**German Chat**everyone welcome* - macht es euch gemütlich

[ZZZen]

reden wir weiter...

3 in a row. How sad am I?

Can anyone tell me what happenes here 1st May?

oh yes I loved all that, living in Berlin was a total blast, being stepped on, shoved into and shouted at. Lovely city but just that kind of thing I just never got used to it. They are a bit proud of it because they feel that being bad tempered and all that is part of being a big city, bit like New York.

Don't let me get started on all my adventures of that type, I would never stop

We have given you a brand new spanking fresh school thread ernest, so all that crappy stuff is out of it. You go in with your eyes open and hope for the best. I was thinking about it the other day and I think we tend to compare the WoRST of what we see and hear of German education (also hyped up beyond belief by the GErman media at times - but for now they have Schweinegrippe) and we take that and compare it to our own school expereinces and just think: OMG

We need to compare the worst of German to the worst of British schools and then the whole picture is drastically readjusted I think

1st May you go into the city centre and pull out cobblestones, throw them at the police or if they're not around, smash some shop windows and dent car bonnets.

At least that's how it's done in Berlin

Yep, that's the city version of 1st of May. The village version is that you wake up to find ketchup all over the playgrounds, shaving foam over your car and toilet paper wound around all the lamp posts never understood it mayself.

didnt know all that about 1st May! thought it was something to do with a Maibaum?

thanks for all you advice on the whole du/Sie debate! BIL's girlfriend seems lovely (only met her once at my wedding 18 months ago!) and is only a few years younger than me! so it'll be du all the way! they get married on 1st August so she'll be family then!!

admylin - your doing so well with packing - it'll be all done soon! from all your posts i gather that it cant come quick enough! its a shame though that things didnt work out here - but never mind - its obviously not meant to be!

wasnt online this morn - took me ages to straighten my hair! i've got mad red curly hair that only looks right the day i do it - and its far too long at the mo cause i'm not confident enough to go to a Friseur here!
so becuase we've got these visitors (and BIL's girlfriend is far too pretty) i thought i'd make myself look a bit decent by having straight hair!!

then i'd read that thread last week about cutting your own hair so i gave it a go!! looks ok - layers are good but its still far too long! not sure how to cut the length any shorter without making more layers!! maybe should just get myself to the Friseur after all!

hello - all this negative Berlin stuff is so water off my duck-like back!! Interesting about education... I'd heard they could be a bit factory like, but also have been very impressed with the level of ed that Germans I met seemed to have, especially when I was an Erasmus student, they seemed to be well ahead of some other countries. As a teenager I spent some time in a Gesamtschule in Hesse - it was a lovely school (much niccer than my one in England!), so I've always thought it must be good. Plus those specialist Gymansien for Classics and languages (there was a bilingual one near us in b-w). All seemed rather good really...

Well, Canella, you will have to help protect the Maibaum from being stolen tonight. It's an old Bavarian and Frankonian tradition to steal the Maibaum from the neighbouring villages while making sure that nobody steals yours. If it does get stolen there is a lot of alcohol required to get it back.
Also, tonight is Walpurgisnacht of course, so any woman with witchy tendencies will be out and about.
Mme Lindt, Pelzig is the only German comedian that dp can watch without a pained expression on his face. My cousin did a Volkswirtschafts degree at the Fachhochschule in Wue where Pelzig's father teaches and he says that his lectures were always well attended because he was so much fun. Funnier than his son, he reckons.
Do Germans still watch Otto??? Really???

Otto is going strong Gracelo. Btw what was the name of that farmer with his sheepdog that is so popular in NZ? Was tryign to think of it the other day, but brain seems to have developped giant holes. Do you know the one I mean?

stick, you just have to make your own experiences of course. I think contact the schools, try and get a feeling for them and see how it goes, same as everywhere really. It's hard to say from 1 dc's experiences in 1 school in 1 town in 1 German state with 1 teacher, what everyone else's experiences anywhere else in the land are going to be like.

Do you mean Cracker Jim, Zzzen? Forgot the name of the dog, his wife/gf is called Polly.
We have an entire set, Jim, Polly, dog and a sheep as soft toys, picture books and his farm bike, which is just big enough for ds who is 16 month to sit on. Flossie? Is that the name of the dog?
But Otto must be about a hundred years old now.

I don't think so gracelo, cracker jim doesn't strike a bell but the farm-bike and a black dog (and some uncouth language I think) is about all I can remember. Maybe it'll come back to me.

Btw gracelo are dc in NZ learning Maori at school these days as part of their curriculum? Do you know about that? Someone said something about that to me recently and I didn't think they would really be learning the language much (as in attempting true mastery of it) in public schools, perhaps singing songs, learning a bit about Maori culture.

Btw Ernest I think you are doing the right thing re trying the schools . It always sounded to me as if you felt quite attracted to the lifestyle in the German speaking world and had you moved to London now and experiences set-backs with the schools, you would have asked yourself whether you had made a mistake not staying on in Munich. I think you are quite right in wanting to find out whether it suits your family

oh, uncouth language, will ask dp. Cracker Jim is for children, no uncouthness anywhere, it's all lovey-dovey.
I think everyone is learning Maori in NZ primary schools now. I don't think many learn it very well especially if they have no Maori backdround. There has been an overall increase in Maori speakers but I don't think there are many who speak it fluently. It's quite a limited language as well, both from the size of the vocabulary as well as the grammar perspective. There are no tenses for example if I remember it right. There are many words that have a clear root in English and are maorinized because there wasn't a term before in Maori.
Huh, dp replied to my question before I finished my post: Murray Ball's Footrot Flats

I remember it now. Is that the one you were looking for?

YES! That's the one I couldn't remember. Thanks Mr. Gracelo!

Interesting about Maori. So it is all part of the curriculum now, that person was right then. Didn't realise there were no tenses in Maori. Interesting, isn't it how things you cannot imagine away from your own language aren't needed in another?

Mr Gracelo did Maori during first year at university. He did a science degree but he likes languages so did some Maori. He and his mate the only non-Maori in the class. He had a great time by the sounds of it.
I think there are no tenses, will check with dp. You have to work it out from the context if someone had done something, was doing something or was going to do something at some time in the future. On the other hand there are different terms for "we" depending who of a group it includes. The latter reflect on the importance of hierarchy in traditional Maori society, I think.
There is quite some effort to keep Maori going, a bit like Gaelic I suppose. Every sign is bilingual, there are Maori TV shows and radio stations.

oh gracelo i'm intrigued with all these old traditions especially since there's donner and blitz tonight!! i'll not be going outside looking for witchy women!!

might go and look at the Maibaum in the village tom - think its like a maypole thing in England with people dancing round it!! dd was very worried that she'd have to dance round it!

mme lindt - i've been a much better driver since i went on that website you linked to!! thank you (and thank you say the drivers in the area!!)

Gracelo
About 14 years ago we were invited to a party by my BIL and Barwasser was also invited (a friend of SIL was seeing him at the time). He was going to do a wee sketch for the guests but the silly friend of SIL had a fight with him a couple of days before the party and broke it off. We were right miffed. I did not know that about his father. DH was at the Fachhochschule, but BWL not VWL.

canella, who's been telling you they go dancing round the maypole in Germany?

OOh they do. They really do have a Maibaumtanz, I stand corrected. Just had a google and found some Bavarians pair dancing around.

Never knew that. Doesn't happen in Berlin

Zzzen
I think it is a southern thing, the maibaum. Most of it seems to be the village youth trying to steal the maibaum from the next village, whilst protecting their own. Which is basically a big excuse for spending most of the night gallivanting about the countryside drinking copious amounts of bier.

god, Maypoles are HUGE round here. Our town has a new one this year.

Mme Lindt, my cousin is 50 now, so he would have been at the FH about 30 years ago.
Canella, there are lots of old traditions well alive and many lost. My mother often talks about things they used to do but most of them had some religious context and they are gone now. Frankonia is such a varied place there will be traditions in your village that I have never heard of.
I miss that in Scotland a little. Besides Hogmanay there isn't really much at least not here in my part of the West coast. I drag the family to every event during summer just to make us feel more part of the locals rather than someone from "The Marine Lab". I'm sure it will happen eventually especially with dd starting school in August.

It's high tme you brought the Maibaumtanz to Scotland Gracelo. Might be in time for the next season of X-factor even.

Well, have a nice weekend everyone and I'll be back on the thread in a couple of weeks to see what you've all been up to. I have stocked up on bags of weird looking, violently coloured sweets (including Haribo snails - igitt!) to impress the Japanese (thanks Frosch).

Sayonara

saw maibaumtanz yesterday, or was it friday? Missed majority of it hunting for my 3 missing children. found them having a whale of a time burying each other in grain mountain in farmer's barn etc etc

OMG, I've booked flights! We're out of here on the 14th of May so plenty of time to finish all the little things and hand in books to school etc. Dc are so happy and tomorrow both are staying off school so we can go shoe hunting - they both need black school shoes to go with their uniform!

morning all! no great time to post! far too much housework to be getting on with!! had a great weekend apart - saw maibaum dancing!!!! and had beer and wurst at the fest in the village!! feel i had a proper german weekend!

only down side about the weekend was that i found a tick on ds2 - after all my worrying about it! and i'd still not sorted a Hausarzt!! hope he's ok - fingers and legs crossed for him!

admylini - glad you've got a date - know it was what you were waiting for!

well need to crack on with housework - washing pile is too huge!!