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

[ZZZen]

reden wir weiter...

Mme Lindt, I'm very glad about the school uniform. I defend it against my German friends and family a lot. If I get around to setting up a profile I put a picture of her in uniform on. She looks so grown up and she isn't even 5 yet, not for another 2 weeks and a bit.

Hi Vik, good luck with the house, it's such a German thing to do, isn't it, building your own house. I'm in the final days of a complete lab refurbishment and I'll be having a bottle of champagne all on my own when it's done.

It hasn't stopped raining here since we've come back from Germany 4 weeks ago, horrible.

Oh hello, I have found you again (previously Schulte). Well my neighbours have just painted their front door Muellabfuhrwagen orange, and it hurts my eyes!

Other than that, DD2, who is now 4 months old and a huge baby, still wakes up to 6 times every night and I am not happy. At all.

Hope you're all well, will try to catch up a bit now.

Rain and warm jackets for most of the northern part of UK I think since August! I am thankful, every day here as we are having a great summer, not too hot , sunny, light evenings and no need for jackets. It can go on like this right through to the end of September please mother nature.

Thanks your brother from me Gracelo, I'll maybe try sending all those Whonungessellschaft places a polite Anfrage. I saw those ones in the paper too - they are like Plattenbau and too far from either dh's work or school. We have agreed we should atleast live right near one or the other so it works with one car. If I get desperate should I go and look at the one above the Bestatter? What if I start seeing ghosts though or maybe it's just the office and the morgue is somewhere else?

Feierabend, dd did that to me (well only 3 times a night) but for a whole year. That's my excuse for looking so old, I never recovered.

Oh god, admylin, not a whole year!!! I am all set to do CC as soon as Madam is on 3 solid meals a day. I just hope it will work.

Ds was on solids (well Babybrei) at 4 months as he was always hungry and he slept through after I started it. I couldn't breatfeed him though due to infections but dd wa sbreastfed so I was convinced it was because of that but I still kept it up BF only until 6 months.

I've just had to go and collect dd from Gymnasium as she has a stomach ache, it's going round so she's back in bed with a hot water bottle.

Oh, the thread has picked up a bit today.

Feierabend
I saw you on a thread the other day and wondered if you were a namechanger. Good name that.

Well done to Gracelo's brother, hope that helps you Admylin. I always think that having someone local helping out makes a difference to a house search.

The gardeners are almost done, in fact, it is very quiet at the moment. I hope they have not just left as I wanted to give them a tip. I only have 20chf, do you think that is ok for a tip? It seems a lot (about 15eu) but since we are not paying them and they worked for 2 days here and I don't have anything smaller.

They have done a great job, and yes, we have a huge garden with beech hedge all around it. I think that it has not been cut back for a couple of years, not properly and they have done quite a radical cut this time. The only problem is that it is now possible to see right through the hedge to the patio. C'est la vie. No more topless sunbathing (As if!)

Not topless sunbathing but I can see 2 men on the roof garden of the office block opposite our 3rd floor living room window and they must be a couple, keep hugging each other and I bet they're meant to be at work as it's an office building with a penthouse on top!

Dd just been out of bed saying she's hungry so I gave her zwieback and a yoghurt. I've just finished surfing Immobilienscout (for the 100th time), quite enjoy looking at the really expensive luxury ones that we can't afford. Can't believe some of the rubbish ones on offer either with ancient bathrooms and no decent flooring let alone a kitchen. In Hannover it looks as if the flooring is up to you to put down quite often. How crazy is that? I wouldn't mind in my own place but laying flooring is another mega-cost.

Yes MmeLindt I keep bumping into you too I spend far too much time on MN at the moment. Just because DD2 lets me.

Immobilienscout is great isn't it, I am always browsing properties on findaproperty.co.uk. Only to find that we can't afford to move.

I know, browsing property websites is great, I love the property porn threads on here too!

Gracelo, just looked through all those gessellschaften from Hannover and none have anything the area we want so I'll just have to keep watching and waiting. Might re-think how I worded the ad too so it might catch someones eye in the paper.

Dh wonders what sort of complete lab refurbishment you are having (as he lives in a lab more or less!) he has a new neuro-electrophysiology lab which he just set up.

Admylin, my brother did say that he thinks you would have a much better chance of finding something in Suedstadt. What sort of housing is there in Misburg? It sounds like there may be many people who own rather than rent if there is a shortage of rental places.
I'm working for a company that looks for natural products from marine microorganisms for pharmaceutical (antiinfectives, antioxidant, antiinflammatory, anticancer, antiwhateveryoucanthinkof), food supplements (antioxidants mainly) or cosmetic applications. We are in the process of transforming our collection of microorganisms into something that other companies can easily screen for any compound they may be interested in. That requires a massive reorganization of our entire lab, both staff and facilities. And I was put in charge of pushing the refurbishement through as fast as possible. I'm almost done and I can't wait to be able to go back into the lab and do some science again. I havn't held a pipette for a few month now. I've learned a lot about wiring, plumbing, fire walls (real ones, not IT), air cons, flooring, putting doors through walls, plastering and painting...and I now know a local contractor for anything I might ever need to have done at home.
I would be way too squeamish for neurology. Microbes are my thing, even if they get very smelly at times.

Hi gracelo, thanks for asking your brother again. I know , südstadt has lots of flats but I think because of the early starting time of school that we should try as near to the school as possible. They have to be sitting, books out and pens at the ready for 8am starting and my family are definately not Morgenmenschen!

Wow, I haven't checked in here for so long! We've had a lovely summer and the kids have been back in school since the end of August - 8th and 11th class so things are getting serious and they have a lot to do.

Speaking of Munich, the dh and I are leaving Friday for an expat blogger meet-up thingy that will last until Sunday. I'm looking forward to it since I haven't been to Munich since I was 11 yrs old!

Admylin - sorry the house hunting hasn't been so successful yet. Let me know when you'd have time to get together for a cup of tea or something.

hope you have a great time in munich westvan - think we need to go back "ohne kinder" and i'm sure we'd have a great time!

wow gracelo your job sounds amazingly interesting!! felt really thick reading your post!! i feel my brain has become mush since i've been a SAHM!! only finished my masters last year but not much use for it while i'm doing housework!!

admylin - any news this week on the house situation?

things here are a bit quieter this week - dh is back at work and ds's are back at kiga! and dd is a joy to have on her own!! it was a long august with 3 kids here for 3 solid weeks!!

cant believe i've been here 6 months already!time flies when life is good!! got some german lessons starting at the beginning of october - i really need them!! managed to spend all afternoon at the pool with a german friend and our kids yestersday and talk german all afternoon but i still find it such a struggle!! i'm sure dd's conversations are more complex than mine!! and she's only 8! but in 6 months time i'll be a new woman with all these lessons!

Gracelo
My mind was boggling at your description of your work too. You know that I am now picturing you looking like the heroine from Local Hero, the gorgeous scientist in hornrimmed glasses and white coat. Or was she a marine biologist? I seem to remember something about seaweed.

Is that all the schools back then? Or are the Bavarian schools still off?

The weather has turned very autumny and it has made me realise that it is almost a year since we arrived in Geneva. Time to take stock and reflect on all that has happened in the past year, good and bad. And to think about the aims I had a year ago and what I have achieved (and not achieved, that has to be taken on with more enthusiasm).

I have changed my French lessons to Monday mornings and am now getting individual lessons instead of getting lessons with DH. He felt he was holding me back, which tbh was true. The individual lessons only go until November I think so I have also signed up for lessons on Tuesdays at a school in Geneva.

Parents of schoolchildren who are non French speakers get free French lessons in Geneva. How cool is that? I am taking them up on it. I have signed up for the intermediate course as I feel I am doing ok at the moment. Still very basic French, but I am getting there.

Kids in Baden-Württenberg and Bavaria still have a couple of weeks.

Eh, that should be Württemberg. Still can't get all the state names right!

Hi westvan, still no house or flat in view - have a great time in Munich and we can meet up one morning in town next week maybe? I've been trying to get organised but last week was a catastrophe with school, one having to be picked uzp early because of stomach ache, one having lessons cancelled so finishing at 11am etc. Tuesday was triathlon at a lake nearby (Altwarmbüchen) and teh dc were meant to just get to the lake somehow so I ended up driving a car full of stranded dc who thought they would be accompanied from school (my 2 thought that too). Hmm, first parents evening is next week so I hope we get a phone list sorted out for things like that.

Gracelo's job description is something like what I have to listen to every night when dh comes home, I try to look as if I'm listening but I don't understand a word of it!

Wow, is it really a year Mmelindt, somehow think you've been there for ages. How much longer are you staying or is it open? You should get a top prize for settling in, 'hitting the ground running' as such!

Lol, Württemberg or Württemburg, one t ot two, I always get that one mixed up! I used to live there!

Hmm, had to think about Baden-Würtenberg / Württenberg / Württemberg

Difficult.

There is a town near Wü called Veitshöchheim. Try saying that after a few glasses of wine.

Anyone seen the others around recently? We are missing a few.

I was watching TV the other day and Jeeves and Wooster was on. Reminded me of Finknottle. Is she still around? And Ernest is AWOL, not to mention Zzen, Frosch and Hupa.

Maybe once all the schools are back they will reappear. Or they are lurking waiting to be namechecked.

OI

YOU LOT

GET BACK HERE!

Maybe we should start a new thread. Any ideas for titles?

Yep, scientist in white coat that's me except for gorgeous and the horn-rimmed glasses. I will keep this in mind though when I will eventually need glasses.
I think my science was a lot more interesting when I still went out to sea (inlcuding diving 2000 m to the bottom of the sea in a sub) or to places like Yellowstone and other geothermal areas, but it does pay the mortgage.

Absolutely horrible weather here, there wasn't a single day since we came back from Germany early August without rain. dd is settling in well at school and I'm a bit frazzled with regard to her birthday party next Saturday. It's the first I organize and I started to write lists with things to do, buy, remember. I'm not a list writing person usually.

I´m still here. Woke up to pouring rain and a real chill in the air - it definitely feels like Autumn. Mind you, a couple of days ago the dc were still splashing around in the paddling pool.

Mme Lindt - the year has flown by. Do you feel settled? You always strike me as being very adaptable and seem to strike up new friendships quickly which must really help in a new place.

DD´s start to school seems to have gone well, although she´s completely knackered in the afternoon. I´ve soon learnt to give her a hour to chill out when she gets back before even attempting to talk to her.

Have any of you been to the cinema lately? We´ve got a baby sitter for tonight and I quite fancy the cinema (it´s got nothing at all to do with the fact that they sell Ben & Jerry´s ice cream) and wondered if anyone could recommend anything.

Gracelo - the job sounds amazing.
I fully sympathise on the birthday front. It´s always such a relief when they´re out of the way for another year. At least here in Germany the parties seem to be smaller in scale than in the UK. Here it tends to be a few friends round for a few games and something to eat. The threads on mumsnet about whole class parties, entertainers, caterers etc.etc. make me glad to be in Germany.