Isla Vista, circa 2007

Oh the things you find cleaning out the draft folder of your email account. I found this gem from June of 2007. I’ll give you a moment to recover from the fact that that was already 7 years ago (!!). I am assuming that since it was in the draft folder the intended recipient never got it—anyway, it was too good to keep it to myself. Below is the body of the email:

Here's a story for the books. I probably didn't tell you but around the first week of this quarter [Spring quarter, 2007] I was one of many Isla Vistans to experience the tragedy of bike theft. Someone (probably in a drunken stupor) absconded with my treasured green huffy beach cruiser. I didn't notice until Monday morning when I went to my back yard and noticed that something was missing....my bike! I realized it was partially my fault for not locking it to something, plus I’ll be going to Ireland soon and don’t need a bike; plus I figured it had already served me the first three years of college, so I got over it and spent this entire quarter on foot. It wasn't too bad actually, I rather enjoyed the quality time in the sunshine walking from this lecture to that one.

So, Thursday. My last day on the campus of UCSB. It's 8:45 in the morning and I receive a phone call as I study for my Italian final at 10. It's CSO (Campus Security Officer) notifying me that they have found my bike. Can you believe it? The last day of class and now they find my bike. Good thing I paid that $6 my freshman year to register that bad boy! So, the officer asks, "Do you own a green beach cruiser?" to which I reply, "Well I did, but it was stolen" "When was it stolen?" he asked, "The first week of April" I said. "What color was it?" me: "Green...Is it still??" there was a pause, I already knew "No, it's been spray painted black." My heart broke when he told me this—I loved that green bike. I guess CSOs are trained to spot spray painted bikes because they are more often than not spray painted for a reason. So apparently they come across my bike at the chem building. They checked the serial number and registered owner and notice that it doesn't correspond with the person who had it. The officer told me they had to conduct some "investigation" and I could pick it up in a few days. It gets better....

I have been interning for a criminal defense attorney since January and Friday was my last day in the office. I get in around 9 and the phone rings. It's a PNC (potential new client)-some guy saying he needs advice, thinks he needs a lawyer. I take down his name and information and pass it along to the attorney who calls him back later that day. So toward the end of my last day the attorney offers to take me out to lunch as a thank you. We get to the restaurant where a few of his colleagues (he used to be a public defender, so it was a bunch of public defenders) were already eating. They all start talking about whatever cases they're working on and the guy I intern for brings up this client he was hired by today. He said he is being brought up on charges of possession of stolen property.

He describes the client: "So this guy has this bike and he is apprehended by a CSO asking him how he got it and why it's spray painted and if he knows the registered owner—and he didn't really say anything. So the CSO tells him he can be expelled for these charges, but if he signs this statement saying that he had no intent of returning the bike there would be leniency, so he does." The attorney then asks me, "In your experience, have you ever known anyone to take a bike and return it?" I said "No. My bike was stolen and they never returned it. Actually I just got a call from CSO yesterday saying that they'd found my bike" The attorney: "Wait, CSO told you yesterday they found your bike?" Me: "Yeah.." "So when was it stolen?" Me: "The first week in April" He chuckles to himself then says, "I think I might be representing the guy that stole your bike" we all laugh; he continues "Well at least now I know I can represent the guy, it's not a conflict of interest if you don't work for me anymore"

If you’re wondering what happened to my beloved huffy, I must admit even I don’t know. I recall another phone call where I was told I could pick up the bike and asked if I intended to press charges. I said no because as I mentioned since I was going abroad at the end of August, I didn’t see much sense in storing the bike at my parents’ for a year. I also thought I wouldn’t be returning to Santa Barbara, but I hadn’t yet realized the missing credits after my time in Ireland. 

 The scene of the crime (my back yard in IV, 2007)

As of late

I started this blog a year and a half after I moved here as a forum to present my musings about life in Germany from the perspective of an American. It became apparent after a while that such a tenor, as embodied by my former choice in title, limited the range of topics I could, within the framework of my thematic choice, reasonably delve into. It has been a while since I last posted anything, almost a year to be exact. “I just got too busy,” is an easy alibi, but it’s not that cut and dry.

The truth is that at some point in the recent past I stopped observing my life through this prism of a foreigner and have become comfortable here. Although I cannot say in confidence that my fluency and accuracy are on the same level, my language skills have improved enough. I can hold my own in conversation, but I am well aware of the fact that my speech is still lousy with incorrect articles, improper use of verbs, or nouns, prepositions and adjectives for that matter, and peppered with clumsy yet still comprehensible (or so I tell myself) constructions. Yet none of that bothers me anymore.

That being said, I have not completely lost my Californian core. Take for instance this gorgeous summer weather we have been enjoying recently. As someone who comes from a place with nearly year-round sunshine, June and July have been kind of rough times to live here. Last year I only retrieved the summer clothes out of the basement for my trip home. In the past, I heard from people that there used to be proper summers with plenty of warm and sunny days. The first two years I lived here such days were few and far between, or so it felt to me by comparison. When there were sunny days everyone would enjoy them, and all you would hear on the streets is “Oh, how lovely is this weather?” The evening news would start with the anchor saying “Germany is blooming,” with b roll of kids playing in fountains or splashing in public pools, dogs panting, smiling groups in sunny beer gardens and of course the obligatory eating-an-ice-cream-in-the-shade shot. But these days, while treasured by all, seemed fleeting. By the time you got comfortable with the summer weather, clouds rolled in and you were back to the status quo. 

This year has been different. We’ve enjoyed a couple weeks now of consistently legitimate summer temperatures. I get the distinct impression, however, that not everyone is as delighted with this sunny spell. The fact that there had been no rain for a week didn’t bother me at all, but when I was at the salon I could hear another patron lamenting the dryness and uncomfortable heat, and the stylist echoing her opinion even reassuring her that the forecast predicted rain in the coming days. Or on a walk in the countryside with a friend and her dog, as we pass another resident the first words out of his mouth are “It is too hot, right?”

I like the heat. In fact, I think some Germans tend to play a bit fast and loose with the word “die Hitze,” (the heat). While 30°C (86° F) is balmy, I am not in any way distressed by it. I’m used to much hotter summer days, and where I’m from those temperatures have yet to arrive-they’ll surprise you in August or September when even some Californians begin to tire of the summer sun. Though it has to be said, the heat here is somehow different. Geography undoubtedly plays a role (latitude?), but that’s not the point. It’s examples like this, moments where I feel somehow different from everyone around me, which once seemed ever-present but over time have become as infrequent as warm and sunny days. 

This isn’t to say I don’t still have such thoughts, or plan to deny indulging myself by writing about them, but there are other yarns to be spun.

A summer of firsts

Looking back on my third summer here in Germany I’ve realized it’s been a summer of firsts for me. It’s the first summer I didn’t have to go to the immigration office as my visa is good for another year (woohoo!). I passed my theoretical road test on the first try (double woohoo!). And I just got back from my first typical German holiday.

So about the theoretical exam; I know I’ve written several posts about it describing how nervous I was and how difficult the content would be. Truth be told, the software I was using to prepare (http://www.my-fuehrerschein.de) turned out to be perfect. Admittedly, I had to put in a fair bit of work. I started with it last year but then cooled off after a few months. I then resumed back in April and worked pretty consistently for a few hours several times a week up until September. In the days after my California trip I was studying at least four hours a day leading up to the exam. I must say, it paid off. 

I was nervous going into the exam-I knew the test would be on the computer, but I had no idea what the layout would be, if the questions would be variations of the ones I so diligently committed to memory, or even if maybe there would be topics I hadn’t discovered yet. But seriously, any expats in Germany looking to get their license transcribed who need to take the theoretical exam (in their own language), without going to driving school, I would sincerely recommend that website because the actual exam was no joke exactly like the software. I sat down and blasted through the 30 questions in 15 minutes. I started to go back and check my answers, but like any multiple choice test I've taken, and having graded enough of them myself, I decided your first choice tends to be the safest. So I submitted my work and moments later saw on the screen that I had passed.Though it’s an occasion to be proud of, I am not 100% road legal yet. I am now allowed to drive on German roads, which means I have scheduled my first behind the wheel lesson. I still need to pass a practical (driving) exam, and in theory could do that whenever, but figured it’d be best to get a few lessons in first to get an idea of what the examiner will be looking for.

So on to my other first, a typical German holiday in Mallorca. For those unfamiliar, Mallorca lies in the Mediterranean Sea and is part of the Balearic Islands (including Menorca, Cabrera, Ibiza, among others). 

Mallorca has developed into a prototype of mass tourism with all the comforts and attractions expected by tourists. It welcomes millions of visitors per year (nearly 10 million in 2006), 80% of whom come from foreign countries. From the graph you can see that the largest group of foreign tourists is German with the British coming in second.

So to put it in a nutshell, tourists abound! That doesn’t mean that I didn’t enjoy it. We stayed in Sa Coma, a town on the eastern coast of the island in the municipality of Sant Llorenç des Cardassar. The weather was warm and sunny, the beach was minutes away, and I had with me a guide who had visited the island plenty of times and thus knew where to go and what to see. I must admit, the bulk of the six days we spent  were either on the beach or by the pool. I went through 2 books, numerous podcasts and a bottle of sun screen. 

Of the millions of visitors who flock to Mallorca annually, more than half of them are “package tourists,” which means that their flight, transportation to and from airport and hotel costs (usually including food) are all together. This has advantages and disadvantages, particularly for the local economies as the money spent at a hotel chain doesn’t necessarily get pumped back into the local economy directly. If you book an “all inclusive” package, then you pay extra, but drink for free at the hotel. To those looking to enjoy a sun and alcohol soaked vacation, this seems like an obvious choice. However, it also means you’d probably spend most of your time at the hotel choosing from the shrunken drink menu of the all-inclusive package. I found it better to walk around and find local joints where to enjoy a few drinks. On one such stroll we went to a restaurant my guide had frequented in his youth. The food was outstanding and the service was just as good. The server, a friendly older Spaniard, asks where I’m from, I say, “California.” He then proceeded to drop a little knowledge on me. For the Californian readers, you may recall as an elementary school student learning about Father Junípero Serra and all the missions he founded (I’ll avoid describing treatment of the locals in said missions for now). Well, would you care to venture a guess as to where he is from? If you said Mallorca, then you’re correct! 

Anyway, it was a truly relaxing vacation. I enjoyed plenty of sunshine and will now proceed to cover up the tan I acquired with layers and scarves as all of a sudden it’s fall in Germany! The new semester is upon me and I have plenty of work to get done. I’ll conclude with a few highlights of the trip. Hope everyone had as nice a summer as I did!