SPY GAMES

I am convinced everyone in my language class is a spy.  There I said it. Outwardly, they are all too nice.  It’s as though they are all competing in some sick spy game. The winner gets to kidnap the American.  Of course this pessimism has much to do with my New York heritage, but surprisingly there is more factual evidence then just conjecture .   Number 1: This is and always has been the edge of the western world.   Next stop, the former Iron Curtain.  Number 2: Just over 2 decades ago, spy’s and assassins used this part of the world as there private play ground. If there were a stat for spy’s per capita, Germany would have more professional bullshit artists than there are rice paddies in China. To this day, it is no doubt one of the most important junctions where east meets west.  Number 3: The huge volume of international travel going through the airport is probably the most important factor in  supporting my unease.  With governments slicing and dicing budgets faster that Zorro,  spy’s are flying economy more than ever these days.   I bet the majority are even flying with layovers.  It’s cheaper AND more importantly, it gives a great guise for top secret meetings where the micro film can be transferred.

All of my classmates seem to know something that I don’t. I get the feeling they are all watching me, waiting for me to say something personal so they may text their handlers about it.  The other day, the Syrian began asking me where I lived. I gave him nothing. Vague answers leave vague impressions.    I want each spy in my class to suspect that my incredible ability to evade there interrogation techniques can only be because of my own super spy training.  That perhaps I  very well maybe the O.G. spy.   00 times 10.  James Bond’s top secret son ready  and willing to thwart there terrorist plot with a bit of some nationally financed bullshit, and a big huge gun.  When I enter the room, everyone smiles, and says hello to me. Strange.  Those smiling eyes are hiding something damn it.  The Persian I swear is packing more than just pencils in her purse. The Ethiopian is constantly on her IPHONE looking up to see if anyone is watching her.  What’s with the new attractive Ukrainian huh?  She just happened to come into MY class.  I’ve seen the Manchurian Candidate, and Men in Black.  I know full well they have mind altering, mind erasing thing-a-majigies these days!

The danger reached a fever pitch on Wednesday. The Iranian got up to go to the bathroom AT THE SAME time as me.  As I walked down the hall, I could hear her behind me shuffling through her purse looking for the chloroform.  With panther like quickness, I made it to the bathroom drug-free which was a miracle.  I waited 7 whole minutes, and when I exited, guess who was there!  Thank god for the receptionist at the front desk. Her baring witness is the only reason I am not hanging upside down being electro shocked like Riggs in Lethal Weapon. 

Now that I know I am a target, I have been doing my best to brush up on my spying techniques in order to save my own life.  After watching  Tailor, Tinker, Solider, Spy, I can consider myself an official graduate of I-AM-A-BAD-ASS-SPY University.  If you can stay awake, and understand what the hell is going on, than you can be a bad ass spy too.  Watching Cobra while doing pushups has really been a huge help in developing my confidence.  Even though Cobra has no spying in it, the gun fight at the end is one of the finest pieces of gratuitous violence ever in a 1980’s movie. In honor of Sly and my new found confidence, I now carry a knife with me at all times. Though it’s only a butter knife, it still feels good.  These movies have been essential to my spy training, but most importantly, I try to look mean as hell. I’m talking crack head violent mean.   That seems to at least rattle the elderly Polish lady with the liar eyes.

After today’s class, I believe my teacher is working for British intelligence.  What is a Polish-German women doing eating Cadbury chocolate eggs in May? The distinctive manner in which she rattled off the pages and exercise lessons  for homework leads me to believe  she was speaking in some sort of code.  Friendly? Doubtful.  I now suspect the receptionist maybe working for the Romanians, or maybe the Romulons. The only reason she prevented the Iranian from putting me to sleep, rolling me up in a carpet and throwing me in the back of some van, is because she wants to torture me herself. Who knows? Perhaps all of this is just a lie, a fantasy concocted from a mind filled with too many hours of cable TV.   Perhaps the blue van parked outside for the last 36 hours is just a construction crew doing some work. Perhaps this weird eye twitch I’ve had for the last 12 hours is NOT the after effects of sodium pentothal being slipped into my water bottle.  Perhaps. 

THE FEVER DANCE

Living in this country has done a number on my immune system. Understandable when considering the fact that I am new to the continent, but odd because I am no stranger to the magical world of deadly microbials.  A single NYC subway car when swabbed, and sampled, probably holds enough virulent virus to rival a CDC lab. All of the Purell and hand swipes in the world couldn’t keep a cold away in the Big Apple.  New illnesses and zoological plagues are born each day under the wooden benches  found on the 21^st avenue subway stop in LIC. The only thing that has prohibited a massive outbreak are the bums who sleep and bath on these very same benches daily.  Their populations have been decimated by these super germs (which has sadly taken the thrill and danger of robbery away from  Time SquareL).  Yet there collective sacrifice has kept the rest of NY’ers safe and 8^th avenue free of most loitering for the past 15 years.  (Conspiracy theorists have ascertained that Disney, with its enormous financial stake in the Broadway rendition of The Lion King, with former Mayor Giuliani’s enthusiastic blessing, released Ebola Zaire into the bum population in the mid-90’s but this of course has yet to be conclusively proven.  Many still ascertain he pulled a Robert Irsay and trucked all the homeless people secretly too New Jersey in the middle of the night.)  

Despite all of my immune systems heavy lifting over the years in the mean streets of cold and flu, nothing could prepare me for the biological warfare currently found in the Old World.  The cold strains found here are weaponized ! Escaped germs from former Soviet Lab’s run amuck causing mass hysteria from Kindergartens to Senior centers.  The Germans, well aware of the dangers of living inside a hot zone by now, ride bikes and wear strange equipment when outside in order to evade the deadly diseases.  When riding in parks, these “professionals” whisk past you like Russian diplomatic motorcades indiscriminately knocking down anyone that dares to get in there way.  The elderly go to great lengths in order to ensure their own sanitary sanity.   Traveling in groups through heavily populate areas, they use strange walking canes to protect there fragile immune systems from infected individuals.  The clack-clack sound of these special canes  collectively hitting the pavement is a warning to even healthy patrons to get out of the way!  This healthy train is making no stops for you!

Speaking of the elderly, I now have an all too clear understanding of what Grandma’s everywhere mean when they say they have “caught a chill”. I used to laugh when hearing this seemingly benign phrase mumbled  through old chapped lips. Now, I worry. A chill is no joke!  I caught my first chill a few weeks after landing and it knocked me into another dimension.  Completely broken, bent over and made that cold’s bitch, most of that particular day was spent feeling as though the Borg from Star Trek was attempting to assimilate me.  Sitting there in my mother in laws house, alone, in pain, with withdrawal like symptoms that would make the late Kurt Cobain blush, was not a picture of pretty.  Having no crayons to color in my fever drawings, and with nothing else to do, a rudimentary list was compiled of Things That I Would Rather Do Then Sit In My Mother-In-Laws House Sick Alone 1) play tag on the autobahn blind folded in a fog, 2)play golf during a severe thunderstorm warning while simultaneously flying a kite,3) go mall shopping with my wife.  As I pondered my top 3, a dread began to fill my bones.  At the same time, Vincent Price’s recital of The Raven poem began to play on continuous loop in my mind interlaced with a fierce dance beat. The fever had come.  Now usually, I love a good fever. The sweating. The shaking. The visuals.  It’s like eating mushrooms at a club except you never have to leave your couch.   The scary thing about THIS fever was that it made me feel old.  I’m talking 80 years old, man diaper on, IV drip steady, Seabond subscribing old.  

My body began to stall like a Chevy volt.  Buddy began to smell death in the air.  He climbed up onto my belly and began to look at me with the sympathy of a priest reading the last rites.  I knew all he wanted was a bowl of Aldi’s finest dog food (or for me to take him shit), but  I pretended that he really did care anyways. Shit anywhere Bud!  Godspeed my good friend.  The big ol’ unicorn in the sky will be coming down pretty soon to ride me away to a world of all you can eat China Buffet and unlimited free Champions League soccer games.  Do they use blankets up in heaven, or do the dead just wrap themselves in clouds?  After a few more psychic visions and some alien abduction nightmares, I started watching Top Gun. Being the only English movie that I had, the choice was simple andsomehow kept me alive until the girls got home. 

One good thing has come out of all this disease and depravity; With every sniffle, cough and shudder, a deep connection with the Native American’s has developed.   Let me explain. Here they were living in utopia, one with nature, wearing loin clothes every day (love those), having drum circles and painting each other’s bodies different colors.  Basically, what Greatful Dead and Phish fans have payed handsomely to do for decades.  That is, until my forefathers, the Europeans showed up on their shores.   With their incurable ailments, and bad fashion, they burst that bubble. Like a fat man in an airplane seat, it wasn’t a pretty sight in the America’s after 1609.  White was right, Indian was wrong. Empathy for the systematic destruction of their way of life in that age of innocence is now my new mantra.   When sick in bed, these war painted spirits appear to me, jolting me in the ribs like an old lady’s cane.  After peeing myself, I always apology to these feathered chiefs for the invasion of their lands by my arrogant forefathers.  There greedy hands planted colorful flags in a soil they knew nothing about. The chief always seems to appreciate my sincerity, and has never once raised his massive war axe in anger. Praise god!

Waking up drooling, and incoherent with fever madness, I allow these spirits to take control of me like Whoopi Goldberg in 1990’s Ghost staring the late great Patrick Swayze.  Doing the rain dance stark naked in the middle of the night too my wife’s wide eyed amusement is my way of saying thanks. I think we in this modern pill popping world of treating symptoms, have lost the true definition of what health really is.  We have a lot to learn from the peoples of the past, like my very own Chief Scares -The-Crap-Out-of-Me. Or maybe, this entire blog is simply the Nyquil talking and my impromptu performance is the barbiturates effect on my brain. Regardless, I’m going to keep fever dancing,  talking to the imaginary chief and waking up my neighbors in the middle of the night. 

LAST NIGHT

A couple of beautiful girls took me to a hookah bar downtown last night. Promises of the place turning into an orgy with sex swings falling down from the ceiling after 11pm were sadly unfounded (liars). The Mosaic Bar was locked upon arrival, and a man actually opened the door to let us in. Fascinating. Luckily we got the secret password of the night right (Frodo), and the cavity search was surprisingly gentle which made entry a breeze. The ambience I can characterize as Moroccan chic. Arab inspired chandlers with candles found within their mazes were hanging down from the rafters. Shadows danced across the room and draped each drunk face in a veil of mystery. Every time I looked at Doreen, I couldn’t help but imagine her being a Soviet spy sent to seduce secrets out of me! Sadly the only secrets I had at the time was a bit of indigestion. Doubting my divulgance of such intel would be good enough for her spy handlers, we ordered drinks! Persian blankets were weaved through each beam to give the appropriate feeling of a tent located somewhere in the desert. A side room where two people sat enjoying a hookah were lined with red pillows bathed in elegant candle light. The harem feel was appreciated but the seats were not. It was as though I was magically transported back to Grandma’s house, Thanksgiving 1986. It seems my banishment to the kiddie table for the last time in my extensive holiday career was still a sore spot in my heart. Some indignities can sadly never be forgotten.

Service was slow, served by a mid-50 ish gay Arab in a lime green shirt, with Steve Urkle pants who loved to touch my arm every time he came by. His flamboyant demeanor was surprisingly appreciated, and made me reminisce about the rave scene in the mid 90’s. Visions of drag queens sexually harassing me at Club E Buffalo, NY circa 1999 flashed through my eyes as the drinks were served. The physical damage was however worse than the emotional one, 7.50 EURO per drink. Atrocious. Yet, the Singapore Sling was potent. No whiskey Jim? When in a fake Moroccan harem in Germany, you don’t order whiskey out of principle :) 

The gin, cherry brandy, and grenadine mixture allowed our newly instituted fiscal spending plan to get fuzzy, which was a welcome digression from the memories of my language class earlier in the day. The teacher believes in the philosophy of calling you out. Questioning an individual at random, and then working out the answers through your mistakes. My class is a Level 2, so the mistakes come in tsunami like waves. Today I just didn’t have the patience, and initiated my own personal Arab Spring. Throwing my pen up in the air in protest over her teaching methods and refusing to answer was childish I’ll admit, but I am an asshole. When treated like a child, I act accordingly. Rising above it and getting my jesus on is not something in my daily plans. The only answers she was getting out of this angry Irishmen was a big fat middle finger. Thank god for Friday night, and the second Singapore Sling. It dissolved away my anguish like a big fat tablet of Alka-Seltzer, and was the perfect accompaniment to the nights entertainment! Our gay waiter decided to stand proudly on top of the table, gyrating his hips and flailing his arms around like he was drowning. This was all done amazingly with lite sparklers in his hands and in perfect unision to the bass drops of hard techno music now rupturing my ear drums in the background. Impromptu? Amazingly he seemed to have fans, so this maybe a nightly occurrence. We can only hope and pray this is fact. Whatever the uncertainnty surrounding the schedule of the waiters Oscar worthy choreography, it certainly made me feel better. His magical moves took me from zero to hero, and filled my half glass empty attitude up to the brim with joy. I am very fortunate to be where I am, and to have such great people sharing these adventures with me.

As we left the place,and headed back home down the Zeil, the square was packed with drunk custom clad characters celebrating Fasching, loitering among the park benches getting even more drunk. Along the way I saw a fight, a pirate, and some guy eagerly eating a whole bucked of KFC. Poor bastard. The morning shit will be chock full of pain and the colonels secret recipe of 11 herbs and spices. These same people will storm the government office some time later today, and put the mayor in chains in celebration of carnival! A thousand and one WW2 jokes can now go right here________ Please choose your best one, and insert away. Ah Germany. The fun never ends.  

The Grammy's Suck. See Here Why :)

The Grammy’s were last night. Honestly, who cares?  The Grammy’s aren’t telling you who’s hot anymore (not that they ever did).  Sure the stars show up, because it’s an old fashioned dress up party! Every little girl and boy remembers playing house when they were 5, sitting in there undies sipping imaginary tea. (was I the only one?)  And who doesn’t want an award?  Most of these artists are ego-maniacs, so playing to their vanity with a gold statue is easy. The hypocrisy lies in the fact that they do show up.  Being on the fringe got you to the Grammy’s and now you’ve decided that society’s opinion matters? And the biggest bullshit is when the artist says they are taking this award on behalf of all there “fans”. Why would they want to be honored by an institution that stands against everything that got them those fans to begin with?  Lady Gaga at the Grammy’s? Come on.  If she wanted to be really trend setting, she should have  publicly denounced them and no showed. But then again, Gaga’s “trend setting” seems to be another way of saying, I rip off Madonna, so little can be expected from her.  Until that day when artists stop participating, were going to have to deal with the likes of Skrillex winning a Grammy for Best Dance Album.  Something that you listen to bugging out on E should not be given a Grammy. I realize that they are trying to diversify their audience, but Skrillex?  That’s not trend setting, that’s pandering.  How can you take an institution seriously which took 15 years to choose a Hip Hop release to win Album of the Year (Lauren Hill)?

The Grammy Awards are like listening to music in Europe; the song comes out 8-9 months AFTER it breaks big in the States. Simply celebrating Adele for what she did last year and calling it a night is ridiculous.  The Grammy’s should be pushing new and unsigned talent.  They should be trendsetting, not piggy backing.  Yea you can sprinkle in current stars and hand out awards, but taking the time to create something new should be the Grammy’s true goal. The Grammy’s should pin the winners from all the music shows against each other.  I’m talking about the super bowl of music competitions; having the winners of Idol, X-Factor, The Voice, and America’s Got Talent battle it out in an old fashioned sing off.  Getting the networks to agree to such a thing would be difficult, but an alternating cycle of which network air’s the awards would help.  But who am I kidding. Just as a playoff system in college football makes too much sense, so does creating the biggest music competition on the planet.  How about popular artists nominating a true amateur and having them battle it out on stage.  You can form brackets like in the NCAA basketball tournament. Vegas could put out a line.  Adele’s favorite new artist against Lady Gaga’s?   LL Cool J’s girl vs. Puff Daddy’s. Voting could be done via text by viewers and by the celebrities in the audience.  People would have  direct involvement in the advent of someone’s career in one night. They would then be more inclined to invest in that person’s career in the form of album sales and tickets.  An idea such as this would keep people talking about the Grammy’s all year.  It’s sad that the biggest thing to happen at last night’s awards for content purposes was Whitney Houston’s death.  That’s the real tragedy.

The Grammy’s are the so-called recording industry’s night, but the industry is dead. According to the Economist, between 1999-2008, music revenue in the US dropped  from 14.6 billion to 10.4 billion.  In response, the industry did what any too powerful industry does that doesn’t want to hold itself culpable; they blamed Napster.  It became there Salem Bitch.  Instead of seeing the future of MP3’s and file transfer sites, they sued it, in the hopes of preventing the inevitable from happening for 1 or 2 more years. CD’s are dead, payola doesn’t work, and countless record companies are going out of business.  Maybe these experts should get together and have a meeting about the survival of their own industry!  How can you be an expert if your fighting for own job? When his band Pearl Jam won a Grammy in the category Best Hard Rock Performance in 1996, singer Eddie Vedder commented on stage: "I don't know what this means. I don't think it means anything."^[13  Well said Eddie.

When the Grammy’s talk proudly about how they have gone from 109! categories to ONLY 79, there is a problem.  What the hell is a Best Regional Roots Album?  If you want an excuse to nominate Bruce Springsteen or some other ancient relic of the past who certain members of the panel have a crush on,  give them a lifetime achievement award.   What’s even more laughable, is that NARS members don’t even receive nominated recordings to listen too.  They are making an opinion based on a list sent to them by 150 “experts”. The members are voting on such a small fraction of the thousands of recordings sent in, that a fully informed opinion can’t properly be deduced.  Next year, do yourself a favor and boycott the Grammy’s.  They have overstayed their usefulness and welcome.  When a friend is in trouble with alcohol, you cut him off.  He needs to hit rock bottom to begin walking the new road.  Well, the Grammy’s are that drunk Uncle.   Nobody wants to watch just an awards show anymore.   What do I get out of that? The simple fulfillment that my star won?  That’s the stupidest thing in the history of the world. If you tried to sell the current Grammy’s format (without its pedigree) to a network today, they would laugh in your face, punch you in the gut, take a picture of you vomiting, and plaster it on You Tube so the entire world could know what a dick you truly are.  The Grammy’s should be so much more and could be, but first, it must die. Help me kill it?

War Crimes, A Gold Earring, And the Super Bowl!!!

Today was jammed packed full of excitement ,war crimes, and the Super Bowl. But before the skinny on that, there was fatty shaved meat in my mouth. The national dish of Germany is not wurst, not schnitzel, not even spaetzle.  It’s that delicious, juicy, crispy combination of meat and salad all wrapped up in a pita.  Aka the doner, and the best place in town to get one is found in Sachenhausen called Koylu Doner.  The place is nondescript, the workers speak no English, little German and there is no seats. With THAT out of the way, let’s eat! A single standing only bar lies against the far wall to the right.  On the left, lies the counter and IT. Glistening, revolving thick block of veal daring those that pass by within eye shot of its glory to not stop and pay tribute.  Wanting to fulfill maximum meat craving, I told the Turk to skip the bread, skip the rice and simply pile on the meat.  With a little salad of shaved onion, tomato, and kidney bean to round out the plate, at least some semblance of a health standard would be kept.  The rest of the standards would be caught up in a meat murder.  As I plunged my fork into this jungle of carnivorous rapture, and tasted my first bite, angels began to fall down from heaven riding unicorns on waves of light.  A blind man walking by threw his cane up in the air and proclaimed that he could finally see!  A bus full of terminally ill children collectively ripped out there IV’s and began break dancing over joy for being fully cured!   And then the Russian spoke, “You’re going to want to put some garlic yogurt sauce on that.” Garlic yogurt sauce? Why yes? I think I am going to want to put a whole LOT of garlic yogurt sauce on that. In fact, I’m going to draw a bath of  garlic yogurt sauce and just float the day away my fine sir.  It turned out the Russian had lived in Brooklyn for a time, and takes the pilgrimage weekly.  There was another tall yuppie lawyer type who chimed in stating proudly how he travels form Stuttgart with his family (the wife and kid were there) to come and be privileged.  After devouring every last morsel, and declaring this day a new national holiday (National Delicious Donner Day) I paid the Turk who tried to short change me. The heathen.  He stated acht euro fuenfzig. I handed him a 10 which he then deposited directly into the register, closed it, and said, “Thanks”.  I guess he was thinking that I was some schmuck American from Kansas here on a day trip, wearing a fanny pack, and Mickey Mouse underwear who was just simply going to walk away.  Kudu’s to him for the try, but he didn’t realize he was dealing with a professional asshole from NY!  I simply stood there staring a hole in the back of his  uni-browed head, with my hand out  while the yuppie lawyer let out a laugh  He seemed to understand what the thief was attempting to do.  After a few moments, he stopped acting like he was doing something else, looked up, popped open the cash register and gave me my 1.50.  Next, I politely thanked him for a wonderful lunch and then told him to go straight to hell.  Not understanding English, there was no threat of retribution by clever wielding Turks, and it made me feel better.  A fairytale ending! 

Feeling properly full, and vented, I made my way over to a small house found right on the Alte Bruecke. An exhibit titled Mengala’s Skull was showing. Sounded promising!  I decided that spending the rest of my day with one of the greatest perpetrators of the Holocaust would be a perfect lead in to the Super Bowl!  The exhibit opens into a dark theatre room, where a film called “The Kiss’ talks of the kidnapping of 20 passengers by a paramilitary group during the war in Bosnia in 1993.   Using forensic 3D technology,   Hito Steyrel’s installation reconstructs the events that led to their disappearance. I didn’t get it and more importantly I was suddenly depressed.  Simultaneously, the bottom dropped out of my meat high and a profound compulsion to go back for MORE doner began to emerge.  But first, to check out  the namesake exhibit upstairs. Passing two yuppie museum curators who looked hung over and in need of a cigarette, I walked up a thin stairwell to the upstairs exhibit which was fascinating. A huge screen showed a documentary based on a book by Thomas Keenan and Eyal Weizman titled after the aforementioned exhibit.  It goes into how the forensic identification of Dr. Mengel’s exhumed remains in 1985 in Brazil helped pave the way for the new era of forensic pathology in which objects, such as bones, act as the witnesses of past events.   A good hour was spent up there going over all the horrific details of the 1982 US backed genocidal ant-communist campaign in Guatemala that killed thousands of people.  That turned out be the perfect amount of flagellation for my earlier over indulgence of donner.

With penance paid, I made my way back across the bridge. I was nearly to the other side, when what juvenile prosecutors in South Side Chicago call a life defining moment occurred. A strange glimmer of light emanating off one of the stone pilings caught my eye. Upon further analysis, it turned out to be a 5 hooped earring that appeared to be gold.  The NY’er in me immediately wanted to put it in his pocked and proclaim “finders keepers, losers weepers”, but sense prevailed. What the hell was this doing here? Calling my wife for support, I asked her what to do. “Take it. You’re a freakin NY’er”, was her direct quote.  Ditto. But then there was the cynical Jim thinking it might be some kind of police sting.  Not knowing the details of entrapment in a country can make you think twice. “Your right, wipe your finger prints and leave.” Jesus Christ women. Wipe my finger prints and leave? Oh dear lord.  Deciding against spending the rest of such a magical day locked up in some police car for what turned out to be fool’s gold, I got the hell out of there and high tailed it home for the game!

From doner, to Mengala, to fool’s gold, and then to the Super Bowl.  What do these things have in common? Not a god damn thing! But deep into the morning, with 3:39 left on the clock, and my NY Giants getting the ball back with a chance to win the game, I realized that these events helped to preoccupy and settle my nerves for the coming heart attack of the 4^th quarter.  They helped me to focus, use my breathing like some yoga instructor, and find my inner chi.  They were what Tommy Lee in an episode of MTV’s cribs referred to as his koi pond.  His own place to go get away from it all, and enable the struggle to be endured.   When the clock ran out, and Tom “I-Can’t-Beat-The-Giants” Brady’s last second heave fell harmlessly to the ground, a silent prayer went out to the sucker who got nabbed in the gold earring drag net. Believing that I have the power to control football games with my mind through screaming, jumping, kicking and biting in my living room, I knew these events in some sick, unexplainable way helped me to achieve the ultimate victory for my big blue.  Another Giant victory over the favored New England Patriots, again! Go Giants!!!!!

HOME

A revelation came during my second spoonful of Thai Curry Soup, and no it wasn’t a glass of water.   I was talking to my home girl Lara during our break from language class, when the subject of missing home came up.  We are both natives of islands; she of Tasmania, I from Long Island.  As with all natives of islands, there is an innate need to be by the water.  The ocean air makes us complete. My youth was spent swimming in the Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean. Years of my life were spent body surfing, and getting sunburned.  Eating Frozen Fruit Bars, and reading on my back on a beach towel. The beach was my second home, and my greatest memories were born there.  While waiting for the slow ass waitress to give us the check, Lara began telling me how much she missed the beach and her own Tasmanian Sea. I concurred. She then stated how hard it would be too NOT live next to the ocean in her future life. I agreed, but wait! I AM, right now, living nowhere near the sea in my future life. Well I suppose the Meine, Rhein, and the shitty brown Nitter could be considered bodies of water, but my life blood the ocean, is so far away.  And then it occurred to me; my whole life I had the same notion. That I would never live but within a stone throw of the sea, and now here I am. Living in a land locked city in Northern Europe. What are the odds? How in the hell? Anxiety began to rage inside me like an American Idol Finalist.  Why was this factor not part of the plan? How could I have possibly over looked something so obviously important? By the time I swallowed my third spoonful of the fiery broth, a calm began to cascade over me, and no it wasn’t the sweat running down my back from the thai chilli peppers. A profound, simple thought sprouted in my mind and began to take root; It’s the people that made the beach so great. It was my family that made the sea what it was.  When I look at pictures of the ocean and wax poetic, I’m missing more the moments that I shared with them. Without those loved ones, the sea would just be another place.  Home is where good people are. It is comprised of all the smiles, tears, screams, and hugs that are found within your days and nights.  It is within the eyes of those sitting across from you and the family that you leave everything you’ve come to know behind for. As I sat there with Lara, and laughed my lunch away, that fact was never more evident.

Different Strokes

Where is the light switch? Oh that’s right, it’s located on the outside of the room.  It would be too easy to have it located on the inside.  Since this is Germany, there has to be a process to entering a room. First, one must turn on the light to the room one is entering. Next, the door must be closed. Then, simply enjoy.  But, what if one wants to turn off the light, say to go to sleep without having to open the door? That’s a great question, and one where the process to turn off the light begins.  First, one must open the door. Next, the light must be turned off. Thirdly, sleep can resume. But, what if I am  sleepy from a long hard day, want to stay in bed and turn off the light which presumably most people in civilized cultures would like nothing more than to do? Move to America!  So many times I’ll be in the room, close the door and….DOOH!! After the 12^th time in a single day, I usually just sit in the dark.

It’s these seemingly little differences that accumulate up to create this alien world known as Germany. Sundays, businesses are shut down, but the powers that be don’t stop there.  They even shut off the traffic lights around the mall areas to save energy!    In a restaurant, any restaurant, you have to pay for water. The bus boy coming around with a big jug of unlimited tap water anytime your glass is empty is not happening.  Beef is expensive, way more expensive than in the states. A thick juicy steak with some veggies is going to cost you a week’s salary. But if you want some pig, here’s a dump truck full for 3 euro! The refrigerators are smaller, for energy efficiency and because people don’t “Costco” shop. They purchase a few items for a couple of days, not for next year’s Christmas Eve Party.  Many apartments don’t come with kitchens. You have to buy them! Cabinets, refrigerator, dish washer, sink, the works. When you do get that place, 3 months deposit is required instead of 2. Untrusting bastards. The first floor is really the second floor. A two-bedroom is really a ONE bedroom.  To open a door, you pull, not push. To get off the subway, you have to push a button to open the door!  The German engineers have built a microwave that has somehow harnessed the power of the sun. They are incredibly strong!  All German’s stare. They love it!  Hint for tourists*; reciprocate by crossing your eyes and sticking your  tongue out to the side to make them stop. Instead of paper towels, the bathrooms have this self cleaning towel roller thing! That’s where I get off the Save the Trees train.  Can a brother get some paper towels please!  Serving size is smaller, even at the supermarket. Quality over quantity I guess. Book stores are still thriving….for now. Starlight Express the musical is STILL going on here! Do u want to know where the American pop star goes when they die??? They come here with the same song and talk to some guy named David Guetta. REMIX!!!!. The mighty McDonalds has even identified these differences enough to market to them.  They’ve decided that Germans will buy even more burgers with sausages on them. Not one, but 3 sausages on them!  http://www.werbejunkie.de/mcdonalds-huettengaudi-teil-3-mit-camenbert-chicken-und-schuhbecks-feines-zweierlei/

And then, there is the language. I’d like to go back in time and kill the Roman who decided 2000 years ago that Latin wasn’t hard enough.  That it would be much easier if certain things were referred to as der, others as die and what’s left over as das.  This bastard is laughing is ass off at those of us who are know paying are hard earned money to learn this disaster. How dare he randomly fuck with people like that? If only I could invent a time machine, and make him suffer.  How you like my DER in your eye bitch! It’s not the fact that these pronouns exist. This isn’t an arrogant American pleading with the Germanic speaking world to “get it right’ and just speak English. I in fact love the distinctness of a place and want to firebomb McDonald’s as much as anyone else.  It’s the randomness of there being. There is no method. A table is der, but a lamp is die?  For one to even place masculinity in a table is retarded. 

I believe that one day soon, all of these differences will fade away and I will see the Christ Child’s light.  That just over the horizon, my shoulder will be clear of bruising from trying to push through the door.  That my hands will finally be dry after washing them in the bathroom, and using the nasty towel rolling device.   That der, die, and das will become drinking buddies of mine.  That the train won’t leave without me getting off because I pushed the button.  That love for sausage will conquer my addiction to steak.  That a kitchen will be seen as just a room, that you have to pay to fill.   That I can one day proudly say I have assimilated and am truly home.

EDEN

The most amazing thing occurred on the way to Aldi; I saw a trip listed for 4,999 euro per person, NY to Singapore by boat!!! 39 days!! Only in this country could such an offer even be conceivable. Aldi is a discounter in the same vein as Costco, but Costco could never fathom listing a trip for 39 straight days. Never in all of America’s collective imagination could it dream of taking a vacation for that amount of time.  In the USA, the population lives to work, here, they work to live.  I’m not trying to piss on America by any means, just stating an absolute fact.  Maybe that’s why people are so annoyingly patient here, why the atmosphere is so sickeningly relaxed, and not so rushed. Why the beer tastes better, and the lines don’t seem so long.

Being an ex-patriot, the possibility that I could go on a trip of that magnitude is beyond comprehension. My brain seemingly can’t accept it as reality.  The cruise is all inclusive, includes stops in Bali, Sydney, Goa, flights to the port of embarkation in L.A., and extended layovers in Dubai in a 5 star resort. Screw Disney, Aldi is the place where dreams come true.  For along with having these top notch vacations, they also sell huge blocks of prosciutto de Parma for 11.99.  Prosciutto and a 39 day cruise. What more can a person want?  As well as having all other sorts of goodies like proseco for 1.99 a bottle, they have a bread dispensing machine!  Just push the loaf button, and presto.  Rolls fall out still warm!  Whoever invented this contraption should be knighted.  How the hell can Somalia be starving when they have bread machines?  The warlords should buy thousands and litter the countryside with warm rolls. 

All of these amazing deals and innovations got me thinking about what else Aldi may have up its sleeve.  Perhaps they’ve figured out cold fusion, or invented a healthy cinna-bun.  With inventions like bread dispensing machines and mozzarella for .79 a pound, Aldi has become my Steve Jobs.  It has inspired me to reach for the stars, to go where no Jim has gone before; to the bottle dispensing machine! I know some you of snobs might be thinking that I’ve grown a mullet, and now must be rocking confederate flag t-shirts, but here, everybody does it.  They consider it a public responsibility or something.  The shops bill you the deposit upfront forcing you to recycle to re-coop the money. Here, a bottle collector can be a  full time job that’s worth it. Professional can collectors in the states should save up and check out the dumpsters here.  It’s paradise. Those bastards can make a killing if they can hit a sporting event just right.  Now I haven’t seen an enterprising bum pushing a shopping cart full of empty bottles yet, but I bet they are out there.

For a long while I thought it was all a façade, a collective lie. That these German’s couldn’t possibly be so chill. I roamed the streets looking for road rage, but found only drivers patiently performing the zipper during lane closures.   I arrogantly cut lines at Rossman to try and wake the German dragon, but instead got nothing but kindness; I was short .20 cents and as god as my witness she payed for me! For weeks I wondered how, I wondered why. Then I went to Aldi and found a new meaning for world peace, a blinding alien light cutting through the darkness, the meaning of what Mike Reno/ Anne Wilson were really singing about in their 1980’s hit , Almost Paradise.  In those fluorescent lighted aisle’s, there is peace and cheese, there is gamoodlich and cheap salami, there is the German way. 

The Interview

What a day. Woke up at 3:30 in the morning thinking of demons. The new movie trailer “The Devil Inside Me” was to blame. See here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWPGSbHlI2w After realizing that I wouldn’t be spitting out green bile and contorting my body into shapes that would make a Russian gymnast blush, I had some corn flakes.  With the fear of demonic procession behind, and my hunger assuaged, I could now worry about more important things, namely my first job interview in 6 years.  Though I am a people person, the fear of rejection gives me the bees knees, and zits as big as small children.  Hence a job interview to me is about as horrible as your worst dentist appointment on mushrooms.  Compounding the pain was the fact that later in the day, two Polacks would be coming over to put up wallpaper in our brand new flat.  Time constraints on such a big day can be problematic and give you that not so fresh to death feeling.  Comparable to trying to do Six Flags Theme Park while your wife is in labor.  Further fracturing my chi, was the fact the Voice of Germany started at 8:15 tonight!!  Even though that mattered little, it shows how riddled with confusion I was.  Getting to the new flat to drop off some supplies for my polish babysitting duty later, I quickly changed from old, busted Jim, to hot salty buttery Jim. My suit was crisp, my Donald Trump tie a perfect complement to my brown Steve Maddens. My finger however was not cooperating with the look. It was leaking!!!! A reluctant carrot during the previous night’s dinner prep was too blame. The minimal damage now appeared smeared all over my collar.  Cold water can be a man’s best friend, and thank god it seemed to work. Rushing out the door to the bahnoff with plenty of time, I thought the majority of my crisis’s were over, until I reached for my wallet. Damn.  I was soon in full Olympic stride down the street in the rain.  Making like a Kenyan marathoner up the stairs and then frantically looking for it, and then finding it in the most unlikeliest of places (the bathroom. What the hell?) I raced back down just in the nick of time to catch the train. My body then began to thank me for allowing it to participate in such a magnificent cluster fuck by spasming everywhere all at once. So off I went on bent hubcaps to the center of town.  Right before getting off the bahn, the smelly homeless man who constantly walks along the tracks as though he is looking for his lost contact said hello to me!  After looking at him, I came to the quick realization that I’m in pretty good shape!!! The language schools offices are right in  Frankfurt. The women turned out to be very good at her job, and we talked for about 2 hours.  Hence, it went really well, and she invited me back for the second interview with the head of the Frankfurt office.  Later, back at the residential, the polish dude’s showed up, got to work, and didn’t try and rob me! Somewhere a unicorn has given birth over my joy!

NEW YEARS!!!!! I'M ALIVE!!!!

Happy New Years! Slide Well as they say here. I can’t believe I am still alive today! Last night was nuts. These Germans love shooting fireworks at EACH OTHER!!! The girls, I and Bjorn went rolling down to some bar right on the Main River last night.  Apprehensions were high when we arrived at 9pm to a scene that had no pulse.  Even the guy at the door seemed surprised we were there, but we sat down early and got a bottle of champagne anyways.  Soon enough, the place was packed and we had moved on from champagne to a harder variety; vodka. Why is vodka itself cheap but when you add the two words Red Bull in front, it becomes 10 euro?  I know how much a red bull costs, and that’s exactly why I BYORB bitch! Bjorn and I would rotate paying up for a 3-shot glass of vodka, and then play bartender under the table with the Red Bull I purchased for 1.50.  Pretty soon, we were snapping pictures, inspiring  our girls to,” act like you’re about to bang the guy, you unzip his fly and….and…you can’t find it! It’s WAYYYY too small. Give me that look! Ready! 3-2-1.”   For a whole hour we played that game to the consternation of the tables around us. Yes, we were THAT table. Explosions of too loud laughter, breaking the cool code with a variety of unsavory facial expressions, camera flash going off every 5 seconds like a Japanese tour group, speaking as if we didn’t care because we REALLY didn’t!  If only all my Saturdays could be spent almost urinating in my pants from laughter!  All that changed quickly, when everyone in the place cleared out to hit the streets.  Outside, in a scene straight out of Syria, there was all out war. A mob of Frankfurters had gathered at the River Main to view the fireworks as they do every year, and they came armed with every firework known to man.  M-80’s, black cats, and mortars, were firing from every conceivable angle. It was a full on artillery barrage!  With not a cop in sight, it was every man,  women  and child!? ( what the hell were they doing here?) for themselves. Impromptu firework displays began to pop up like dance circles at a rave.  Everyone in the mob was drinking or drunk.  Pretty soon groups began to square off like in some demented musical, firing anything that could inflict bodily harm.  I began of course filming the drunk mayhem earnestly. Out of the corner of my eye, a young Turkish youth tired to throw an M-80 in our vicinity, but the butter fingers got him.  As I was wiping my brow in relief, the fiend looked up to see me eyewitness news'ing his ass. A sinister smile soon developed on his face as I panned away to more of the debauchery. I now of course knew who HE was aiming at. Pretty soon thereafter,  3 rows of people that were in front of me soon weren’t.  A bottle rocket made a b-line right for my leg. With Chuck Norris like agility, I boot stomped the projectile into the street, and went looking for the Kebab kid.  But I would have been better off looking for an Italian who doesn’t talk without rapid hand movement.  He  and his gang of merry twits had vanished in a swirl of firework fog.   Off to go car-jack some poor defenseless grandpa.  Happy New Year dickwad!!! Then the finale went off. A thick San Francisco mist began to drift over the entire area, straight out of some colonial battle field. My body began to convulse unexpectedly, as Bjorn poured a half bottle of champagne into my already FULL glass. PTSD? No, thank god. I just needed to piss. Pretty soon, the madness was over, and the masses made for the trains.  Vio, Emily, and I consequently lost everyone we were with. Shortly after that, I lost my glasses. Damn it. Not the greatest encore of the evening ever, but the night was one of the most culturally enriching new years I’ve ever had to date.