Thrift is the New Terrorism: A Cheapskate’s Guide to Airport Security

Not so long ago on a continent far far away….

The train schedule in Zurich was different from the train schedule in Geneva, so I missed my train and tried to stay in the train station overnight instead of finding a hostel last minute. Four ass-hole harassers later and with the promise of no sleep at all in my near future, my plan got thwarted when they closed the train station in the wee morning hours, so I was stuck with 1) renting an ungodly priced room for half the night assuming I could find one on a holiday weekend, 2) getting on a train (any train) asap or 3) staying on the street. Too expensive, maybe, out of the question, respectively–so, I opted for the latter, and the train ended up making one measly connection in a country that wasn’t on my Eurail pass, so I had to pay out the nose for the penalty fair. 

THEN! When I finally made it to Duesseldorf for the my plane to England, security wouldn’t let me through, because I accidentally left a very dull, kitchen knife in my purse from my packed lunch. I’m sure it didn’t help that it fell through the ripped lining of my purse either… or the fact that the hole was very small, and I had to rip the lining of my purse further to get it out. Something about carrying a concealed weapon?!?!? And sewing it into the lining of a purse!??!! Dunno. ::looks innocent:: So much for saving money by making my food.

If opera repertoire were a candy store, this would be Belgian chocolate laced with speed in a spotlight with a theme song and superhero tights

Friday, July 11th

Bayerisches Staatsoper

Muenchner Sommer Opernfestspiel

Edita Gruberova

Yes, she’s singing IT…

Best 1,60 euros I ever spent

Oh, Kaesebreze, you are indeed the food of gods.

A rose by any other name just as sweet? Leider, in Koeln riecht sie suesser.

Since arriving in Deutschland I have struggled to come up with Bayrische Ohren (ears). The southern accent and dialect–swallowed vowels, dental consonants, relaxed lips and tongue, and short, throaty (I know, right!??!) ich-lauts–prove overwhelming to my education in strict Hochdeutsch. More often than not the words fly by indistinguishably, and I can’t even decipher the separation between words I already know, let alone identify new ones. It gets to the point where I don’t even know what to look up in my dictionary because I just can’t weed through the thick pronunciation. By the same token, it often takes me saying something two or three times for them to understand me. This can often be an embarrassing situation and has really hindered my desire to speak out.

On my way to Brussels, however, I switched trains in Koeln and found myself (ploetzlich!) in a wonderland of perfekt Hochdeutsch. Bright vowels, loose jaws, crisp consonants, excessive tongue movement, hissy ich-lauts… and not a trace of dialect. Individual words! Whole sentences that made sense! It was so yummy to hang on the sound of every glorious little word. Even the idiomatic expressions were much easier to decode and assimilate, because I could actually hear their components loud and clear. Who cared if I didn’t know a word here and there! I could repeat that whole sentence back and had something concrete to look up in my dictionary. Bitte, sagen Sie diesen Satz noch einmal? Mir war soooo schoen. Ach, sweet relief.

So, in turn, I raise my glass to the stalwart exchange students who prevail against the linguistic terrors of the American south. You have my deepest respect and admiration.

Discount! Discount! Git Yer Country Now!

Update: Since writing this post I have learned that Danish masquerades as Flemish quite regularly in the mouths of those not acquainted with the language. In light of this new information, I replaced the word Flemish in the following post with the word Danish. Otherwise, nothing has changed.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Hallo, Sprechen Sie Deutsch? Nein?

Parler Francais? Non.

Danish? ::head shake::

::manic gesturing::

Well, thanks anyways!

Right now I’m in the grand ol’ land of Benelux.

Photo Tease

There are finally photos thanks to the lovely Miss L.

Check ‘em out at right.

Wheee!!!!!

Tour Groups

Tour groups are simultaneously miraculous and annoying inventions. No travel guides, no surprise expenses, no train to bus to bike to bus to plane itineraries, no missedconnections, no unstable connections. It’s one flat fee, one knowledgeable guide, and it’s all been done plenty of times before. Me likes. The people are generally nice too. I find it’s a great way to meet people in a non-creepy way, because let’s face it, meeting random people as short, friendly, single girl when you live/travel/work alone can be a questionable activity.

The problems that accompany tours may outweigh the benefits though. People, myself included, tend to get lazy on tours. If the tour company does all the work, why invest in the experience? Other problems may include self-important tour guides, slow walkers, tourist traps and a plethora of Americans. I want to meet people, but, girlfriend, I did not come all the way to Germany to work on my twang.

Travel Tip #4,937: If you do your homework on the destination, most tour guides can give you very specific times and locations to meet up with the group after uninteresting component x finishes. This, I tell you, is bliss. It cuts down on the bulk of travel planning (e.g. fares, reservations, timetables) and lets you really focus on the local area. And, if the ENTIRE tour promises to be tourist hell, then you can always find out the time of the return ticket you paid for and meet up with the group at the station for the return trip.

My trip to Dachau yesterday was with a tour group. Great decision. The tour guide was genuine, well-informed and interested in learning along with us. He also considered each person’s questions with an appropriate level of sophistication and sobriety that you don’t often find in tour guides. If he didn’t know the answer to a question, he deferred to one of the memorial’s staff members. Per usual, travelling went off without a hitch; the annoying people stuck together like glue; and the crowd was decently international. It made the whole experience very enjoyable, and I was able to experience the memorial free of banalities. Honestly, no one should have to think about bus schedules at Dachau.

Next up: Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau, Bavarian Food Tour, Bike Tour to Starnbergersee, and a day trip to Nuremberg.

June 20-25: So busy I didn’t have time to come up with a title

The trip to Salzburg, London and the two days in Muenchen since have been an unparalleled whirlwind of activity.

While in Salzburg I …

Walked through the Old City, shamelessly danced and sang at all the Sound of Music sites, visited Mozart’s birthplace and house, soaked up sun in the Maribell Gardens, marvelled at the Churches of St. Blasius, St. Sebastian, St. Erhard, the Schlosskapelle and St. Peter’s Abbey, climbed the heights of FestungHohensalzberg, bought postcards, ate lunch at Berchtesgaden, and walked around Koenigsee for pristine views of an Alpine lake.

While in London I visited,

Kew Gardens, the Sherlock Holmes Museum, the Globe Theater, the Tate Modern, Leicester Square, Big Ben & Parliament, Westminster Abbey, St. Margaret’s Church, the Jubilee Gardens, the London Eye, Dali Universe, Charing Cross, the Victoria Embankment Gardens, Trafalgar Square, the London Stock Exchange, Regents Park, the Royal Academy of Music, St. Paul’s Cathedral, the Barbican, London Bridge, Cleopatra’s Needle, and three traditional English pubs.

Muenchen riecht nach…

Muenchen smells like …

 

…beer, meat and bread. Punkt. Even bread can smell reminiscent of beer because of the yeast content.

 

Then there’s the smoking. Everyone smokes here. In the US we have vending machines for water, soda, candy, etc. Here, they sell cigarettes.

 

Outdoors, it smells of fresh air all the way from the airport to Marianplatz. You can smell the plants, the cool air from the mountains. The smell of sweet, ripe fruit permeates the areas around the vendors. The air is rife with pollen. I left the windows in my apartment open for four days now, and there’s very little dust to be seen. If I did that (and I do) in downtown Boston, all of the surfaces in my room will be covered with filmy, black dust within 48 hours. And that makes me start to wonder how Germany, Austria, and Switzerland all rank ahead of the USA for the lowest lung cancer mortality rates. Hmm.

 

Now I’m hungry…. the question is whether or not I want to chew my carbs.

Roommates have more tape lines

Muenchen is a decent sized city in not such a big area. It’s comparable to the geographic area Boston. Yesterday I spent all day walking around the city. I wandered from Schwabing all the way through the length of die Altstadt and then walked around the perimeter twice.

 

I walked for seven hours that day and four or five every days since. My jeans have never fit better. But I digress…

 

In the course of my wandering, I found hardly any ethnic areas. No Little Italy. No Little Istanbul. No Chinatown. I found one Halal meat market yesterday, but I don’t know if that really counts because a) the sign was really small and b) it was in the middle of a giant meat market called the Viktualianmarkt. Which is not to say that the city isn’t diverse. People come from all over to reside, travel and study. I’ve met permanent residents of Muenchen from America, Peru, Turkey, Ukraine, Russia, Argentina, China, Croatia, Greece, all over East and Western Europe, Ethiopia, Senegal, and the West Indies.

 

In celebration of sexual orientation being covered by strict scrutiny in California (what joy!), I’ll add that Sendlinger Tor is called teh gay area for inquisitive tourists, but it’s really not the way we think of it in the states. There’s one small community center, a handful of restaurants, and some fabulous gay boys on the streets. Translation: Not that different from the rest of Muenchen. There really aren’t gay bars or clubs either. Businesses are merely gay friendly. Instead, they have parties that rotate to different clubs around the city, not unlike guerilla queer bars in America.

 

Poverty (die Armut) isn’t really talked about or visible here either. Granted I live in one of the trendy neighborhoods, but I’ve looked for it on my maps, on the internet, in conversation… all over. So far, there’s not much. The closest I’ve come to poverty while here is “geistige Armut”, meaning “intellectual poverty”. It feels a little unbequem (“uncomfortable”) sometimes to be surrounded by buildings where precious metals drip off the walls, the bushes are perfectly manicured and the people are dressed in all the latest styles. Every day in Boston there are at least six or seven homeless people begging on the corner by my home, but I haven’t seen any homeless people in Muenchen either. Not in any of the city centers, not in any of the public parks, nowhere.  

 

Reflecting on the differences between Muenchen and the other side o’this lovely pond, American society looks balkanized. Both systems are homogenized and fractured in certain ways. Both places have their pros and cons. Nevertheless, I feel more legible, more freedom to self-define here. Race, sexuality, national origin, neighborhood, etc.–they’re all in the mix.  Perhaps it’s worth asking if there’s a correlation between the way we write identities on our streets and the way we experience them written on our bodies and in our lives?