He's compensating for something...

Traveling to work everyday on the K-bus I pass this sign and everyday I chuckle a little bit to myself. I'm sure all the other passengers think I'm a little weird. Well, I finally took a picture of it. It's an ad for a car shopping website and it says, "Anew from the USA: Penis lengthening without OP (operation)!" There's another one that was taken down already that had a picture of a Porsche that said, "Viagra fur Frauen" or "Viagra for women." I wish we had the stones to put up ads like this in the USA... I would definitely make my commute a whole lot more entertaining.

THE apartment tour

As requested, here is the guided tour of my fancy $2000/month apartment/hotel/whatever. Prepare to be.......... disappointed...

We start in the entrance way... To your immediate right you can see my kitchen, where culinary masterpieces such as the 'ham sandwich' are prepared. Straight ahead is the living room area and ahead and to the right (can't see) is the entrance to the bedroom and bathroom... we continue to the bedroom...

Here we notice the lack of door... that's right, it is open to the hallway. There are however nice olive green curtains the can be pulled over the entrance. Make note of the stylish gold plated light fixture and mirror... They give the place a sort of 'palace' feel. To the right is the bathroom, but you don't need to see that... On we go, turn around and continue down the hallway to my living room...

Here we are... This is where I spend most of my time. As you can see I have a nice little TV that gets 9 channels... 6 in German, 1 in French, 1 in Italian and 1 in English, which happens to be CNBC Europe... all economy, all the time. Luckily late at night they do show the Tonight Show and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, so I get some of the comforts of home, but only if I want to stay up until 2am on weekdays. Note, more use of olive green curtains. What you can't see is another coupling of the gold plated fixtures, as well as the use of wallpaper to cover the ceiling... chic! Onward, to my view...

A tree!

Well I hope that was educational. I spent most of today wandering because it was nice out (and I have no money to travel), so I took some pictures of the city. I will be posting those sometime in the coming week, so check back.

Soccer with the natives...

Well yesterday was my first soccer game with the EUMETSAT soccer club, or EUMFOOT as we call ourselves. I came into the entire thing with low expectations of my ability, even though there were a few elder-ish gentlemen in very short shorts in the group that I should have been able to run around... afterall, this is their sport. The courts themselves are indoors and about half the length of a normal football pitch, with nets all around and above so the ball doesn't go flying into other courts... so basically there were no out of bounds which meant I slammed myself into the walls a few times, which hurt quite a bit since the actual walls only went up to about your waist. There were 10 of us so it was an even 5 on 5 with players rotating in and out of the keeper spot. When it was my turn I missed almost every ball shot at me, which gave to other team 3 or 4 goals... very sad. I myself scored 3 times, which I was very proud of since I was the second leading scorer on our team, but I only managed to basically negate all the goals scored against me. I also took out a kid... that was fun.

So overall it was a fun time, I'm excited about going again next week. I did manage to discover some muscles in my legs I never knew I had, so hopefully they'll recover in time.

Coming up next... Tour of my apartment

ELECTION DAY!

So, in case you didn't know, yesterday was election day in the US. Everyone here is very interested in my opinion on everything since I seem to be the only American in town. I have found it interesting how all, literally all, of the Europeans I have met (either at work or randomly in public) wanted Obama to win very badly. They simply don't understand how anyone could possibly ever vote republican and I try to explain it to them, but it doesn't work. I myself am slightly left of the middle so I'm not a hardcore raging socialist or anything, so I would think of supporting someone like McCain if he had chosen a different VP. Therfore, it turns out I am probably one of the most republican-esque people in the area. Unfortunately I was not able to vote this year because my absentee ballot did not get here in time and am very dissapointed about that, but everyone here congradulated me when I came into work this morning... very awkward. It was a little weird to have to go to bed not knowing who the next president would be and then wake up to the news of a landslide victory... but the coverage of the election didn't even start until 1am my time so I was not staying up for that. So far I have noticed that everyone here likes us a little more now that we elected someone they like... so I guess that's good news... http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/05/germany.obama.reaction.pleitgen/index.html

RANDOM FACT OF THE DAY:
It is illegal to have an office without a window in Germany.

Everybody has private parts, but not everybody can punch someone in the face...

One thing that has been bothering me is what German's find acceptable for public television. This Sunday I basically spent the whole day on my butt watching F1 racing and major hollywood movies dubbed into German. I have noticed that violence on tv is much more restricted than in the US. For instance, when Spiderman punches the criminal who killed his uncle, which in turn makes him stumble backwards and fall out of a window... not ok. However, the shower scene in Starship Troopers... that's ok. What's even worse is during Sunday morning cartoons they will feature adverts for these "Sex Report" shows with full nudity... I don't get it. Punching someone in the face... not ok, but sex education for 3 year olds... fine. I suppose it speaks to the difference in morality between our two cultures in that the human body is no longer viewed as 'dirty'.

Back to the '50s

OMG... the gym has two of those "shake the fat off" machines and people actually use them... I'd totally take pictures but I'm afraid they would kick me out.

Just thought I'd share :-)

Germans like it hot!

Well, I joined a gym. It's right by work so I can go every day after work to get my run on. I figured this was a good idea since I also recently joined the EUMETSAT soccer club (yes they call it 'soccer' and not 'football' for some reason... probably a good sign for me). The team is actually named EUMFOOT... how cute. But I figured, if I'm going to be running around with a bunch of Europeans playing their native sport, I should get back in shape. I tried running outside a few times, but since it has now reached below freezing in Germany, my lungs have been screaming for mercy. Lucky for me this gym came into my life...

It's a small place, but one can be very easily persuaded otherwise if looking in from the street... The walls are literally covered in mirrors. It makes the place feel 4 times bigger... clever advertisement ploy perhaps, or are Germans that claustrophobic? One thing is for sure, it makes for checking other people out all that much easier... not like I would ever do such a thing. Anyways, there are some key differences between the German exercise experience and ours. Firstly, they are much more obsessed with routine. I have never seen a bigger workout plan wall in my life, and for such a small place. Everyone has their little packet, which is about 10 pages of what to do, and they follow it to the letter. When you join the place, and every 6 weeks after, you get a personal session with one of their trainers and they make a routine for you and check your 'health level' and what not... I think this is pretty cool, but I didn't really care that much for a plan, I just wanted to have a warm place to run. This confused the guy who signed me up greatly, but I managed to convince him to skip it all and get me a 50 euro discount.

The whole process is built around making you feel better, not just punishing yourself for drinking a coke at lunch like we do in the US. Included in the monthly fee is free use of a full service sauna (with a waitress), free flavoring for your water and a solarium. The part that really weirds me out is that you will see these muscle bound guys come up and fill their water bottle and then ask the attendant to give them two squirts of peach flavoring... strange. I haven't experimented with this, and I'm not sure I ever will... nothing makes me feel more manly than drinking my water without the peach flavoring.

The part that is hardest for me to adjust to is the temperature in ths place. It's like 95 degrees in there. I swear part of plan is to just make you sweat all your weight off instead of actually working it off. I thought that was what the sauna was for, so now I'm afriad to try that out... I might pass out and die. Here comes the perfect example of the lack of German common sense... no towels. They do not provide towels because everyone thinks it is gross to share towels after they are cleaned. Funny, because it's perfectly fine to get your water from glasses that someone may have used 3 minutes prior and was just dipped in hot water and put back on the table... oh well, I bought my own towel... and water bottle for that matter. I guess for a while I should avoid wearing a white shirt in fear of being arrested for indecent exposure.