongside a tambourine that it's been a good night.
*** I made my own costume and it was pretty damn amazing, even if I do say so myself.
**** It was Pancake Day back home after all. The Germans don't celebrate Pancake Day, the poor bastards. The again, they have Karneval, so swings and roundabouts, I guess.
The first tale of alcohol-fuelled frolics I feel I should impart is that of the fateful trip to Djazz about a month ago. Except I can't impart too much because I don't remember too much. I'll tell you about what I do recall. We pre-lashed at Kate's on a dangerous mix of vodka and Nuwang* before tottering off to the club around 11.30. Upon arriving at the club, we went to dump our stuff in the unmanned cloakroom, where there was a piano that I drunkenly attempted to play, and a tambourine, which I stole.** I believe some dancing may have followed this, though what we were dancing to I cannot say. Then came the clincher, the point of the evening from which all that follows has been entirely wiped from my knoweldge; somebody, and I name no names (Kate), got the shots in. That one drop of sambucca destroyed whatever chance any of us had of knowing what the hell happened that night, and between that point and finding Kelsey at 7am sat in Starbucks (drinking a frappé and babbling about some bloke named Samsung), I only recall a total five minutes worth of events. The rest of the night we have subsequently attempted to piece together through photographic evidence, but that in itself is so bizarre that it hasn't helped much: photos in front of the Naked Man statue, photos outside Kate's building, photos outside Kate's school... they track our drunken trail across Duisburg and still we have no recollection of any of it. I guess we'll never know.
You would have thought that after that little escapade I would have left it at least a week before daring to touch the Devil Drink again. Not a bit of it. Try less than 24 hours. For it was the good Matthew Endersby's leaving party and there was no way he was going to let us get away with spending the night on only lemonade and water. The night kicked off in very British style with a wonderful traditional roast dinner courtesy of Cerys. Yum. Then there were cornflake crispy cakes for dessert courtesy of Sammy. Double yum. Then, after a handing over of pressies and cards, not to mention a speech written by Lyndsay which, in her absence, I attempted to deliver with a straight face, we just got smashed. I'm pleased to say I curbed myself on the previous night and just got moderately merry, but not so Kelsey, who somehow acquired an odd mix of a someone else's wine and cherry liquor, before bumbling off out the flat in search of God knows what and causing a full-scale panic among the rest of us who had no idea where she'd gone. Apparently she'd been talking to some people from Manchester, but whatever, she gave me a heart-attack. When we did eventually decide to go out, we left one of our number, a little worse-for-wear, behind and set about buying cocktails-to-go from a nearby bar to get us through the oh-so-arduous walk to the club. Which we reached, eventually, in varying degrees of a state. I think the rest of the night passed without drama (except a truly foul cheeseburger at 4am) and, needless to say, my body was not thanking me for that weekend for some days to come.
You'll be pleased to know that I take a break from heavy drinking for a couple of weeks after this. My ravaged liver needed a bit of a holiday in order to prepare itself for the party-highlight of the Germany calender: Karneval.
Yes, Karneval. Commencing at 11.11 on the Thursday before the start of Lent, it lasts until the wee hours of Tuesday morning, with everybody wearing crazy costumes and boozing considerably throughout. Each day has a different significance, with the most important being the Thursday, Wieberfastnacht (which has something to do with female empowerment and means women can chop off men's ties and kiss whoever they want) and Rosenmontag (which features great big parades of thousands of people in all the major cities with floats and throwing goodies to the crowds). In NRW, the best place to go to party is definitely Cologne, although having sampled Düsseldorf I can tell you that that's pretty damn awesome as well. This is my Karneval story...
Thursday: Due to having to work until 3pm on Thursday I was unable to attend the big celebration kick-off. However, I raced over to Kelsey's after work to transform myself into a parrot*** and we managed to make it to Cologne for around 7. We even made sure we caught the others up on the train, snaffling on a couple of bottles of (awful) wine and playing the best (or most stupid) drinking game even invented: Drink Whenever You See Somebody In A Costume. We then found Kate and Lara somewhere around Clodwigplatz and proceeded to have a good ol' party. And it really was lots of fun for a while. A generous man kept buying all four of us drinks, Lara found a tambourine, we drew face-paint flags on each other and we sang riotously to the German Karneval tunes. When Kate and Lara, who after all had been on it far longer than Kelsey and myself decided to head home, we kept the party going, following two blokes dressed as pigs to some scrappy little club in Barbarossaplatz. Fun was still being had. In fact, fun was had right up until around 2.30am, whereupon fun very rapidly stopped being had because I discovered the absence of my purse; it had been stolen out of my bag. The rest of the night was given over to a trip to the police station, my hysterical tears and a prolonged sit in McDonalds until we could get the first train home on Friday morning. I got home at 7am, showered and went straight out again to the bank to cancel my cards and generally fix my life. I think I finally got to bed at bout 11.30am, after having been up for 26 hours.
Saturday: Saturday was Düsseldorf day. Well, night, really as we didn't get there until gone 9pm. I'm in love with Düsseldorf Altstadt normally, but that night it was magical. They'd rigged up a speaker system all down the main streets playing out a truly eclectic mix of tunes (The Killers, Status Quo, Viva Colonia, Whitney Huston...) and there were stalls every few meters supplying all your Karneval needs, from funny hats to beer, from Kanye sunglasses to "Karneval Kocktail". The atmosphere was infectious. We hit out favourite Irish pub before partying in the streets and then headed to Ratingerstrasse to dance the rest of the night away in Goldener Einhorn, where we met some true legends, baffled at the fact that "When A Child Is Born" is apparently a party tune in this country, and I stole a builder's hat.
Monday: 22 whole hours of party time. Everything commenced at 8.42 when, armed with a bottle of wine and dressed like twats, we grabbed the 8.42 to Cologne. We stocked up with more beer on arrival and, avoiding the attentions of an extremely pissed bloke dressed as pink bunny rabbit, we headed off to the... well, we headed off somewhere and found ourselves a good spot to watch the parade. By this time, however, I was experiencing a call of nature and all the toilets seemed to be some kind of VIP only affair. So, Kelsey, master of crime, busted me into a locked set using her own house key. Amazing. Until, that is, we got shouted at and had to run away (fortunately, I'd already made use of the facilities, so this wasn't too much of a problem). The parade itself was crackers; hours and hours of people and floats trooping by, pelting the baying crowds with biscuits, chocolate and sweeties. As Ally was dressed as a racial-stereotype Mexican, we used his hat as a container and got down to some dirty fighting in a quest to amass as much Haribo as we could. We were so good we decided to form a band of Superhero crime fighters called the "Süssigkeiten Ninjas, and then pigged out on all our spoils until we felt sick.
The only way to combat the excess of chocolate was Bratwurst and beer, which is what we did. The next few hours were a mixture of singing loudly to German anthems, pratting about in a shopping trolley in front of the Cologne Cathedral and showcasing dance moves from Jersey Shore. By 11.30 we were getting bored of staying down by the river and headed off to another part of town, eventually ending up in the same place I had been on Thursday when I got robbed. However, far from resenting that crappy little bar, I'm actually a little bit in love with it. They played some banging records (including "Torn" by Natalie Imbruglia, allowing Ally and myself to whack out the David Armand dance routine) and I'm sure I danced solidly and with gutso for at least three hours. Around 3am we decided it would be an idea to hit the road but then accidentally found ourselves in another bar, dancing around behind the full length glass windows and waving to the people outside. I'm not quite sure how this happened, and as Kate pointed out, we must have looked just like prostitutes in Amsterdam, prostitutes in Amsterdam dressed as red indians, cave girls or parrots. We ended up eventually leaving around 5 and getting back to Duisburg around 6.30 on Tuesday morning, staggering blearily through the crowds of commuters now on the their way work. A terrible sight indeed. I fell in my front door at seven and crashed out till lunch, when I got up again, washed the gunk from my face and hair and headed over to Carol's for hangover pancakes**** and to say bye to Lara, whose sadly now left us for the sunnier climes of Madrid. Personally, I'd have chosen Duisburg myself.
I loved Karneval, but I've been glad of the few days normality that have followed it's dramatic climax. I'm not sure I could have handled another weekend quite like that one, though it was brilliant to watch this normally conservative region well and truly let its hair down. It was an unforgettable experience to say the very least!
And that, folks, is the cumulation of my most recent drunken escapades. I'm sure there will be new ones to add to the record very soon. There always are. However, with my next post I promise you something a little more civilised and so, as always, stay tuned.
*It's ALWAYS the Nuwang. For those of you that don't know, it's a cheep pear-favoured wine coloured nuclear-green. At 10% volume, you'd wonder how it manages to do such terrible things to people, but it does.
** I still have it. It's on my desk right now. You know when you wake up alongside a tambourine that it's been a good night.
*** I made my own costume and it was pretty damn amazing, even if I do say so myself.
**** It was Pancake Day back home after all. The Germans don't celebrate Pancake Day, the poor bastards. The again, they have Karneval, so swings and roundabouts, I guess.
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