6 months today

It's hump day! And yes it is Sunday, not Wednesday. But it is also the half way point for me in this journey. I know for certain that I will be home on or before 6 months, 10 days from today and I left the US the same amount of time ago. It's been a crazy 6 months which I'm glad to have had, but I couldn't be happier that I'm half way home.

One of the biggest struggles in my commitment to be here for a year was knowing that I couldn't afford to go home for Christmas. Christmas in my family is huge, it's all about the people and the time and the food. I've never missed the 7 hour marathon that is Christmas Eve at Granny's until this year. And while some members of my family don't always like it so much, I love it.

I spent the month after Thanksgiving preparing myself for skipping Christmas this year while still trying to be a cheerful and energetic member of the family bringing Christmas cheer to the kids. I knew I wouldn't get a big family event with anyone and that the tree wouldn't get here until the 23rd. I was really struggling with it and feeling pretty home sick. But my host family came through as I never expected.

The kids and I talked about traditions and shared a lot of our culture, the mom, Ari, asked for CD's of my Christmas music which she put on at every opportunity, we all plotted out the perfect Christmas presents to get each other, holding secret pow-wows in the laundry room to get it just right.

On Christmas Eve (Heilige Abend) we went to Mass and I hummed along to Christmas carols (turns out trying to sing something like Silent Night in English while everyone else sings in German is not functional). The end of Mass marks the end of Advent and the beginning of Christmas. As the very last thing, instead of small talk everyone hugs and says "Frohe Weinachten!" for the first time.

Then we came home and the kids had to go upstairs as we got everything ready: dinner, presents, tree, everything. In Germany Santa Claus or Saint Nikolas comes on Saint Nikolas Tag (St. Nick Day, Dec. 6th) and Christ Kind (the Christ child) brings presents on Dec 24th. On getting back from Church there's supposed to be this big reveal of everything for the children so it's like the baby Jesus brought good food and presents and (a newly decorated) tree while you were out celebrating him. Since the kids are 10 and 15 it was more about getting everything perfect than having a Christkind surprise. We even put lit sparklers on the tree (Germans don't have smoke alarms or fire extinguishers in their houses, this is the most terrifying thing ever!).

Next came dinner: the traditional sausages and potato salad (it's not like the American stuff, it's so much better), Ari even went out of her way to buy turkey sausage for me. And after dinner I hid the pickle.

The pickle is a German tradition which we've always done at my house but the Germans didn't know anything about. We had talked about it a few days before and Ari and Mark had gone out shopping to buy a real German (glass) pickle for me to use on my tree from now on. Prim found the pickle so she had to play Santa and deliver the first round of gifts.

Most people don't know how much I love giving presents. My dad's big on the one gift Christmas since he hates shopping so I'm used to a small "haul" from Christmas and was completely prepared for getting my two gifts from home and watching everyone else open the presents I had lovingly ordered. What I wasn't prepared for was that my (host) family all went out and bought me presents. They had all chosen things I had talked about needing or wanting over the last 3 months and really put a lot of thought into my Christmas.

Every time I try to explain this it comes off sounding consumerist, but it wasn't about that at all. I had a wonderful Christmas because the people I was surrounded with went out of their way to listen to me and care about me. That's a kind of compassion we usually reserve for family and it's something I admire and respect in others. I felt really loved and valued this Christmas. I missed home and family. I missed playing silly games and having to eat with a kid on one leg, a dog starring you down and sitting on the living room floor because there are no more chairs. I missed being so excited about Christmas morning that I still woke up at 8 even though no one was getting there until 11. But I had people around me who adopted me and loved me when going home wasn't an option. I am beyond grateful for that.

There are a lot of times in the life of an Au Pair when you're frustrated or feeling abused because of cultural differences, living with a family you don't know to well, and the nature of the job. But I feel blessed to be with a family that wants me here and cares for me everyday.

Merry half-way-point!
Ellbow

Snow Ball Fights

I'm the last Au Pair in a line of five for my current family. The kids have had Au Pairs coming in and out of their lives for 3-4 years. They know that eventually I'm going to leave and as a defense mechanism they don't get too attached, especially the younger (Reason #37 why I will never have an Au Pair). But this disengagement from me makes it difficult to form a positive relationship. On the one hand I have to drag him on walk and force him to play games with me, and on the other hand while he's happy to avoid the special fun times, I'm around all day so he's perfectly comfortable being a grump at me.

Despite his best efforts there are some days he cannot resist enjoying spending time with me, like Dec 3 when we baked 60 sugar cookies that never made it to the neighbors. And last Saturday.

It finally snowed last Saturday. And for those of you in Portland saying I shouldn't complain you've had plenty of snow and cold: it's been under 0 degrees C here for weeks on end, never coming above the freezing point, and also refusing to snow. So when it started to snow on Saturday, the two of us at home alone for the whole day, we got unreasonably excited. We waited and waited for the accumulation to hit a sweet point and then we took both dogs for a snow ball fight walk.

It was amazingly enjoyable, and even if he returned to being a pre-teen the moment we got inside and he realized how wet and cold he was, we had one good day together.

My mom at this point of the story started wondering if I really was in a good place. My mom, like most people, is able to hear the negative louder than the positive. I've had two really good days with the kids in the last 2 weeks. When you're more used to removing yourself from the equation because they don't want you around at all, 2 days is a lot. 2 days means that things are looking up.

Thanksgiving

I missed Thanksgiving in the states, but thankfully my family here is just deranged enough to give into my pleas for an American holiday. I ended up cooking for days and having to complicate recipes because they don't have things like condensed soup, French's fried onions, and canned pumpkin puree here. But in the end we had a very lovely, all American (tasting), German Thanksgiving dinner for 16. We did have to do it on a Sunday because Thursday wasn't a holiday over here.

The typical Martha Stewart chef photo.

Prim found the combination of Pandora Christmas music and the screen saver of hot men very amusing.

It was also the first day of Advent

My reward: a visit from St. Nicholas

London Days 3, 4 and 5

Having spent the first two days only traveling through central London at night and primarily by tube I was over joyed to find that London was already well into Christmas-craze the last week of November.

A proper department store, selling some spirit

The main thoroughfare was well lit with huge decorations and even a functional snow globe set up around the fountain at Piccadilly Circus

On day 3 I took a nice walk through Kensington Gardens and Hide Park (angry-fist the repairs on the tube) which led me past several embassies and mansion-ettes that maybe 1% of the world could afford (a sign at the gate to the street told me that photos were not allowed, so you'll have to imagine Daddy Warbucks' mansion on a street between Notting Hill and Buckingham Palace). And then through the gorgeous parks which, being me, made me want to put on a Victorian gown, carry a parasol and had me singing "Thank Heaven for Little Girls".

On the far corner of Hyde Park I finally met up with some Hungarians and went exploring Winter Wonderland, the Christmas market that was trying to be a gussied up Oktoberfest. No but really. Nearly every stand had some Bavarian theme to it.

A talking moose head with Bavarian flags

A poorly labeled Tannenbaum

The Santa trash bin. No. But really.

What they actually were calling "Oktoberfest"

The haunted Christmas house

And the topping on the cake: an animated drunk Bavarian who sang and yelled at you in German

After a disappointing double loop around Winter Wonderland, we never did find the circus or zoo that the signs pointed to, we traipsed farther across London to the British Museum, home of the Rosetta Stone. Had I been in a more energetic mood the museum, crowded as it was, would have been great. As it was I was exhausted, uninterested in reading plaques, and only able to focus on the grandfather clock display and finding the Rosetta Stone.

Then I parted ways with my Hungarians, opting for a more touristy, less informational hop back and forth around the city center. I went to King's Cross...

How much fandom can I fit into one trip???

And then to Buckingham Palace...

And then to Big Ben...

And the London Eye

And then back across town again to watch the Doctor Who 50th. I won't annoy non-Whovians with too much detail, but please let me say: I thought the 50th was perfect, flawless save for the sad fact that Tennant is aging, I loved every moment and was so stressed and concerned for my Doctors, and I couldn't have made done John Hurt's Doctor better if I had made him my life's work. I just wish Billy had been there as Rose just a bit. Okay, moving on.

On day 4 I continued to not sleep and have no energy so I decided to take the day to go up to more touristy places like 221B Baker Street, home of Sherlock Holmes (where my camera battery promptly died; angry-fist the effects of cold on battery life)...

And then up to Notting Hill and along Portobello Road for a long afternoon of post card writing from a cafe. While up on Notting Hill (pro tip: the market is WAY better on Saturday and you just end up around tourists on Sunday) I went into a random bookshop that looked interesting. The layout seemed really familiar, like I'd seen it in a film or something. I went in looking for detailed travel books about Ireland and a copy of "The Dinosaur Who Pooped Christmas" but couldn't find what I was looking for. The women in the shop were very friendly and helpful and know their stock by heart and I was sorry not to buy anything. Then I stepped out of the door into a crowd of tourists taking pictures in front of the shop. I had naturally failed to realize that this was the book shop used in the film Notting Hill, but on the bright side they ordered the book I was looking for and I felt very important (and a little daft).

Sunday night I met up with a couchsurfing person and had one of those middle-of-the-road couchsurfing experiences. While the guy was not unkind or creepy, we clearly had nothing in common and I just wanted to get my butt back to my horrible hostel bed and sleep. He wanted to drink and sit in a bar that looks like the Vegas airport and ask me a series of questions that didn't really help us get to know one another. But that's one of the pit-falls of couchsurfing: you never know if you are a good friend match or not based on a couple of emails.

One cool thing was that we were out at the Cutty Sark which is this old British privateers ship they've moored into the promenade and you can walk all around it. It was pretty cool!

Monday was my last full day in London. I built on my experience of the last few days where walking around real neighborhoods had been really enjoyable, but tourist stops had been frazzling. So instead of really doing anything all day I just walked around the City of Westminster. Westminster is, yes, where the Abbey is, but it's also the area with the private parks and the fancy residences which all look exactly like Upstairs, Downstairs and 27A Wimpole Street. Walking around acting like a local, without the option to put in headphones, and not really trying to get any where was the best way to spend the last day. I fell in love with the city walking around these streets, and even living abroad, I've never loved any city accept for Portland. Loving Westminster is a big step for me.

In the evening I wrapped up a rather fanciful day by seeing the production of Les Mis at the Queen's Theatre. I went to see it because Carrie Hope Fletcher, who is a really cheerful youtuber, is in it. And I have to say, while seeing and then later meeting Carrie was wonderful, and the whole cast was absolutely fantastic (I don't think I've ever seen such a flawless execution in a stage production, ever), I still hate this opera. I just can't stand the plot lines and the repetitious themes and how much they try to squeeze into a 3 hour production. But if I concentrated on each scene individually, ignoring the overarching drawbacks, I really enjoyed the moments separately. The cast of #LesMisOfficial is really quite talented. And I say that having seen the original cast of Wicked.

After leaving the autograph-getting part of the night things moved quite quickly. I went to bed for 4 hours. Got up early. Caught the correct bus which was running 8 minutes later than google maps said it would be. Therefore missed my 5:10 am coach to the airport. Couldn't get on the 6 am coach because it was full and no one had bothered to forewarn us. Had to buy an additional ticket from another company to get to the airport on time. Had the flight delayed just enough so I got stressed that I would miss my non-refundable train back from the airport in Germany. Mis-read my booking schedule and ended up taking an unnecessary taxi to catch a non-existent train. Waited in the snow for 2 hours (at least Germany had the courtesy to snow for me). And 12 hours later got home. It essentially took me the same amount of time to fly to London as it would have been to DRIVE.

But overall, even being happy to be back in Germany, having slept horribly and over-paid for everything except food, I loved London. I think on the next trip I'll couchsurf and aim for a London Society trip: high tea, an evening opera show, quiet hours at the Tate, and more wandering about the City of Westminster.

More photos as the weather holds...

...and my brain doesn't ever stop singing "Feed the Birds" after walking past Marble Arch

London: Days 1 & 2

So this week I went to London! The short version: the city is beautiful, it's the first place other than Portland where I've ever seriously considered living. Walking around the parks, meeting the people, not being mocked for my fandoms. It was loverly. I wasn't sad to leave for the reasons elaborated below, but I also wouldn't say no to a life time in the City of Westminster.

The long version:

I started traveling at 7:20 am and bus, train, taxi, plane, coach, tube, bus, and 12 hours later I finally arrived at the hostel. In terms of travel 12 hours isn't so bad, but considering I that I paid separately for every piece of transportation and I only needed to move one time zone to the left, I wasn't too happy with the schedule. Also it gets dark at 4 in London (what's with that), so my whole trip from getting off the coach to arriving at the hostel was a little unnerving. Do yourself a favor and don't take your first bus trip in London outside of zone 1 in the dark.

The coach ride from Stansted was actually really enjoyable. Even though it was almost two hours of bus ride (longer than the actual flight) we went through the English country side for about an hour and then drove past every major sight to see on our way to Victoria Station. There was an Asian family sitting around me who were pointing out sights with the assist of Google Maps on their iPad (pro tip: such a good idea! It was like a free bus tour of the city.).

The down side was arriving at the nearly empty hostel, hungry, tired and still without money only to have my worst fears confirmed. The bad reviews on hostel world were much more accurate than the good. I stayed at The Monkeys in the Trees hostel which was falling apart, moldy, and while reasonably priced for London, not at all worth the 18L or so I paid for a 6 bed female dorm. Also, being located on bus line west of Hammersmith, it was in not the greatest neighborhood, and really sketch to walk back to after midnight or leave before dawn.

Luckily, the equally miserable other visitors at the hostel were happy to venture out. I spent my first night in the pub around the corner with some Aussie boys, drinking my dinner. (Pro tip: cash machines, or ATMs as I know them, might say "free withdrawls" but they're going to charge you if you're using a credit card like I do. Only take out cash once to avoid unreasonable fees; Pro tip #2: beer is CHEAP, actually alcohol is just cheap, so drink.)

Pretty much sums up the relationship of these two Aussies

Every single night I found myself falling into my bed and going to sleep immediately, regardless of when I got back, which included falling asleep at 8:30 pm on Thursday and waking up at 5 am on Friday. The early wake up was certainly excusable in this case: on day 2 I spent all day out at the ExCel Conference Center for the Doctor Who Celebration! I'm a nerd okay. I did warn you about the fandoms.

From beginning to end, the Celebration was awesome (and chuck full of queing). I was really happy to be there for the 10 Quid my Ebay ticket cost.

All of the Doctors greeted you going in and out of ExCel

We spent the morning queing and at the special effects panel. The director of SFX (or something to that effect) was there telling us about all of the explosions and shooting and bangs that he has to coordinate. Also how he accidentally set David Tennant's hair on fire. Did you know that Matt Smith's Doctor's jumpiness around explosions is actually Matt being scared of the sparks and bangs and falling? And when he jumped through the glass door in Closing Time the pressure used to explode the glass went off a little late and the stunt guy apparently got knocked out by it. That's what you get for only having one take.

They exploded this Dalek on stage and also brought out a Cyberman for a shooting demo. Apparently they have only 6 Daleks or something like that, 3 of which can explode nicely. It was really fun having the guy talk about things they do that are near home-remedy SFX. Like how there are actually people crouched down inside the Daleks who move them around like Flintstones cars.

When they brought out the Cyberman (scary as hell in real life, he was walking around after lunch), they had two volunteers come on stage. This poor kid dressed up in 11 cosplay got up there not knowing what was going to happen and then a Cyberman burst through the wall. You can see both the kid and the host were genuinely terrified of the Cyberman. Even the SFX people didn't want to touch him and kept asking him to turn around, jumping when he moved and trying to keep at a safe distance. But 11 got his revenge, he got to shoot the Cyberman, with Rose's gun from Journey's End no less.

After the SFX show we got qued up for more. No one was able to explain exactly why we were queing or where we were going, but we ended up in the big hall with exhibits, smaller panels and a little shop of course. The sets from the opening part of the 50th were all set up at the entrance. I thought they were classic who or reproductions so I only took one photo, but after seeing the episode I wish I had taken more!

I did just sort of lean over and casually stroke this piece of set though. You know you've gotten too into your fandom when you cannot control your impulse to touch sets and costumes.

The friend I met up with got to laugh at me a lot as we came around the corner and I got unreasonably excited about the dinosaurs. I love Jurassic Park and the idea of petting a Triceratops, even one made of rubber, was just SO exciting.

By and far my favorite part of the day was seeing Bernard Cribbins. He plays Wilf in Doctor Who, was also in Faulty Towers as Mr. Hutchinson, and has done more British comedy than I can recognize. He is a really sweet, little bit dirty, funny as hell man. Really. He spend an hour just telling us stories about everything and everybody. He couldn't praise Davies or Tennant enough. He sang us the first bit of "Whole in the Ground" and talked about his music career. Really, tired as I was, I couldn't help but smile from ear to ear the whole time he was around. Bernard Cribbins, my new favorite actor from Doctor Who.

After Cribbins we had a lot of time to kill so we wandered around the auditorium. There were a lot of costumes and booths and shopping of course (though you had to que to shop which was a little strange). Standing next to these costumes, all of which we weren't allowed to touch of course, was pretty surreal.

Then as the last official part of our day we had two panels: "Regenerations" and "The Eleventh Hour". Regenerations had 3 of the classic Doctors, the same three who did the 5ish Doctors Reboot, who had fun bantering together. They were Doctors 5, 6, and 7 so they all replaced one another and really had a bit of bickering between them. But hearing their stories and banter and seeing clips from their episodes really made me want to watch some classic Who. Unfortunately the auditorium was very warm, we were a bit far away, and I was ready for a nap, so I only took in about half of what they were saying.

Eleventh Hour got the current big-wigs on stage. Having moved during the interlude we were only about 100 feet from the stage, so we just kind of sat there gawking at Matt Smith and Moffit and Coleman and Wilson. This was the one point where I wish I had bought tickets for Sunday as the panel couldn't say anything about the 50th or the Christmas episode so their answers to questions were aggravatingly vague.

After the panel we wandered around a bit more, took some photos of people signing autographs and then took off. The conference had some great potential, and was definitely easy to nerd out to, but fell a little short on content. Also Tennant, Piper, Darville and Gillan weren't there on Friday (or at all as far as I know), which definitely left me feeling a little empty. I would have enjoyed a panel that could actually answer questions but had Darville and Gillan or Tennant and Piper instead of the whole group that just wrapped the Christmas Special and were under a gag order.

But I still left that second day with a nice happy feeling (and throbbing feet)!