We're right past the halfway point of
my year in Germany, and to prove it, last week we had our midyear
seminar in Frankfurt.
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| A pretty unique skyline for Germany |
Luckily the week before last, all of my
classes ended. In fairness I only had 3 classes and 2 half classes,
so it wasn't like the end of classes gave me that much more free time
than I normally had. However, I decided to take this opportunity to
drop by Berlin and Karlsruhe again before I headed into Frankfurt a
day early.
I've already discussed Berlin ad
nauseum, so I'll skip a long-winded explanation of how much I love
that city. On Saturday I bought my ticket from Berlin to
Frankfurt...via Karlsruhe. If you're not familiar with German
geography, this is like driving from Kansas City to Chicago by way of
Denver. Every ticket checker I encountered was confused as hell.
Anyway I eventually get to Frankfurt a
day early, having booked an extra night at our hostel. I was checked in
by a very nice guy from Kenya. His German wasn't fantastic, but
neither is mine as you'll soon see. There was a lull in the check in
process where something was printing off, and to fill this lull he
decides to banter with me. At this point I notice that his hat has
some sort of bible verse on it, and his T shirt is similarly
decorated. He then asks me “Sind Sie...Christ?” Now I'm an
atheist, so I never really focused on learning religious words in
German, which means that I didn't know that “Christ” in German
doesn't mean “Jesus Christ”, it means “christian”. So I was
very confused for a hot second, because of course I'm not Christ, not
by a long shot. Then I realized he was asking my religion, so I was
relieved to see that he hadn't mistaken me for his savior, but also
concerned that I'd be drawn into a debate about born-again
Christianity, during which I'm not certain I would have stayed
polite. So I very excitedly informed him that I love Jesus and that,
yes, my family is Christian. So, I technically avoided lying
depending on how you define my family and if by love I meant respect.
Welcome to Frankfurt!
That night I met a guy named David, who
is a history student at the University of Frankfurt and who is also
learning to be a tour guide of the city. He showed me around
Frankfurt and explained the history of the city and the traditions,
and he even spoke some Hessisch, which is the local dialect. He paid
special attention during the tour to mention anywhere that JFK stayed
at, spoke from, ate in, sat on, or even so much as glanced at during
his time in Frankfurt. Later in the week, we also met his friend
Samuel and all of us got lunch together at the University (Fun Fact:
the University used to be the headquarters of the Supreme Allied
Command after the war.) This particular building on the campus
doesn't have normal elevators, but instead has paternosters. They're
cool as hell. It looks like an elevator, but it never stops running
and has cabins all along the elevator cable. There is an upward side
and a downward side. So instead of pressing a button and waiting you
just step into a cabin as it comes by and wait until you hit the
right floor! It was wild!
At this point, I suppose I should
explain the title of the post. I often say sentences in German that
make no sense to anyone except me. Usually people just say they don't
understand and ask me to rephrase it, but last week was different. I
have two examples. During the first example, I was standing in front
of the Goethe Haus with David and Samuel, and we were planning what
to do next. I said that I would probably catch a train back home and
not stay another night (I was getting a sore throat). Then I added an
apology for being a party pooper. I wanted
to say something funny like “don't get mad and hit me.” and I
said “bitte mich nicht abhauen.” And Samuel asked me to repeat
it, so I did. Then David asked me to repeat it, and I did, and then
they both laughed. They said it was a very pretty phrase, but made
absolutely no sense at all. It was worse than a grammar mistake and
more like a collection of random German words strung together. I
ended up saying “ please me no scram.” After four years of
German, that was humbling to say the least.
The
other, and by far funnier, mess up that I made happened on Sunday.
Christoph and I were going to meet my friend Kevin for lunch.
Christoph didn't have any cash, but time was short. So I wanted to
tell Christoph that I would just pay for his lunch. I tried to say,
“I'll cover you.” In German, things to do with covering usually
have the word stem “deck” in them. Decke = blanket, abdecken =
conceal, entdecken = discover, Deckel = lid. It seemed logical to me
that covering the cost of a meal would also involve this word. I very
casually said to him, “ich decke dich”. And he suddenly stopped
walking. Then he realized that I (probably) didn't actually mean what
I had just said, and he started to laugh. He then politely informed
me that I just said I was going to impregnate him, ostensibly in the
restaurant.
Other than my (hilariously) poor German
turns of phrase, the week was a blast. The first night most of the 75
of us decided to go to a bar near the hostel. It being a Monday
night, they weren't expecting 40 people to show up at once, but the
bartender made bank on us. We also got to see the The Who's Tommy. At
my mom's behest, I'd seen the movie version when I was about 15 or
so, and I loved it. But I was the only one who'd heard of Tommy.
Trying to explain the plot of Tommy goes over about as well as
explaining the plot of Rocky Horror Picture Show: There's this kid
who sees a murder, and then he is struck deaf, dumb, and blind...for
some reason. So Tina Turner tries to cure him with LSD. Oh and then
(still blind) he gets really good at pinball and defeats...Elton
John. Then he founds a cult. My friends were less than enthused, but
after the first half I think they were all converted.
Anyway, I'm halfway done, and I'll be
writing more soon.
