Hallelujiah Berlin

There's this really hilarious, corny German song that compares Berlin to the province Brandenburg which surrounds it. Among other things, Brandenburg is known for the German equivelant of hicks and neo-nazism. Compared to cosmopolitan Berlin, it stands no chance. This week I had a few really unexpected hallelujiah Berlin moments, in spite of working an amazing amount. You see, suddenly, school vacation ended, one of the other teachers from my company became ill and another one found out she was pregnant. So suddenly, I went from having 2 hours a week to like, 20. Of course, a few schools decided they wanted to add courses, and parents decided they wanted to add kids to existing courses...so yeah. It's been an intense week. And the hours that I've been substituting have been early morning hours. We all know I am not made of sweetness and light in the early morning. Other times, yes. Early morning, no. Despite this phenomenon, I had a few of those awesome moments when you just think "damn, my life is pretty awesome". One of the ones I can concretely remember was riding the S-Bahn (fast, overground public trains) to the outskirts of the city. The sun was rising and the whole city was fresh. Berlin is a city that goes from being hardcore urban residential to being woodsy at the drop of a hat--or within a few miles of train track. The leaves are also starting to turn color here--not nearly with the same glory they do at home, but it's an effort I appreciate nonetheless. So two mornings this week, I got to barrel out into the countryside and teach wee little German kids the intricacies of the English language.

That's the fun part. It's an exhausting job--don't ever listen to anyone who says otherwise. Little kids suck the lifeblood out of you. There is no better birth control on this earth than working with small children. What's not so much fun is teaching the slightly older kids--you know, the ones in second grade. That is officially my least favorite age. I teach these kids in Horte (plural of Hort), which are the after school programs (I think partially government subsidized) where the kids hang out from 1pm until whenever their parents are done with work, which can be as early as three pm or as late as five or six. Although I was in a pretty cool Hort today (music classes, sport classes, swimming, art...anything you could possibly think of, these kids do), I don't know how much of a fan I am. My initial impression is that there are always WAY too many kids for any number of qualified or unqualified personel to keep an effective eye on, so the kids get up to god-only-knows-what for hours and hours on end. I mean, sure, children need to be able to adapt to social situations and get along with their peers and be able to resolve conflicts, etc. but man...every Hort I've been in, even the best-organized ones, seem like pure chaos. As a result of this, when I get the kids to teach them, they're totally riled up and nigh on impossible to control, let alone teach. I learned a new German word the other day: Verhaltens-auffaellig. Literally translated, it means "noticable behavior". In real words, the kid is hyperactive or has behavioral problems. I definitely do not feel qualified for what I do. I mean, I have an extraordinary amount of natural patience...and I was born speaking English, but really...I have a whole new level of respect for elementary school and preschool teachers. They are superhuman individuals, that's for damn sure.

In other news...working out has been a fabulous release. The only problem is, I come home and I'm utterly exhausted. And I have little or no interest in working out. I crashed today for like, an hour. Stephan took one look at me and was just like "aaaand you're going to bed!" so I slept for an hour. Now I'm functional and putting off putting together material for Amelie, the nine year old that I tutor in German. Well, mostly German. We're supposed to do Math, too...but let's be honest, Math sucks. She's a sweet girl, and her parents are a riot. And the money is almost worth me giving up the better part of my Saturday morning. I have been able to make yoga twice a week for the last few weeks though, and it has been amazing. I spend so much time rushing from place to place and being on my feet that twice a week is barely enough decompression time. I'm pretty sure it'll balance out though--it's only my first week of a full course load. Oooh, other cool thing that happened this week: I got a new phone. And a real plan, like with a contract and shit. So I now have (though my cell phone) a German land line aaaaaaand a cell phone number. And 100 free texts a month. This just blows my mind. I mean, for those of you who have had American cell phone plans forever, this is probably not at all interesting. My only prior forays into the world of European cellular technology have been in the prepaid realm, so I find this exciting.

Anyway, I should probably wrap this up and outline some things for Amelie, otherwise I'll have to do it later and let's just say other things are planned.

Real Internet (among other things)

Just so everyone knows, we at Boxhagener strasse 102 are now officially paying consumers of the internet, as opposed to syphoners of other people's wireless (as we were for the last three and a half weeks). It's glorious. I'm thoroughly enjoying writing this and not being out on the dark, cold balcony with the laundry. And the tram.

Today was pretty productive, considering it's still school vacation so I still haven't "really" started working yet. I was at Immigration Services again and finally managed to hand in ALL my paperwork for my visa and my green card. It's a good feeling...except for the whole "don't call us, we'll call you" the woman gave me before I left. That's always just a tad disconcerting. After that I interviewed at the Volkshochschule (kind of like a community college, but without the degrees--more like adult ed), and I'm now slated to be teaching a business English class twice weekly from November to December. It should be a nice way to pick up some cash before the holidays (and before I have to start paying taxes here...). Next week I've got another interview with a company that provides kids with tutors--we'll see if I have time for them. Sadly, the institute for Kurdish studies in Berlin hasn't got back to me after cancelling my interview (the day of) a week ago. Sad, because the guy sounded nice and it would have been cool to say that I'd worked for them.

Other developments include me getting my training plan for the gym (yeah, I think I've been ther every day this week, which scares me)...and that'd be about it. I'm actually pretty excited about the whole fitness thing. I mean, Stephan and Julia are really into it, which gives me added motivation to go, and added motivation not to cop out when I'm there. But this gym is awesome and did all kinds of neat tests when we all signed up, and even though I've lost weight since college ended, one could say that the results were...motivating. Which I suppose is good. I'm interested to see if the new trainings plan yields results, or if my trainer Janine is full of crap. I can safely say that the yoga class they offer there is fabulous. A real quality mix between getting your om on and really challenging poses and stretches. I felt so great afterwards. I also thing the whole zen centerdness of it is going to help me keep levelled out with all the cohabitation and weird relationship dynamics floating around here. Nobody get freaked out: I still like the dynamic of my relationship...it's just that when you live with another couple, sometimes shit is weird. Like when they have a tiff, and one of them is really being an ass. Or whatever. My work schedule, once it starts is going to be pretty insane as well. Fortunately my 2 tutoring clients are only once a week--all I have to keep straight aside from that is which Kindergarten I'm supposed to be at with which paperwork and whether or not it's a business English night. I really hope I'm up to this...it's scary. At least I got the wrangling with the Labor/Immigration offices out of the way while I wasn't really working. Hopefully. Because none of the jobs I have are ones where I can be like "oh, sorry--I'll be late/I was late because..." Well, I mean, you can always say it, but here it goes over a whole lot less well than at home.

Ooh, I also used the internet to load pictures of the apartment up onto Facebook. So if you look at this and not that, check them out. All right. I think it's time for me to brush my teeth and continue reading hilarious celebrity gossip/satire in bed. From the internet. Cause I can.

round 1: Immigration Authority 1,000,000,000 Me: -234,927,928,347

I'm frustrated. I waited around for hours, compiled 3 different applications and achieved absolutely nothing. I couldn't even give them to the man behind the counter. I mean, I wasn't expecting to walk out of there today with a residency permit and a work permit, but damn! Total and utter defeat wasn't necessarily on the docket, either. Whoah! So I'm disgruntled about that and hoping that the two back-to-back job interviews I have tomorrow go better. And that my boss lets me know what I can do about this whole pesky "am I a freelancer or am I not" debacle. And that someone tells me what goddamned application I need to file next, cause the guy at Immigration was an ass-HOLE.

Grrr.

It's also gone from cold and rainy this morning to just plan bloody cold. Stephan and Christian have been gone all afternoon doing random shit--Stephan had a few job interviews and I assume Christian was just along for the ride. I've just been informed that I'm "allowed" to cook dinner tonight, which is a kind of hilarious situation, because I live with two guys who both cook well and enjoy it. I've got to say though, sadly I'm not in the mood for the job or the desired dish. But whatever, I'm going running with Julia at seven, whether or not they've returned from wherever they've been. Yay for physical activity as a way to cope with stress! However, I've been out here for fucking hours. We can get real internet aaaany time. It'd be fine with me.

The Himmel Ueber Berlin

...is cold and grey.


And the wireless is sort of on the fritz again. We'll see if this successfully posts. Yesterday was German Unification Day. We didn't really celebrate: I drank half a gin tonic and we watched Enemy of the State. Stephan's mum and Max came by on their way back from Schierke, which was cool. Stephan obsessively compulsively cleaned the apartment before they came, even though it wasn't dirty, and then proceeded to forget where he'd put the keys when we went out to help them unload the car--leading us all to believe we were locked the fuck out on another typicall cold, mies Berlin afternoon. I think he was a tad nervous. Not to fear--Angie (his mum) loved the apartment, and in his brother's eyes, wherever Stephan lives will be some kind of temple to awesomeness. Younger siblings are great like that.

So far today I've been shot down by the Auslanderbehoerde (Immigration Department) and had minor success on other fronts (I got a tutoring client, I left a voicemail with the new talent scout for Berlitz language camps and my boss will, I believe, pay for my month-transport-pass). But back to my crushing defeat: after spending WAY too much time pacing the apartment, being on hold, I get to talk to this real live woman, to whom I spin my very sad story

"Hi, yeah, I'm sure you hear this all the time, but my situation is really urgent. I was supposed to start work last Monday," (they don't need to know that I actually did start), "and I really really need my Aufenthaltsgenemigung (Visa-ish) and my Arbeitserlaubnis (Green Card), like, now, so I was wondering if I could make an appointment with you."

To which the heartless dame says "Well, actually the best thing for you to do is to just come in during our regular hours and wait, because the earliest appointment we can give you would be in 4-6 weeks."

At which point I start tearing my hair and gnashing my teeth. Why? Because the Auslanderbehoerde in Berlin is Not A Nice Place. People are so desperate to get in that they sleep there. Yeah. And my chances of actually getting in and getting my business dealt with in a timely fashion are...slim to none. Julia, who's here on a high-powered internship is STILL waiting for her paperwork to go through. I have no internship and no well-funded foundation who's got my back. All I have is a German-national boyfriend and a part-time job. Yeah...not feeling too good about this one, to be honest. I mean, technically, I have two weeks of vacation before things really get going and I really need to have this under control. And technically, I have until...December before I'm no longer legal to be here. Can the German beauracracy actually take that long to issue a Visa and a work permit? Ohhhhhh yes they can. It is this, this that oppresses my soul.

It's cold out on my balcony, though, so I think I'm going to take a break and wash some dishes.

Argh. I've been trying to get the Auslanderbehoerde (Immigration Office) on the phone essentially since I got up this morning. It took an hour to even get connected to the "Hi. You have reached the office of immigration. All our agents are currently busy. Please hold the line" message, which of course costs me money like whoah. So I did that for ten minutes and then gave up...I've got my cell phone set to automatic redial, which it will do for a half hour at a time. Other than that, I'm still looking for another part time job. Or a full time job for the next two weeks, since it's school vacation in Berlin and when school vacation's on, I work *one* hour a week. It sounds like it should be sweet, but it ain't. I've got two call centers and a hostel lined up--all of which sound nightmarish, yet somehow character-building. More material for my memiors, I suppose. The rest of my to-do list is banal beyond belief and includes some minor bill-paying (my weird-ass, probably entirely invalid insurance policy), some housekeeping (taking out the trash, dishes, grocery shopping) and some light deco-work (finishing touches on the bedroom). And waiting for the laundry to dry. Speaking of insurance and oddly banal things, last week we had the insurance salesman at the house two nights in a row, talking about a joint policy for Stephan and I. Not gonna lie, this freaked me out. I mean, all the talk of death and dismemberment (insurance salesmen are macarbre bastards) was enough fun, but I mean...a joint insurance policy?! I mean, that's like "Committment" with a capital "C". The jury's still out on that. But my liability insurance will definitely be over Stephan's policy. It's weird, all this intensely grown-up stuff. The real world has a hell of a lot of fine print.

Christian and Cindy moved in last monday, so the week was spent getting them settled and getting the kitchen and living room and bath made livable and fusing possessions and whatnot. It looks pretty cool, I have to say. The walls of the living room are still blank white, which is driving Stephan a little crazy, but we'll get around to painting them eventually. So far, living with the two of them has been all right...I did have a few homicidal moments, but it was a rough week in general. I don't necessarily take it as an indicator of how thing's are going to be. And when it gets a little too intensely German (for example, discussions of which rooms in the apartment will be heated in the winter) for me, I can always peace out. I'm sure I'll be able to get along with them--they're very very nice, but yeah...I don't have any real desire to make them my best-est friends. They're a little too...beige for me. Conventional, quiet, nice...people that like toast. Perhaps with jam. And tea. They like board games. You know the type. Cindy formulates about 85% of her sentances as questions. You get the idea.

GOD! I swear, I'm going to have to get up at 6:55 in the morning and call these people. The hell of it is, all I want to do is make an appointment so I don't have to spend an entire day of my life sitting down there. Granted, technically I do have the time right about now to spend waiting hours and hours for bad-tempered German beauracrats to tell me I've got the wrong papers for my visa application...but yeah, that's not fun. OOOOh. It just occurred to me, something else I can do while I'm completely and utterly alone in the apartment (tomorrow is the German Unification Day--national holiday, so Cindy and Christian went home, and Stephan is doing a day of "trial work" at some call center and won't be back till 6.) I can finally upload pictures of my apartment to the facebook. Or gmail. Or anyplace, really. Providing the somewhat finicky wireless connection keeps up. Good stuff. But first the visa bill. And maybe a shower.