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

[ZZZen]

reden wir weiter...

hello miad, how long have you been in Holzkirchen ? Had to google it too - you're about half an hour from me. I'm in Feldkirchen, just east of Munich.

Bulying sorted inasmuch as the little git has changed his seat on the bus Holzkirchen - am seriously reconsidering strting them in local school after Pfingston. hmm. dh away till wed, then thursday off to London, so difficult to get a window to talk to him.

How's your German. Am so of all of you lot having german spouses.

hope the other thread din't put you off miad Quite funny really. don't worry, austrian tiled stives don't sound too poncey to me. fwiw, no way would my dh take dc to a mcd party full stop. not cos he's against mcd I suppose, but he'd have horrors of any social gatherings, but esp ones that contained loads of screaming kids, where he'd have to talk to someone.

Dh used to work for a swiss bank in London. (with my encouragement) he was transferred to the basel office, then we moved to Zurich, then he got a job with an Italian bank. We were supposed to be moving to Milan, but at the 11th hour, well, after he'd been working in Milan 6 months, he changed to a job in Munich, and here we are. Been exactly 1 year now. dd is 11 months old. How fast this year has flown.

Now the kids are changing to the local school, I really hope I can start sorting out some sort of social life. Everyone I meet seems to live so far away, well say 20/30 mins. I think this is ok travel, but they act like I'm in a different Bundesland or something.

Canella, how's your budding social life developing?

Hi Maninadirndl, welcome. Good name, btw.

Had to look up Holzkirchen to see where it is. Isn't Ernest somewhere around there?

Got to go and take DS back to school, DD was at a friends for lunch and he was bored on his own.

XPosted with Ernest. I thought it was something -Kirchen that you were in.

DD did not want to go back to school. That is the first time EVER that she has refused to go to school or kita. Just because of the Zicken at school (don't think that there is a good English equivalent of Zicke).

Luckily her new friend came along and they went off together. She was upset because the Zickenverein don't want to play with the new girl.

Is Zicke bitchiness?

welcome on the thread maninadirndl. How do you like life there in Holzkirchen? (Have to admit I'd never heard of the place before). Will google when I have a chance and see what it's like.

Hope the birthday party went well for trockodile's ds and they're all having a good break.

We're quite a mixed bunch altogether on the thread, aren't we? I don't have a german dh either ernest. Neither does NN (she doesn't post on here I don't think but I count her in as part of us "German" lot) Trockodile and Scootergirl are forces and Gracelo is German with a dh from NZ. Think there are TONS of people from English speaking countries livingi n Germany or married to a German tbh, with a German parent or somehow connected to Germany.

Canella, your little girl doesn't sound well. Have you been to the doctor?

Isn't Zicke a goat and yes zickig sein is sort of catty.

Oh, catty is close.

The best definition of Zicke is probably a group of pre-pubescent girls. A Zicke of girls.

It is more a mixture of cheeky/catty/stamp your foot kind of behaviour.

Hi ZZZen. There are many pretty towns in Bavaria full of colourful and historic town centres.....however Holzkirchen is not one of them. Remember that website www.birminghamitsnotshit.co.uk? I feel like posting pics of the building sites here as the Buggermeister does bugger all for the young families here. The reason its great here though is that Munich is 30 mins away by train, and the Alps also 30 mins. We spend great weekends there often, from swimming in the lakes to deer spotting in the autumn to of course, skiing and Nordic skiing in winter (we live almost on a local "Loipe"). The quality of life is high but the people can be grumpy and undfriendly. It is very isolating here to be honest.

Ernest the secret tip for a great holiday is Montenegro just south of Croatia. I am a fan of Korcula on Croatia though also. Cheap and beautiful. My German is fluent on say the phone but I don't like speaking it much. My mother in law forced me to speak it in the beginning so I had no choice. But when I can cjill I'll watch British television as I think German telly is awful except for perhaps Wetten Dass in autumn or German Pop Idol "Supertar" which the kids like

LOLOL at Buggermeister

We rarely watch German TV, partly because our sat dish does not pick up enough German channels. I prefer UK TV.

I am fairly fluent in German, sometimes get the Endungen wrong. Bloody dativ/genitiv etc.

Starting to get to grips with the French. I have to go to the Marie today (town hall) to enquire about borrowing chairs and tables for DH's 40th. I will translate what I want to say before I go and hope that she speaks a bit of English.

thanks zzzen for worrying but she's not been sick all day and has eaten some bits of bread! back to school for her tomorrow! just wish MIL had taken ds2 with her - he's even more of a pain without his brother! can i resign from parenting this week?

had 2 viewings of our house in the UK which we're trying to sell so i've had the computer on all day waiting patiently for some response from the estate agent! fingers crossed people!!

XXX fingers for a house sale.

PMSL maninadirndl, yes buggermeister is classic! Montenegro? Don't really know anything about that country, will investigate though, feeling quite intrigued. Might be a nice place to go this summer even. Thanks for that tip.

Would have expected the Swiss to speak pretty good English ML, I suppose they just have that super-efficient image.

Ah, the Swiss speaking other languages. I do think that most of them speak at least German, or they should understand a bit as it is their first foreign language in the French speaking part of CH. I think they start from P3, so about age 8ish.

They do not like to speak German here, that is my feeling. I was chuffed today as I managed to arrange for the town to lend us the benches and tables. A friendly MNetter kindly translated what I wanted to say, I memorised part of it then took out my Spickzettl and read the rest.

They will help out with English or German if they realise that you are trying to speak French. Otherwise they just look at you with a Spaniel look in their eyes, head to one side. Like this

in general german speaking swiss hate speaking high german for several reasons, and prefer english to german, tho i was surprised at 1st how many couldn't speak english. mind you, not as bad as in italian part of ch.

Madame Lindt you may wish to deply "the man with the van" Geoff from Bavaria Satellite to get a twin LNB so you can get German telly (quite why I have no idea) and the other Astra sat so you can get proper telly from UK like Channel 4 and the Beeb. Not forgetting the facility when worn out of dumping the "Schratzen" in front of CBeebies to allow yourself to chill (except for Ballamory which even they think is crap).

I admit to liking shallow German telly like Wetten Dass as I like Thomas Gottschalk's international guests (I fetch more beer when German "prominente" come on) and I also love to watch Deutschland sucht den Superstar - the equiv of Pop Idol. That's usually a hoot. Wasnt this year however.

ZZen Montenegro is one of the bits of the splintered old Yugoslavia. It has the Bay of Kotor which is this amazing enclosed bay with thousand year old villages nestled at the foot of spectacular mountains. There's an island in the sea there which has a church and an adjacent island which is artificial - made by the vicars throwing rocks every year on one special day in the sea to build it up. I was lucky one year to see the ceremony with loads of boats full of brancjes to throw on the water and beautiful women (and men for the ladies to look at) looking like nymphs from the sea. Or something.

Yes it beautiful. CNN often has this advert for the place.

Ernest isn't Blindham Tierpark close to you? I prefer it to Munich Zoo as I don't like the 70s concrete animal enclosures. I used to have a Jahreskarte for that place. Any of you in the area we could meet there on a Friday afternoon for a beer.

MIAD
We already have a dual satellite thingy, it worked fine in Germany but we moved last year to the very Western tip of Switzerland, near Geneva, and it does not pick up both satellites so well here. We had a sat guy come out and have a look and he hmmmed and hawwed and shook his head then pronounced our dish to be too small and the solution to be a new system costing CHF 1600 (?1000) which we declined with thanks.

DH was in Croatia on a freebie business trip last year and said it was incredibly beautiful. He did say that he was slightly uneasy about being in a country with such recently troubled past. The thought of the terrible crimes commited not so long ago, against neighbours and colleagues gave him pause for thought.

Hi everyone. Just about settled and dc happy in school but I have been ill, probably stress but I collapsed with breathlessness on Sunday. NHS is great and I am being well looked after until they get to the bottom of it.

Rain rain and more rain up here in the Lake District. Will keep in touch when I am better and more settled hopefully.

ooh Admylin! Yah! Good to hear from you.

I think it must surely be stress and I really hope the doctors can help you with it. Must be scarey to feel out of breath like that. It has just been all go, hasn't it?

Your dc are at school already?! Wow that was fast. The whole thing was fast really. I am so glad to hear they are happy with school.

PS I second ML that you can leave the country but don't think you can leave the THREAD

(scarey music)

Thanks MIAD,Montenegro sounds quite attractive. Not somewhere I had ever thought of going to before. I know what your dh means ML, whenever I meet people from ex-Yugoslavia, they are just lovely and yet a very short time ago it was all-out frenzied killing. Hard to imagine really.

Whispers : I cannot abide Thomas Gottschalk. From his curly long hair to his ill-fitting gawdy suits to his Gummibärchen ads, so I can't watch Wetten das. Bet some of those dares are a scream to watch though

I will admit to having watched Hausfrauentausch while we're at it - and that's seriously rubbish tv. I always ask myself why oh why do people want to go on that show though?

Morning!! had a busy few days but dh at work and dd at school so just me and ds2 and he's quite happy watching bad german kids tv!! no satellite for us - could do with a dose of british tv!!

well the tick thing gets worse - found 4 on ds2 after a walk in the forest yesterday including one on his little willie!! had to cover his eyes as dh got it off with tweezers!! also found 1 on dd - we were in the depths of the forest so no surprise!! think it'll be long trousers tucked into socks the next time!!

hope you all had a good day yesterday for christi himmelfahrt - never celebrated in the UK! no idea what it is really! But it was fathers day too - more of a reason for chocolates in our house!!

admylin - glad to hear you're settling - hope you feel better!!

nips into thread

dd has got through the year

hip horay....

very very close. to being kept back but she did it

Im so proud of her
hope everyone is well

take care

Hello everyone, welcome maninadirndl...

I'm posting from the klinikum; still stuck here, I'm afraid, as DS is very yellow. She's been in her UV spaceship since Wedneday and is soaking up the rays like a little beach bum.

Am quietly fuming at midwives who watch what I drink like hawks; no tea, no coffee (fair 'nuff, I suppose) but no peppermint tea?!? Nicht gut fur die brust, apparently. Abendbrot is very unappetising and so DH is sneaking in tuna mayo sandwiches.

I will now go and read the last few pages and catch up on your news in depth...

OMG Frosch! Mning from the Klinik with your little one just born. That's the stuff!

Is it ds or dd, dd I think. Hope it went ok and you are not in too much pain. Welcome to the world little Frosch junior, you little German kid you!

And.... 10 points to Autriche for getting through the schoolyear. Excellent news cinders. Any news on the great escqpe? Have you noticed that admylin has done hers. Reminds me ofthat tv series (forgotten the name), old one with the allied prisoners of war escaping all the time and the good natured chump Fritz. Stalag 13 is that it?!

PS guinea pig is running on all 4 engines again, thank goodness - and leaving her doodles ALL over the place, little minx