I started at work on a Monday.
Favorite black slacks, check.
Best plum button up shirt, check.
Best black pumps, check.
Excited, Check.
Nervous, Check.
Public Transportation pass, check.
Being on time for my first day, ....oops
So I was a bit late (10 minutes past 9) but I dont think anyone really noticed. It wasnt only my first day. Over Christmas, the office moved to a new location, so there were people wandering around everywhere, getting situated, unpacking boxes, and looking just as confused as I was for most of the day. My boss is NH and super nice. He walked me around a bit to introduce me to people whose names I did not have a prayer at remembering. Of course it being the first day back from a nearly 3 week long Christmas vacation, there was alot of work for NH to catch up on, so I had some down time to sit at my desk and get things set up for myself. My computer was nowhere near set up. I had no access to the email system (Lotus Notes), no access to the drive that my teams projects are saved on, and no Office products (i.e. no PowerPoint, Excel, or Word) so that if I needed to read over something, I could not open it.
The first team meeting also took place this morning. I was happy to get in and get introduced and caught up on the projects. One problem. All. In. German. Here is an interesting fact. Melanie understands German when her parents speak it, and when most people speak really slowly and deliberately. Apparently Melanie does not understand when people speak German regularly and in a business setting. It was about an hour and a half's worth of meeting, and by the end of it i was seriously considering spending the rest of the day sitting in the bathroom with a German dictionary and a box of tissues. When I got back to my desk, totally dejected and my head spinning, my email was set up. Great! Now I can at least get emails and write emails out if I have time. One problem. Well... two. Never used Lotus Notes. It's all in German. And call me crazy, but i never learned the words for "save contact" or "set up a new meeting" or "accept meeting invitation" in my German classes or in listening to my parents for 26 years. So most of the rest of the day I spent playing "trial and error" on Lotus. I may or may not have sent the entire company an email with gibberish, but i figured out how to make folders and send emails and delete them.
I need to mention too, Germans are causal. Most people were wearing jeans this day. I have to say I looked smashing in my "first day" outfit, but clomping around in my 3.5 inch heels while everyone else was wearing sneakers or boots, I think I stuck out a bit....
My saviour for those days was really Louise. She was ( i say 'was' because she has since departed to study in Spain) the intern for the team and sat in my office. She is from England and blessed me everyday for the last couple of weeks by speaking English to me and encouraging my German.
Since then, things have gone really well. My German is improving and I am getting involved in projects and (hopefully) making a good, positive impression along the way. I know i have a ways to go, but I keep showing up, which is always a good thing.
So i work those 5 days a week and unfortunately, with every weekend comes a Sunday, which for me ....SUCK.
SUCK Sunday #1.
Saturday was a bunch of fun. Went out with Seth and Tootie and met some more of their friends. I ended up hanging out with an awesome couple, Frank and Sabine. We stayed out til about 3am. We went around to some great bars in Nuremberg and I tried absinthe for the first time! Not nearly as mind altering as i thought it would be, that green fairy following us around the rest of the night was super cool. Anyhow, looking forward to a nice long sleep in on a lazy Sunday, i woke up at 8 am. A.W.E.S.O.M.E. I laid in bed for a minute and heard rain outside. Great. I am up after about 4 hours of sleep and it is raining outside, so REALLY no reason to be awake. I thought getting up to go the bathroom might help me go back to sleep, so i got up without putting my glasses on (because then i really would be awake). In walking to the bathroom, I pass the kitchen and hear a distinct *drip, drip, drip*. Hmmm. It is raining outside, but this sounds like it is raining insideee....... I detour to the bathroom, and because of lack of sight (i.e. glasses) i just see that the kitchen floor is glimmering... as in when the sunshines on a lake glimmering. You have GOT to be kidding me. I knew what was wrong, but I ran back to my bedroom and grabbed my glasses and ran back to the kitchen to see the near waterfall falling from my kitchen ceiling. Ok not waterfall... more like steadily dripping leak from the Hoover Damn. Operation complete panic commencing in 3....2.....1. I called the landlady, no answer.. of course... it is 8am on a Sunday. I pull ALL the pots and vessels out of the cabinets and arrange them on the floor trying to catch as much of the water as possible. Naturally it is not coming from one spot but along the entire beam that runs along the ceiling in the kitchen. So water is collecting in the vessels and it aint pretty. It is yellow and grimy and just... unnatural. The landlady calls back and says she will send her husband over in about 2 hours. Awesome. I run downstairs to my neighbor who (thankfully) speaks English and just so happens to work for Gfk as well. She said she would come up when the landlady's man came because he speaks no English and I wanted to make sure there was no confusion. All in all, mess got sorted out, so much snow and rain had soaked through the roof causing the leak.
SUCK Sunday #2. Another fun night out with Frank and Sabine (saturday). Big plans for Sunday include: Sleeping in, not waking up to a leaky ceiling, sleeping in. Sleeping in goal not achieved, oh well, couch is here will sit down for some TV and take a nap, get up turn on heat........... no heat turning on..... hmmmmm.... no heat, oh wait.. the pilot light is out... well.... how do you get it back. its 9am... 6 hour time difference... approximately 3am in the States. I dont think my lack of heat is a grave enough issue to wake the parents at 3am. I have alot of blankets and a radiator in the hall. Kein Problem. I finally got ahold of my neighbor who so graciously came upstairs and helped the stupid American turn the heater back on, Monday night.
Sundays seem to be all wrong. Things go wrong. There isnt anything going on, so it is usually the time when i stop and take stock of Melanie. And of course this is the day I think about my friends and family State-side and how much i miss them. Most of the week i dont need to think about it because I have work and people to meet and things to do and beer to drink. Sundays are the hard days. But hards days are to be expected.
And what is a post without a little bathroom humor? POOP DISCRETION IS ADVISED HERE: If you think girls dont poop/would like to continue to think girls dont poop or just dont want to read about poop, I would consider not reading any more of this post :-) But please visit again!
I hate my toilet. I dont know who designed it but they should really rethink their career paths. I have not seen any toilet anywhere in Germany like this. Most toilets are just like a big bowl filled with water and has a seat. You can do your business, clean yourself, and flush blissfully unaware of what is in the toilet. Not mine. There is a small well with water at the front of the toilet, but the middle of the toilet is, what i can only describe as, a platter. A flat surface that displays the by product of delicious German food being processed by the human body. It is unavoidable. You have to look, hating yourself for the two seconds it takes to flush the toilet and cursing the guy who created this infernal toilet. Let's face it ... it was a man... who else would want to make sure you see your poop before it disappears? Honestly.
No comments:
Post a Comment