Kitchen adventures

As some of you probably know already, flats and houses in Germany don't always come with kitchens. I've been told that the majority of Germans rent rather than own flats/houses, but this doesn't quite mean the same thing as it might in other countries. German flats--even rented ones--are very individualised. Whereas in Australia we would phone the landlord if a burner on our ancient stove stopped working, here we moved into a flat that literally didn't even have a kitchen sink. We spent our first few weeks here washing our borrowed dishes (for, of course, our stuff hadn't arrived yet) in the bathroom sink, and even after our stuff arrived we just set up our dish drainer in the bathtub for more effective washing until a friend helped us get a sink and bench unit from the Ikea down the road, and until Ikea delivered us a brand new oven. Which, naturally, didn't come installed, and so we had to enlist the help of another friend's very handy husband. Very, very interesting times.


In Germany, for example, you can put your seven year-old on a ladder and have her paint flowers on a bedroom wall.

Our kitchen, unsurprisingly, turned out to be Not Very Great. The layout was terrible, the sink stood away from the wall, and the tiny bench space was made up of two benches which, for some reason, had wheels. I'd tried my best, but none of my plans factored in things like specific points for the sink and oven, and only one reasonable spot for the fridge. The furniture was cool, but turned out not to fit with the layout, and we ended up with our cups, plates, and baking stuff in the living room. Funny, but annoying, and it didn't make life easy.

My favourite neighbours moved away on the weekend, and their parting gift to us was their kitchen. They didn't even want it, but since the real estate didn't know if the next tenants would want it (I don't see how this would even be a question--I'd've chosen quite happily to take somebody else's kitchen rather than buy my own!--but there you have it) they were required to remove it and asked if we wanted it. Yes, please! So we've spent the weekend and today wandering around bits of kitchen bench in various areas of my house. It's surprisingly fun, especially because there's a handyman doing all the work and I just get to admire it and clean up the dust.

The funniest parts came tonight, upon finding out that the real estate (or German equivalent) were meant to be coming for the keys tomorrow. My friends' apartment is not finished, or so I think, and their oven was still in their flat. With the handyman not coming here until midday tomorrow you can imagine that we were a bit flustered. My friends had left things for other people, and I choreographed this quite merrily. Here's the fridge, isn't it lovely, the washing machine is here and all the water has been let to drain. I'll mop this spill off the floor so it still looks nice, and et cetera. It all went quite spiffingly until I got a call from my German-speaking upstairs neighbour. My German is getting better but it's still not great, and a wrong word meant that hilarity ensued.

The handyman had left the oven with all its electrics stuck into the wall, which of course presented a little problem. I tried to let her know that the oven was still in the kitchen, but unfortunately said gekocht (cooked) rather than geguckt (looked). A little note here: when you say 'guck' (look) the g sounds like a k. So basically I said gekocht rather than gekuckt. I don't know if they look at all similar here, but they sound very similar to me.

My upstairs neighbour freaked out a little. "What do you mean, you cooked there?"

"No no no," I tried to explain. Then said the same thing. I tried to qualify it with examples, in my terrible German, but she wasn't buying it. "I cooked with my eyes," I told her earnestly. "Like, I cooked at a football game. Or I cooked at my children playing. I cooked at the stove." She made a worried noise and went to speak to her husband before calling me back very concerned about my odd confession of cooking in an otherwise empty apartment that wasn't my own. The only way I was able to regain her trust was to take her over there and mime what I'd done otherwise, I fear, she might have spent the rest of our time as neighbours thinking I was truly insane.

Tangential and I waited a while for a phone call, received instructions on how to go about removing ovens from walls, and set off, perhaps inadvisedly, under the cover of darkness to retrieve the stove before the Wohnung/real estate people came to take back their keys.

We figured out the oven. Well, my husband figured out the oven while I leaned over the stove and shone spotlights from both our mobile phones in the general direction of the back of the stove. Then we figured out the best way to carry it so that it could be stowed in our basement for the new owner. This is where the cover of darkness didn't really work in our favour. Not that it isn't getting dark now at 4pm, but that's entirely beside the point--it took us until we gathered a small audience of very suspicious neighbour before we realised how dodgy it looks for two people dressed in black (winter jackets, naturally) and wearing gloves (because who'd move furniture without them when it's 3 degrees?) to be wandering through the quiet neighbourhood at 9pm with an obviously purloined stove. My husband, bless his heart, thought to call out to put fears to rest, but alas my husband's company's German course still hasn't started and his command of the language isn't quite good enough to reassure anybody! Not only were we dodgy black-clad gloved people skulking around with a stove at 9pm, we were also foreigners. I'm surprised the police haven't shown up yet.

At long last we got the stove into our basement, ready to be picked up. I've got new, shiny cupboards in my kitchen, most of my dishes out of the dining room, 21 types of tea, and a handyman coming tomorrow to finish the job. Quite a satisfying day. Really, where else could I possibly live that would see me with a spare kitchen sink in my hallway?

Have you removed yourself, by any chance?

Ah, German, I love you so much. Sure, you can be almost impossible for me to pronounce at times, you have all those funny letters, and people mumble you so quickly I can't tell what they're saying nearly ever, but you also have the funniest phrases.

My 'word of the day' email came up with this little gem as part of the 'use the word in a sentence' exercise: 'Du abgenommen hast'. The word itself isn't sticking in my head, but the phrase means 'you have lost weight'. Abgenommen apparently means 'removed', 'abgenommen hast' apparently means 'have taken', and all together it means 'you've lost weight'.

The part that I'm secretly chuckling over, however, is that when somebody first said this to me I thought she was saying that I'd been nomming on things. Not quite the intention, I'm sure!

Savignyplatz s-bahn station

As I said in the previous post, Savignyplatz s-bahn station is my favourite s-bahn station. Sure there are other, bigger ones, but this one is such a pleasure to ride through or even wait for a train on. We've been here a few times for spielplatz visits, a festival nearby, and of course a trip to the Schwarzes Cafe, home of the most must-see toilets in Berlin! That and it's easier to change trains if you're going far enough west and you happen to get on a train that terminates at Charlottenburg station (which has a layout that I can't quite get my head around).

A lot of the stations in Berlin are decorated with various themes. I still need to take the camera to the Rathaus Spandau u-bahn station, but at least of the stations I've visited I've noticed that the u-bahn stations are a fair bit more likely to be decorated than the s-bahn stations. In contrast, the s-bahn stations are more likely to be modernised. A fair number of them have lifts, for example, even if the lifts are often broken. A word to the wise: if you're going to take advantage of the ridiculously cheap monthly bike tickets with your kids, make sure you can carry more than one bike at a time. One lovely Berliner helped me carry Jill's bike through Zoo Gartens, but sometimes getting around with our bikes resembles that old logic problem of having a boat that will fit three when you need to get a cat, a dog, and a chicken across the river but you can't leave the cat and the dog or the cat and the chicken together alone.


More graffiti, more art.


Der Baum - the tree.


Even quotes!


I really like the Theodor Heuss quote, though I'm not quite game to translate it for you. They have an u-bahn station named after him.


Yet more quotes. :)


Finally, a rose. It may seem silly to be so attached to a train station, but I think it's really lovely.

Über Spielplatz „Sherwood Forest“

Last weekend Tangential was sick and Maddyn needed a nap, so Jill and I decided to have a girls only outing towards our goal of visiting the Top10 Spielplätze. The day's adventure: the Sherwood Forest Über Spielplatz. Within very short walking distance of Savignyplatz s-bahn station--one of my favourite stations, with gorgeous decorations that I need to post about--it's in a bit more of an urban area than most, and with that comes the unfortunate Berlin graffiti. Apparently graffiti is very much debated here: a lot of people agree that graffiti is unsightly and should have harsher punishments, but others believe that it's a valid form of artistic expression and should be protected. I've personally seen some gorgeous graffiti here, including a Doctor Who theme on a wall and some very impressive pieces on trains, but a lot of it also seems to be tagging and English-language swear words in children's playgrounds. I'm getting more and more used to it, but there's so much more graffiti here than I recall seeing in Australia and it's still a very strange idea to me that it would be protected.


In front of the castle is a very cool climbing frame, a water feature, a play house for toddlers, and swings. I didn't quite see immediately why it was an Über Spielplatz until we went behind the castle. The whole area behind the castle just made the outing for Jill. The lovely metal slide, the ramparts, bridges, a climbing wall, and a lovely place under the castle where a fair number of the kids gathered to have a pretend tea party. The park has an unfortunate building site next to it, but it's still very green: lots of bushes, at the very least, to make it fantastical in the middle of the urban setting, and strategically placed rocks for the adults to sit on. I don't know about the other adults, but I had a lovely sit down with my book.


The climbing wall. Jill liked this one a bit more than Rapunzel's hair at the Märchen-Spielplatz, because it wasn't quite as high and scary, but I think they're both fabulous.


I'm collecting a lovely number of photos of the carved statues in the parks here.


I don't know if you can see it clearly, but what looks like an F there is actually a T. This is part of the climbing structure at the front of the park.

All in all, I'd definitely go there again. There's also a very cool flying fox (adventure swing) that connects the castle with the climbing frame at the front of the park, and I think the kids could easily spend hours there.

Berlin Aquarium

One of the kids' favourite places in Berlin is the Berlin zoo and aquarium. They're very reasonably priced, and are such a guarantee of hours of fun that we're saving our pennies to buy an annual family ticket to the zoo. Even still, that's only 180€ (which is quite a bargain considering an annual family ticket to a certain zoo in Australia currently costs between $425 and $920!). Or the utterly ridiculous Sea Life and AquaDom here in Berlin, about which I left a scathing review. Over forty euros admission without taking my husband with me, they charged for Maddyn (nowhere else seems to charge entry for three year-olds, and the zoo will let him in for free until he's five!) and not even a discount despite having less than half the sea creatures the aquarium does, nor that their current building project means some of their exhibits are closed. There are no words for how displeased I was with the entire experience, but I digress. Back to the excellence of the cheaper and far more enjoyable alternative.

Tangential has been working very hard recently and in exchange for a hectic week that saw him coming home at 9.30 one night and midnight another--and even working on Saturday--he scored a day in lieu. Maddyn's been missing his dad dreadfully, so the boys and I headed out to the aquarium.

Maddyn's favourite part of the aquarium is the snakes. On our first visit he sat down next to the giant snake at the top of the main staircase and just watched the one enclosure for twenty minutes. He also loves the giant enclosure of caymans and slider turtles--you can choose to either watch them from a bridge that spans the enclosure or from another floor up, on the floor with the insects and arachnids. He's also a very big fan of the shark tank and the large reef tank that sits in the middle of a lovely chamber of sorts with seats if you fancy a sit down after walking through three floors of aquarium.

There's a back door that takes you from the aquarium into the zoo. We've probably spent ten hours in the zoo so far and we haven't seen a fraction of it. We didn't go this week, but the kids love it there (hence our plan to buy annual tickets). There's even a three-part playground, which was legendary even in winter when we found it deserted and dusted with snow. Alas with our move and our recent exploring most of our photos were taken back when we were in Mitte with sketchy wireless so I don't have the photos handy, but I can't rave enough about how much fun we've had at the zoo.

Playgrounds

We have a goal, these summer holidays, to explore the playgrounds (spielplatzes) of Berlin. We went on a mini tour last holidays, but we have about six times as much time to explore this time and we intend to make the most of it! My mini challenge within this is to explore the Top Ten Berlin Spielplatzes, having recently discovered that there was such a thing.

Jill was absolutely thrilled when she found 'the elephant park' in the list, the listed picture online being the larger elephant multi-level part of the park. We trundled out of the house with our bikes and a picnic lunch and went to see the Zirkus Aladin spielplatz.


It turns out she named the park well. There are two elephants at the park: this is the smaller of the two.


The second elephant has about three levels, accessible by ladders, with a huge metal slide as a trunk. It's brilliant.


It also has a wee circus wagon. Isn't that delightful?

The circus park of course includes dozens of the carvings that are found in so many of the lovely Berlin spielplatzes, as well as rope ladders, climbing ropes, two spinning toys, and the obligatory ping pong table. I have no idea if the carvings are a German thing or just a Berlin thing, but I do have to wonder how they come about. Is there one guy out there who supplies fabulous, carved animals for parks? Is it an industry? I can't say I ever wondered about where playgrounds in Australia came from--they were just there and generally resembled each other, with differences mostly in layout and size, etc. The parks here are such a wonderful enigma, with their metal slides and wooden structures, with the carvings, statues, and ping pong tables instead of swings. I love them, but I also digress. The seating was more than adequate, with a lovely little round seating area decorated with carved animals. Then there was the water toy!


The kids spent a solid hour pumping water and constructing a 'river' until I made them get out of the sun. It was 29 degrees Celsius today, so I didn't fancy them in full sun even with 50+ sunscreen, but rather than having to go home the multi-level structures provided more than enough shade for them to play without getting burned.

Gardening

Gardening


A post about our little green thumb now. Grampa gave Jill fifty euros for her eighth birthday and she used that and a bit of her pocket money to buy a garden!

Facebook people might remember her little garden:

The flower pot.


The strawberries.

Suffice to say that a lot has happened since April!


We have strawberries now!


All of the flowers have bloomed, and the two tiny strawberry seedlings have turned into five plants and so many runners we've had to chop some off. We've also got two running plants over the edge of the balcony, one of which flowered this week.


Tangential's brother also sent Jill some birthday money, part of which also went towards the garden. On an Ikea mission to find some toy storage for Maddyn, Jill found these and some gorgeous, colourful pots.


This and a third plant found our sunny balcony a little too much, so that one now lives on our kitchen table and the yellow flowers on our coffee table. They get sun through the window, but not so much that they have to droop.


A bonus for me! I went to brunch with a friend for my birthday and she bought me this beautiful plant! I picked up a matching Ikea pot for myself. Isn't it lovely?


Lastly, an outdoor shot. Somebody--possibly the doctor or his wife upstairs who love to garden--planted red and white roses out by our front door. I got to see this lovely flower open gorgeously for quite some time, until it was unfortunately damaged and somebody took it away. The path to our front door is lined with roses and pretty yellow flowers.

Our friend Amy also brought Jill some sunflowers and some other flowers that weren't thriving on her balcony, and helped Jill plant them in the yard. We have our first sunflower bud now, so I should share photos of that when it blooms.

I must confess I don't know very much about gardening, but nearly all of the balconies in our area have rows of long pots with flowers and it makes for a gorgeous sight. It might seem silly, but the flowers everywhere is just another reason why Berlin is such a lovely place to live. The kids also think it's great to be able to walk out to the balcony and pick a strawberry or two to eat, and the guests we've had here seem thrilled to be offered home-grown strawberries. It makes me happy.

Karneval der Kulturen

The second carnival we visited was much, much larger. The annual Karneval der Kulturen ran weekend before last for three days and nights. Our neighbours went earlier in the day, but Maddyn was napping and we agreed to meet up at the Latin music stage.

As per the above link, last year's Karneval attracted 1.45 million people, and you can quite believe it given the sheer mass of people there. The struggle to get out of the train station just to get to the Karneval should have clued me in, but when we went looking for our neighbours we were almost immediately trapped in a slow moving crowd. The stalls on either side of the walkways were doing a very brisk trade as people ducked into them just to get away from the crowd, and the noise was pretty amazing. All manner of voices, languages, and accents. Tangential and I cracked up when a voice called out in a very distinctive Australian accent, 'Hey, do you wanna crepe? I wanna crepe.' Bless.

It seems silly to be surprised by a cultural difference in a carnival like this, but one of the first things we were struck by was the number of people who liked Maddyn's monkey backpack. We've never used it frequently, but it has D rings on the bottom, clips across the chest, and comes with a lead. He thinks it's fabulous, but I've never come across too much support for the idea of leashing children and so was very surprised when we had a number of people come up and ask--one even in English--where we bought it! The one who spoke English mentioned he has a two year-old, and would love something like that so she couldn't run away. I hear him. We took it off so the kids could go on the bouncy slide and before I could put it back on Maddyn spotted a gap in the crowd and sprinted away. The kid's been training for nearly six months on his balance bike and he can run. I pretty much dared for anybody to judge me after managing to catch my son after a five minute run and him deciding to weave in and out of the kind of toilet line you get when you've got over a million people in one spot.


And, of course, the toilet queues you get at a festival where beer tents outnumber the vendor tents. Bier 3 euros; Vodka & Spek, 2.50.




Lolly stand!

After a couple of hours of browsing through stalls and admiring the sheer number of alcoholic options available, we came across a harassed-looking woman who, for a euro fifty, was able to load us up with all the sugar energy we needed to get back to the music stages once more. At least, with the number of people there I ended up with Maddyn on my shoulders for about four hours all up, so if nothing else I needed my strength! We trundled back through the enormous German barbecue stands, found a bier tent which kindly sold cola and apfelschorle (apple lemonade?) in glasses, and I shared a chicken curry with Maddyn outside an Indian stand quite hastily upon finding out that the plastic bowl I was using had a two euro pfand--a deposit that you can get back once you've returned the bowl.

All in all it was a spectacular day. My back and feet were glad of the seat I managed to finally get on the s-bahn when we were a few stops away from home, but I'd love to go again next year.

We never did find our neighbours.

Naked man park

We have been busy lately going to festivals with the Musician neighbours. They're so lovely, and very keen to show off Berlin.

The first festival we went to was the Peruvian festival. Alas instead of the outdoor festival we were all expecting it had been downsized to a large apartment with a few tables in a hallway for food and some Spanish karaoke. Oh, and some gorgeous artwork, which I wasn't quite sure if I should photograph so I didn't. We left quite quickly, went a-walking with the children, and popped into an American diner. I'm amused by the number of American diners here--I suppose I'm used to them in Australia, but American foods and the like aren't really as embraced over here (as opposed to the McDonalds on every corner that I'm used to). All of the kids at the table used the e-coli scare to carefully pick all of the salad from their plates, but it was generally quite delicious.

After lunch we went walking again--past little poles with beads decorating them!-- to a park. To access to the park one has to walk through the grounds of a gorgeous church. I left the kids playing with the others and went back to take a photo of the church only to find myself, camera out, in the middle of a park full of naked men. I'm getting more and more used to the idea of naked sunbathing here, and I think the idea is quite excellent, but I never expected to see naked sunbathing a) quite that close to a playground, nor b) in front of a church!
With the eyes of a dozen men on me and my camera I hastily angled the camera up, pointed, and took the photo as quickly as I could. Then I fled.

Seeds

Apparently Germany is working towards banning toys with Happy Meals and the like. I can't seem to find an English-language article to verify this, but it's been mentioned by a few parents so I'll assume it's the case.

I doubt companies who want to appeal to kids with toys aren't going to let some sort of mandatory crack down on imported trinkets cost them, however, and it's very interesting to watch the ways that they're getting around this alleged ban.

Jill fancied Burger King last weekend when we went to the museum, and was offered a toy. Not one that was automatically included, but she got to choose if she wanted one or not. Silly question. Naturally I now have in my house a plastic torc referencing a movie I've never heard of. I've planned in advance which bin that will be sorted into.

We went to KFC for her birthday in April, and their option is to include gummi bears with their kids meal box. It made me laugh, because while everybody loves gummi bears I'm not sure candy with junk food is actually a healthier option.

I don't think we've taken the kids to McDonalds here (though their McRib looks oddly appealing), so I'm not sure what they do. I'll let you know if we do.

The most inventive, excellent idea I've seen so far is from a yoghurt company. Tangential and Maddyn took off for a bike ride during the week to pick up a few necessities and came home with a four pack of yoghurt with a special gift. On opening it, we discovered the special gift was seeds! Collect the set and you'll have cress, parsley, chives, basil, and Thai basil. Essentially, this means my little yoghurt fiend can eat as much as he wishes and I might get my kitchen garden after all without needing to pop down to Bauhaus and bring home seedlings on the s-bahn. I'm afraid we're fresh out of dirt, so the garden might have to wait, but I think it's a brilliant idea.

For the curious, our yoghurt came with Schnittlauch (chives), which is good timing just after the kids have designed to start eating them. Being summer now I don't actually know if this is the best time of year to start a-planting, but after deciding to fill up the free pot of still-unidentified herb he got at the shops one day with green paint I'm quite that little project needs replacing.

Bonus: I don't know if you can tell from the picture, but keeping with the yoghurt theme it's suggested that you grow the seeds in the yoghurt tubs! I love it.

Cross your fingers for Petersilie (parsley) next? I've never in my life remembered to actually buy any and I doubt I'm going to start now.

Honey, the ceilings are orange

This week has been really fun. Maddyn and I are getting into the habit of riding home from our English-speaking play group, we've done a great deal of baking, and I've met some new people who are becoming friendly. We've even had three social dinners this week: two with the neighbours across from us, who have a son Jill's age and a daughter a little younger than Maddyn, and then another neighbourhood barbecue tonight. Maddyn also has a routine of play dates with the girl whose mother recommended the kita (kindy) that he'll be starting at next month, and the two kids have been having a lovely time getting to know each other before starting there. Tonight's barbecue was an impromptu gathering, in honour of what will apparently be a very good soccer game, though we put the kids to bed rather than going across the way to watch it, but we had Jill's little boyfriend with us and it was all very lovely.

We actually had Boyfriend all day, which is always a delight. He's a great kid, and both kids just adore him. Unfortunately for him we had our first dud outing. We trundled out to Museum für Naturkunde, the natural history museum here. I'm afraid our expectations of museums are quite high--we've always liked the Queensland Museum, with its interactive displays, craft projects, and the dinosaur garden where you can picnic and where the kids can play on the dinosaur models--and this one didn't really make the grade. The dinosaur room is pretty cool: it's home to the world's largest mounted dinosaur skeleton, which is both enormous and brilliant. They've got a somewhat interactive display there, with on-screen dinosaur musculature, skin overlays, and videos of what the dinosaurs might have been like. Maddyn would have been happy to play with that for an hour, but the bigger kids were keen to explore so we trundled off into room after room of preserved specimens and a huge section on the preservation process. There are only so many stuffed rhinos, hippos, and deer that a three year-old can stand, and I'm afraid the 276000 vials of specimens in ethanol lost its appeal quicker than you could say, 'Hey, this could be the Potions store room.' Boyfriend was bored out of his mind, Maddyn tried to run away 2389723497 times, and every time any of us spoke it echoed through the eerily silent rooms, so we made our escape with a quarter of the building unexplored. Some of it was nifty, of course, but things like a mounted red fox on a blank exhibit with a caption describing an intention of invoking mental images of an abstract landscape or a snowy field really didn't hit its mark with any of the three kids. I really wouldn't recommend this museum for children.

I think the highlight of our trip was the ice cream shop at the Friedrichstraße s+u-bahn station. The ice cream there is amazing! I don't generally care all that much for ice cream, and I feel odd raving about it, but it was so good I'm tempted to take the kids there again just for the ice cream. Nom.

Friends and family will also be happy to find out that I've met a Brisbane guy here who doesn't work Wednesdays and who has access to the State of Origin. I don't know him well, so I don't think there'll be wine and cheese, but I'm much happier to know I won't miss out on the other games. Hooray!

I think that probably sums up all of our recent news. I ought to make a post some time about the dangers of moving heavy furniture without a spotter (or, indeed, any adults within shouting distance), but  for the moment I'm settling for nursing my incredibly bruised thigh and the swollen knee. I did install a coat rack, finally, which was very exciting. I've also been soliciting invitations to neighbours' houses to check out how everybody else has arranged their furniture, and I've been copying shamelessly. The small room is partially cleared now in preparation to install Jill and her key (it has a lockable door, to keep a certain small person from crashing her Sims games and/or breaking her DS when she's at school). I'm also hoping to paint the apartment at some point in the not too distant future to rid ourselves of the awkward orange ceilings, but haven't yet figured out how to do so with the furniture in the house nor what colours I really want. Decisions decisions.

A neighbourly gathering

At the risk of making this blog entirely about my neighbours, I feel the need to make another post about the lovely people here.

Not too long after moving here the Musician neighbours invited us to their house for tea and home-made muffins. We had a lovely time--the muffins were amazing--and when we offered to have them for dinner in return they suggested a barbecue on the front lawn and a chance to meet a Brit who happens to live in the neighbourhood. That barbecue was extremely lovely and I think it went so well that the opposite neighbours decided they'd like to host a barbecue. We trundled to the village green (so to speak; we have a lovely green area in the middle of the buildings with a play ground, a little sea of grass, and some magnificent oak trees) and a great time was had by all. It was proposed by the opposite neighbours that barbecues should become a regular event in our neighbourhood. Everybody concurred.

Last weekend was the second of the regular barbecues, and I got a mighty shock when we trundled down with our picnic blanket, hamburger patties, bread loaf, and cheese. The little barbecue my husband manned bravely the previous fortnight had become two barbecues, with a park bench conveniently located for the sitting needs of the cooking menfolk. The blankets had been replaced by a small city of folding chairs. The picnic blanket of food had turned into a number of small tables--one of which even had an umbrella!--with salads, breads, condiments, plates, and silverware. I think somebody had even prepared a jug of iced tea for the occasion. The attendance had gone from seven adults and accompanying children to add at least five new families! I felt almost like I should have brought a friend or six, and our little offering of food was almost pitiful compared to the delightful German man who waved his tongs at me and then deposited a hunk of fleisch on my plate. I ought to have brought a steak knife.

The event was fabulous. Frau Musician hailed me as I tried to wake up from my afternoon nap at about, oh, 4.30, and while some people wandered off to do their own thing most of the adults stayed around until sundown. Which, being so northerly here, happens to be about my bed time. The children wandered in and out of the eating area at will, in many cases begging house keys, and by ten we had to make quite a few trips back to the house carrying bikes, roller blades, and Maddyn's toy trucks. I found Maddyn's socks three days later, in a tuft of grass near the sand pit. Truly, the whole experience was more typically Australian than Australia. It almost makes up for the State of Origin not being televised here!

Back to the grind, however. It's once again past my bedtime, but I'm posting whilst waiting for carrot cake cupcakes to cool. I think I'll be icing them in the morning, and then I'll take them across to the school for yet another baking event. There seems to be at least one bake-off every week here, and I'm afraid my baking really doesn't measure up to German standard, but I tried the littlest cupcake from the first of 24 I made tonight and it seemed quite reasonable (even if I did forget the pecans). I hope everybody else is is having a delicious weekend, and GO QUEENSLANDER!

Grunewald

Delayed post is delayed, and my apologies for that. My only excuse is housework.

On Sunday we had excellent company, who came on bikes with an enormous haul of bakery treats. There is seriously nothing like Germany for bakery treats. The plan was to go for a ride through Grunewald, a huge forest that just happens to be half an hour from the centre of Berlin. I don't even know how Berlin gets off being so fabulous: bakeries, clubs, amazing public transport infrastructure, enough shops to cater to millions of people, and then a forest of all things. If I were Berlin I'd be very smug, but it's remarkably humble for a capital city.

Humble and rainy, however, the latter of which being not the best attribute when you've planned a bike ride. I have no particular fear of melting if rain touches me, but I do have a fear of repeating a certain incident that happened in high school. The rain was pelting down around home time and I rode downhill from the school on my supposedly trusty black Malvern Star that I'd bought with my part-time job earnings (ah, memories. I loved that bike). There was a staircase at the bottom of the hill that was protected by a fence so people like me couldn't accidentally kill themselves. Probably for the best. At any rate, it turns out that the brakes on that particular bike didn't work at all when trying to stop from a fair speed whilst riding downhill in the rain, and I did the only thing I could think of: I abandoned ship. School shoes are, unfortunately, about as good as Malvern Star brakes and there was no way I could have stayed upright. I slid down that bitumen and I slid hard, my navy blue drill school skirt riding up to provide maximum skin contact with the bitumen. I shredded my right thigh, butt, and hip that day, and lost my glasses to boot. I even had to face the humiliation of asking somebody for help--double the humiliation, in fact, as without my glasses I had no idea before I spoke that the person I happened to approach was my arch nemesis who, of all things, called me a poor thing and actually helped me. The shame, I tell you!

To procrastinate instead of embark on another adventure like the aforementioned we went a-planting! Our delightful company had happened to bring a number of plants that had outgrown their balcony garden. We're a tad more suburban than they are and have actual ground (rather than footpath) around our apartment, so Jill set off with her trowel and supervised as my friend dug her a hole to plant our new sunflowers (pictured), and another little garden around the side of the flat. Jill then made a wee garden edge with pine cones.

At length we realised that Berlin was just threatening to rain and wasn't actually going to do anything about it, so we set off on our bikes to Grunewald. The sky cleared up as if by magic the second we got into the forest--doesn't it look amazing?--and we trundled through the paths to find 'Die Sandgrube' (which google rather hilariously translates to 'the sand pit'), sand dunes which stand on a site which is apparently an abandoned gravel mine. 


This is the view from the top of the highest sand hill.

 Die Sandgrube is a brilliantly family friendly place. Apparently the wildschwein--wild pigs--make actually camping there a rather bad choice, but there were heaps of families: kids running up and down the sand dunes, people playing football, various games of catch, frisbee, and even one person with a kite. We chose to sit on a makeshift picnic blanket and eat apples while the kids made a cubby house in the scrub, but it was super. It was also a really peaceful retreat from the city, unless of course the wind blowing just so and we could hear the roar of the Hertha football fans at Olympiastadion as their team won a game which qualified for them to gain a league promotion of some sort.

After a final trip up and down the biggest dune we set off so we could be home in time for dinner. The Grunewald s-bahn station is a kilometre or so down another track leading from die Sandgrube, though we stopped off at a lovely little cafe (sporting a biergarten, naturally) for ice cream on the way.

All in all another fabulous outing, and I'd absolutely go there again. There are signs and maps all through the forest to help you find die Sandgrube or any of the other gorgeous Grunewald attractions. The tracks are wide and quite fine for walking, jogging, or riding either bikes or horses! The path from the main track to die Sandgrube is not wheelchair friendly, and we couldn't find a lift at either Grunewald s-bahn station or a working lift at Westkreuz s-bahn station, but there is parking and the paths, albeit slightly gravelly dirt, are wide and seem to be fairly accessible.

All the mail in the world

I have a post planned all about our weekend adventure, but I've misplaced the camera cable and refuse to post it without pictures. Here's to posting things out of order: you'll get today's adventures instead.

We have a giant basement in our flat. At least, by 'giant' I mean it's literally half the size of our apartment, which I think is pretty cool. It's rather open plan, with the other half belonging to Herr and Frau Musician, and I'm afraid it became a bit of a dumping ground for empty boxes, Ikea Styrofoam, the toys that didn't fit into the house, and half of the boxes we didn't feel like unpacking. (The other half of those boxes ended up in the corner of our bedroom where the desk should have gone. I unpacked them about a week and a half ago and found, much to my chagrin, the towels I'd been fretting about having lost.)

Today was another cold and dreary day. Not quite the seven degrees of yesterday--isn't it nearly summer here?--but cold and rainy. Maddyn has been stir crazy because I won't let him rollerblade up and down the hallway, and even Jill was fretting at the idea of another rainy afternoon at home. I gathered a bottle of water and two pocketfuls of die-cast Thomas engines and took Maddyn down to the basement for some serious cleaning. Two hours later our two-room basement is completely transformed! I carpeted the smaller room with the carpet scraps kindly left by the previous tenants, and set up the Little People in one corner and a Thomas track in the middle. The two fairly large gaps in the carpet have been filled in with the kids' bean bags, and I think it's quite a nifty second play room. There's also a giant table in there, also from the previous tenants who didn't want to move it, which I'm thinking about setting up as a sewing table once we can get an electrician to put in a power point or five and a bit more light.

Happy as I am with the little room I'm even happier with the main area. I collapsed most of the empty boxes, and stacked the ones that are stuffed with packing paper. I've got the dead computer towers, the Australian microwave, and the other miscellaneous crap against the wall (please don't ask me why we transported three dead computers fifteen thousand kilometres across the world), which has left a huge amount of floor space for, dun dun duuuun, a skating rink! Take that, all you naysayers who thought I was a meanie for banning toys from my living room: my kids have a skating rink in their basement. It's quite miniature, of course, but we tried it out this afternoon and it's well and truly big enough for two kids to skate and just big enough for both of them to ride their bikes provided Maddyn doesn't ride too close to Jill and make her fall off her bike and land on top of him. The floor is concrete and I'm not very interested in scrubbing it when we move out, but I'm thinking I might either put down tape or draw a track with chalk. I may or may not get around to that, but right now I feel like I may just be the coolest mother in the world.

Whilst cleaning my basement I encountered another German oddity: the UPS guy. I realise UPS isn't just a German service, but the UPS guys here are great. They have giant, black trucks that they can park and leave blocking entire streets, and every one I've encountered so far has had at least one facial piercing. I love it! They also have what seemed at first to a foreigner to be a very casual sense of duty, until I was presented with my handy 'guide to Berlin' which noted that neighbours here sign for each other's parcels and that's just how it is. Craziness! My neighbour in Australia once collected our dog from the street and shut our gate after we were burgled, and I thought that was delightfully neighbourly, but Germany takes things to a whole new level. Apparently I was the only Berliner home today so, despite my lack of German, the UPS guy delivered the neighbourhood's parcels to my hallway. I fretted a little about all the unfamiliar surnames--this might be a good time to mention that none of the parcels actually belonged to the neighbours who live in my building--and I had no idea how I was going to keep Maddyn from running away as I trolled the neighbourhood with armfuls of Amazon boxes, peering at names on doorbells and trying to explain my purpose in German. Bless the UPS guy (two facial piercings today), he left little notes for everybody else letting them know I had their books and CDs and I had a veritable stream of visitors ringing my doorbell this evening to collect their goodies. I have no idea what any of them said, but they all seemed pleased. I didn't think to put the kettle on, but I rather felt like Santa.

After that I prepared a meal that Jill hailed as, 'My favourite meal to eat... for dinner.' Apparently my pasta is trumped by chocolate for dessert, but I can't argue with that. The kids went to bed and since the rain can't seem to beat this very strange late-night sunshine business I went for a quick ride through the forest. I'm still a tad nervous on my bike, having not been on a bike between age 17 and about a month ago when I had the crazy idea to tell my husband I'd like a bike for mothers day so I could go riding with the kid, but I managed to ride about 7km in half an hour. I'm not going to be winning races (unless they're downhill--I rock at going downhill), but I'm really enjoying this almost compulsory fitness requirement of living here. The jeans I bought at the start of April fall down without a belt, and the jeans I brought from Australia are in a pile awaiting their move to the basement. I really love Berlin.

The flirtatious kind

I happened to get volunteered to be an English-speaking parent at the school today. It seems to be book week again, and the kids have a reading competition happening. Parents are to donate a 'small amount' for every book read, with all funds going towards the library. I'm in trouble at school for not actually specifying what my small amount would be in advance, but I like to think this was a clever choice. As a child I would typically decide that a hundred books in a week would be a good goal to strive towards, and I didn't fancy impoverishing myself. Especially considering the school also counts books read to the kids. Tricky. I have it on good authority that Jill didn't understand any of the books read to her during her German lessons this week.

I escaped relatively unscathed with Maddyn and attempted to food shop. (He threw a tantrum because he thought we were going bike riding instead of shopping, and Frau Doktor saved the day by giving him a puzzle as a gift. Hurry up and grow, little strawberries, before I have to have her over for coffee!) Maddyn made friends with an old German man at the train station who, when I let him know we're foreign, switched to perfect English and said, 'Ah, with that red hair I thought you might have been Irish.' I'll never fail to be amazed by the number of bi- or trilingual people here. Which, in light of my rather boring day, brings to mind an anecdote.

Shortly after moving here I happened to make friends with a very talented singer called Amy from Vox Nostra. She invited me to a solo concert she was doing on Good Friday at Kloster Chorin, an old Abbey in Brandenburg. There don't seem to be many English-language links around, but here is the google translated link to the German wikipedia page. The show was amazing, the Kloster was beautiful, and an especially huge treat considering I hadn't been out of Berlin itself before that day.

After the show I was introduced to some of her friends, including a friend who had brought her flowers. Her flower friend spoke a bit of English, so he and I hung for a bit over the tables in the Kloster courtyard and ate fish on bread from a fishmonger who'd set up a stall there. When Amy needed to do a bit more work after the show FF suggested she meet us at a local cafe. We set off with her harp and her flowers and, after a short walk in my blue shoes down a little cobblestone road to a cafe by a lake.

It was a beautiful day and I, unsure of what one wears to a concert by an opera singer held at a monastery, had worn a black dress with conservative sleeves but not necessarily a conservative neckline that, I must admit, absolutely prohibited wearing a bra. You can't see the neckline in that photo, but such is life. The bodice is very supportive, and not particularly unsuitable, but it turns out I was spectacularly overdressed and I fear I stood out. I sat down with FF at the cafe at a table, and FF thoughtfully asked the waitress for a vase in which to put the flowers. We worked a tad awkwardly through our small store of shared language and ordered dessert. I must admit here to having no idea what was really on the menu, so I went with the safe option and ordered the chocolate-based dessert, which turned out to be ice cream topped with whipped cream and syrup.

When our desserts arrived I noticed that the few looks we'd had from the next table--two elderly ladies with a very elderly man who I presume was their father--had turned into glares. The foul kind of glares you get when you may well be doing something indecent. It was then that I realised I was dressed up yet displaying a fair bit of décolletage and eating cream off a spoon whilst at a cafe with a man thirty-odd years my senior with flowers on the table. Better yet, the bouquet even included roses. FF was well and truly old enough to be my father, but the lack of common language meant we couldn't be related. Add to that my sparkly wedding ring and FF's unadorned finger, we were clearly engaged in some manner of public display that was not only lascivious but also unseemly.

FF, facing the other way, was completely oblivious, but I was mightily amused. I don't, of course, have enough German to defend myself to nosy old ladies, so I settled for eating my ice cream whilst smiling a lot. To make it even better, Amy was busy and didn't meet us until after they'd left, so the women were forced to pay their bill and shuffle off in a huff without any hint that their outing hadn't actually been tainted by a flirtatious foreign, married woman trying to take advantage of an older German man.

Stalemate

Frau Doktor popped by yesterday afternoon to return our plate. The dear woman even washed it, which she really needn't have done considering the state in which my house is kept when I've got a head cold. The children, who had until that point been merrily spreading all of their earthly belongings from their completely messy bedroom and playroom into the hallway, sprung into action and opened the door to its widest extent just to show off exactly how messy my house was*. Oh, and Maddyn was naked. Again. Way to make an impression, guys!

Frau Doktor complimented me on the cake, which was very kind of her, and let me know she was very chuffed. I stood on one leg in an attempt to preserve Maddyn's modesty by using the other foot to try and shove him behind me, and told her she was welcome. It didn't work, of course--the balancing act, not the manners--but I got to try out saying "nackt" (naked) and either my pronunciation was spot on or the naked boy frolicking in the messy hallway gave enough context. Frau Doktor gave me a sympathetic look and let me know she has four sons. I daresay she's seen it all before *and* a messy hallway in that case. Phew. The stalemate occurred, however, when she kindly gave my little nudist a pop up book of Die drei kleinen Schweinchen: The Three Little Pigs in Deutsch. I tried to let her know that he will be very happy to have the book, but I don't know the word for happy, just the word for jubilant (überglücklich). I don't think it came out right. On the plus side, I generally only need to stuff up a word embarrassingly once before I remember, so I'm sure if I come across a situation where I need to use the word jubilant I'll be completely set.

Back to the stalemate. I was expecting my plate back, not a new gift! I've never been involved in gift giving with neighbours--or Germans--before, and I'm not quite sure where to go from here. Perhaps she'll enjoy some of the strawberries from Jill's balcony garden. There are no strawberries as yet, but the garden was only established mid-April and already we've magically gone from two strawberry plants to two big strawberry plants, three new strawberry plants, and four feelers hanging over the edge of the pot. Go strawberries!

*The hallway has since been cleaned.

Cake for flowers

I was extremely chuffed by Frau Doktor's flowers on mothers day. They were such an unexpected, lovely gift, but trying to express my thanks in a language I don't know is a bit difficult. Especially when I consistently mispronounce the sound that ö makes. I spent time listening to a recording of a 'native speaker' pronouncing a word with an ö in it, and the closest I got to copying the recorded voice was an inelegant 'oh-ugh'. I will get there, but perhaps not this week.

On moving here we were given a hundred page internal publication from the relocation company entitled something helpful and sufficiently descriptive, like, 'Welcome to Berlin'. In it were some helpful tips on settling into Berlin, including etiquette tips. Naturally there wasn't a handy tip on 'what to do if your neighbour gives you flowers' or 'what to do if you stuff up the language when you try to say flowers are beautiful' (though there was a tip about giving flowers to your neighbours, oddly enough). We get along swimmingly with the other neighbours upstairs, and quite a few of the others in the neighbouring buildings, but my interactions with Herr and Frau Doktor are generally limited to smiles and 'hallo's in the halls, and one very confusing conversation in the wash room where I thought I'd see if she had any insights as to why there was a line on my German washing machine connecting wool and kalt/cold. It's the shortest cycle, and I wasn't sure if the setting was if you happened to want to wash your woollens in cold water or if I could use it for anything. This was complicated by me not knowing the German word for 'anything'. Her answer was even more confusing than my question; I fear I'm going to have to ask somebody from the relocation company for whitegoods assistance.

Given our demonstrated lack of ability to communicate anything but greetings, I quickly decided that inviting her for a cup of tea would a Bad Choice even if the children hadn't decided to put all their earthly belongings on the floor and traipse those from bedroom to playroom and all the way up the hallway. I certainly couldn't invite Frau Doktor to break her ankle slipping on marbles, at any rate.

I decided to bake her a cake instead, and delivered it on a plate last night. It's a mini apple cake, baked in a heart-shaped tin, and rehearsed my 'Thank you for the flowers' in German beforehand. (Flowers are die blumen, die die die. Oh, articles.) I think it went well. There was a very awkward moment where we ran out of common words, but fortunately it was saved when she turned her attention to the cake and appeared pleased about something that, twenty seconds, I figured out was the cinnamon sugar. I don't know the German word for cinnamon, but I do know the word for sugar, so that went well. I took the first opportunity possible to flee back to the relative safety of my apartment and congratulated myself for getting through another conversation without hopefully sounding too stupid. It was there that I realised I'd yet again mixed up the words 'kitchen' and 'cake'.

Word of the day: nackt

It's 21 degrees in this lovely suburb of Berlin. The sun is shining, the sky is almost impossibly blue, the gardens have sprouted a variety of flowers, children's play equipment, hammocks, and deck chairs, and a giant wasp scared the living crap out of me when I dared to write this entry on my balcony. The dry heat--quite a delightful change for somebody used to living with constant, oppressive humidity--is doing an amazing job of drying the sheets even though the lines are under a giant oak tree that prevents any sun from hitting the washing until 4pm. I could, of course, be daring enough to sneak out and use the sun drenched lines near my balcony rather than my front door, but I'm sure that's possibly even worse form than daring to let my washing encroach on to a second crossed square of washing lines (there are four, you see; one for each little unit). The neighbours upstairs had us over for coffee and home-made muffins last month and let us know that there had been some dramas with the opposite neighbours about which square belonged to whom. Apparently the incident was resolved when the Musician politely requested that the opposite neighbours unstring their own personal washing line when they are finished with it so that the other residents here know when they may use the communal space.

With beautiful weather of course comes different demands on my parenting capabilities. The people in the next building may well have overheard the following conversations today:

Maddyn: What's this hole, mama?
me: I don't know, but the bees like to go in there. Don't stick your finger in it! And put some pants on, please.

Maddyn: The mowing man is here! Can I go see?
me: You may watch from the balcony, but for goodness' sake put some pants on.

and

Jill: the wasp is outside! Mummy, shut the door!
Maddyn: I saw it! It was going to bite me!
me: Well, put your pants on already!

I came inside from putting my third load of washing into our shiny, new, and very tiny German front loader to find my son--naturally natural--on the balcony. I admonished him once again to put on some pants, with a timely reminder that the neighbours don't want to see that, thank-you-very-much. Alas in my haste to herd my little nudist inside I failed to notice my neighbour. I fear that my thoughtless phrasing may have disturbed him, for the next thing I noticed was the poor man fleeing the garden chair with the air of somebody looking as nonchalant as possible whilst wearing nothing but a pair of underpants.

Jill, ostensibly home from school sick but who of course is miraculously recovered except for the moments when I remind her that school is a five minute walk away and there's still x hours left of school (currently four--thank heavens for grundschules), is currently pretending to copy spelling words and bemoaning the fact that her awful mother won't let both children outside for a spot of naked rollerblading. There is truly no justice in this world.

Muttertag

Yesterday was my first mother's day in Berlin. Jill had come home from school on Friday to slyly ask me for hints on a hiding place, "But somewhere you won't look." I let her know that her jumpers drawer might be a good choice. Later I would go on to give her even better advice: that it's generally a good idea to close a drawer after hiding something in it.

I got a wee sleep in on Mother's Day, and the obligatory breakfast in bed. My eggs were a tad cold, because the kids insisted I open my presents the moment the food arrived, but I was greeted very sweetly by the kids calling out to me in unison. Jill beamed, "Happy mothers day Muttertag, mama!" Another new German word for the dear girl. Maddyn, not quite understanding the concept, piped up, "Happy birthday!"

Maddyn tried to steal my eggs, Jill got herself some toast and did her best to spread crumbs over daddy's side of the bed (that's my girl--keep them off my side!), and I got some cuddles. Maddyn asked why it was a happy mothers day, and I tried to explain. "It's because I do all sorts of things, like make sure you wash your hair, make sure you've got clothes even if you don't wear them, and for all those times I've had to help you pee against a tree. But mostly because you love me."

He looked at me with big eyes, then slowly shook his head. "No I don't!" he chirped. I reminded him that it's not nice to say horrid things to me on mothers day. He gave me a repentant look and recited, "I do love you, mama. I'm your best friend." Suck up.

We then sat down to work out time zones, which still don't come very naturally to me, and made five calls using three different methods of calling. Tangential was so worn out he needed a nap, so I let myself into the basement to officially receive the mothers day present (my bike) that we bought last month so I could take the kids out on their bikes more often. Maddyn and I had gone riding on Friday while Jill was at school and he was desperate to show his sister a particular street which had, on Friday, been full of horse trailers. By lucky coincidence the horse trailers were back on Sunday, and the kids hid behind some bushes like mini, bike-mounted paparazzi and watched part of a horse show.

All in all it was quite a lovely day, even if it does make for a bit of a boring post (sorry!). Oh, but I can't forget to mention: our doorbell rang when we were setting out a mothers day dinner of mystery German smallgoods. It was the doctor's wife, from upstairs, who greeted me with a bouquet of purple and white flowers and a beautifully rehearsed, "From my garden to your home." How perfectly lovely! I was so surprised I mangled my schön, but I did manage to thank her. I should like to have her over for tea, though goodness only knows what we'd talk about. Thanks to my phrase of the week I can now say, 'I kill you!' in Deutsch. Great for role playing with the kids, I'm sure, but I'd probably ought to work on things I can say to the neighbours.

A sightly more comprehensive first post

Becoming an expat has, in theory, quite a few pros and cons. Learning a new language? Pro. Surviving until you've learned that language? Con. Seeing the world? Pro. Taking a thirty hour flight with two children? Con. (Thank goodness the flight 'only' ended up being 24 hours, else I might have gone mad, though perhaps I should instead be thanking my old doctor and his shared lack of faith that I could survive the ordeal without valium.)

The reality has pros and cons as well, though the priorities seem to change. Despite having perfected the art of pretending to understand unsolicited conversation by old ladies in the street--I sometimes even repeat the last word of every third sentence, just to show I'm 'listening'--I'm currently feeing less keen to take up Air Berlin's offer of ridiculously cheap flights to Croatia armed with nothing but a phrase book and am leaning more towards the planning of two short trips in the next six months. The next bizarre priority on the list is managing to communicate with everybody left behind without spending more than thirty units per month of whatever currency my preferred calling card website happens to accept. Voila, grandparents: a public blog!

For the sake of the internets I'll change names on this blog. Since my name here somehow shows up with a book reference that I have only a dim memory of setting up years ago I might stick with the theme. Miss 8 shall be Jill. Master 3 shall be Maddyn. I considered calling my dear husband Nevyn, except that somebody back in Australia just gave that name to a baby and I can't, in good conscience, use that. I asked his opinion and he'd like to be Tangential; and thus a family is named. More content when it's not after eleven on a night when I have a packing box on my side of the bed.