If there is one song that I would like to be representative of May in Berlin, it would be this one. Everything about this song. The beat, the words, the feeling you get when you listen to it. The last few weeks have been insanely busy and are only going to get busier. Right now I’m still only working for one school, but things are looking good with school #2 and I’m going in to meet with my boss from school #3 tomorrow to talk about starting and to sign a contract. All week I will be running around teaching 3 or 4 classes a day at least, and my paycheck for this month is going to reflect all of this, which is even more beautiful!

In addition to my work life finally coming together, my social life has also been blooming in this springtimey Berlin, despite the fact that the weather every day has been 50 degrees, cloudy, and generally rainy and gross. I’ve met even more great people and made more friends in the last few weeks, I’ve been doing more fun things and having great days and great weekends. This weekend was an example of an honestly perfect weekend. Especially since, now that I’ve started working so hard, I feel like I deserve to do things like stay in bed all day, or sit outside and watch bands and drink beers at 2 pm on a Sunday. Weekends are only real weekends when you work all week and you really savor them, I think. The biggest headache right now is just that last weekend my laptop finally died. Thus, I’ve been spending a lot of time in the sketchy internet cafe near my apartment  (which is where I’m writing this at this very moment!) and spending even more time listening to my ipod in my room while reading books. It’s actually not so bad, but since I’m pretty much the luckiest girl in the world, one of my students has offered to lend me one of their four laptops for long-term, basically until I can afford to get my own, which is unbelievably generous and sweet. This means that after Tuesday, I can resume my general internet addiction and get back to spending my weekends hungover, watching the Daily Show in bed.

This week is going to be my busiest week yet! I’ve picked up lots of courses, and will be teaching tomorrow from 7:45 to 9:15, from 10 to 11:45, from 1 to 2:30, then meeting up to sign a contract for job #3 (!!!!!!!!) at 3 pm, coming home for a bit, then teaching again from 6-7:30. Tuesday will be a bit easier, class from 10-11:45 and then from 1-2:30, with a private lesson at 8. Wednesday will be another 7:45 am start, with classes at 10 and 1, but Wednesday night I’m going to see Pavement!!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s hard to express with interrobangs exactly how excited I am about seeing one of my all-time, top 5 favorite bands EVER, but try to understand if you can. Thursday and Friday will be more of the same, just a little less early morning, and then Friday night I’m going to see Boys Noize at some club somewhere (clearly the plans on this one are a bit shakier, but I have faith it will happen). Things have basically become everything I was waiting for since graduation and I’m just trying to catch my breath and realize how nice it feels to have maybe 1/8th of the worries I’ve been carrying around since I graduated. Just being able to take deep breaths and be happy … it’s simply joyful. Now all I need is some sunshine in my life, and it will honestly be complete.

i didn't take this picture but i like it.

Dear my blog

I’m sorry that I’ve neglected you for so long. It really wasn’t my intention. You see, sometimes things get a little crazy and it’s hard to even wrap my brain around sitting down and sorting all my thoughts out in order to formulate them into logical posts. I’m well aware that the best way (and probably the only way) to be a successful blogger (or diarist for that matter) is to write EVERY DAY, but I’m working on it. I’m not perfect, but who is? Forgive me?

Okay.

The thing about April has been that honestly, for the most part, everything that COULD have gone wrong, WENT WRONG. And then some. When I left off, I had plans to go to the Bürgeramt to officially register my apartment. This honestly should have been no problem. So I showed up sometime in the late morning, got a waiting number, filled out the paperwork, and sat and waited. And waited. And waited and waited, etc. Finally my number was called, I got up and went into my assigned room and handed a seemingly pleasant woman my paperwork. So she pulls everything up, la dee da, here’s my passport, when suddenly there’s a problem. She tells me that my roommate, the only other person who lives in my apartment, is not the “main renter” whose name is on the lease, but its someone elses name. I saw this name on our mailbox and our doorbell, but I have absolutely no idea who this person is, funnily enough! So I insist, no, my roommate can rent to me, but this woman will not budge. So I call up my roommate (who by the way, does not have a cell phone), and he doesn’t answer. I come home, he’s miraculously home anyway, despite not having answered his phone, and I ask him who the hell this mystery name person is and why this is all happening. So a long explanation later, he shuffles around, finds some paperwork, and decides to join me at the Bürgeramt. We go back to the same lady, and he proceeds to be, in my opinion, pretty damn rude to this office-lady who is just trying to do her job. In the end, we don’t have the right paperwork anyway to prove that he is the main renter, so we need to get the paperwork from the landlord. We call the landlord, their office is already closed (of course!) but the lady had said all we’d need to do is fax the paperwork to her and we can fix the problem. So once we actually get in touch with the landlord, they REFUSE to fax it. They insist they will only mail it, snail mail style. Keep in mind, I had my appointment at the Ausländerbehörde to get my visa IN TWO DAYS and basically started hyperventilating until I realized that I had my old registration from the place I was staying before, which was technically still “good” because I hadn’t registered my new place yet (ah the confusing ins and outs of German bureaucracy …… and this is ONLY the beginning, trust me.) So, I could still technically get my visa, and I just decided to wait until we got our dumb piece of paper that was so all-important for me to live where I currently ALREADY LIVE.

Then the Ausländerbehörde. Thursday, I showed up in plenty of time, waited, listening to my Bill Maher podcast and trying to be calm. My number was called, my friend Antje accompanied me and we walked into the room where probably the nastiest looking bureaucrat in the whole building was waiting for us. He had rotten teeth and gross stringy hair … but anyway. He looks over all of my paperwork and then tells me, nope, sorry, no visa. Why? Because my health insurance was not good enough, not expensive enough, clearly didn’t comply with the recently passed laws etc etc. So he said, make an appointment, get some better (read: SUPER EXPENSIVE) private health insurance, and come back and it’ll all be kosher. So I left … FURIOUS. Absolutely furious. Yelling and cursing in rapid-fire East Coast English, unable to formulate the German words and phrases to encompass exactly how frustrated I really was. So what did I do then? I went home and sitting in my mailbox was the letter from the landlord. So I marched BACK to the Bürgeramt DETERMINED to register my place. And after waiting probably another 2.5 hours in a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT bureaucratic office building, I did it. Minor victories are still worth something, right?

So all of this meant that once I got my fancy-pants, super expensive private insurance, I had to go BACK to the A-Behörde (as we’ll call it). So on Monday I woke up at 4 am (a time when I’m usually considering leaving a bar …) hopped on the train and made my way back up to Westhafen to wait in line! I got there a little after 5 am and was about #20 in line. Now keep in mind, the gates first open at 6 am, and the DOORS open at 7 am. So this means you’re stuck waiting outside, in spite of the weather, for at least TWO HOURS. Also, what’s really cute, is that in certain cultures “waiting in line” has very little significance, so once the gates open, people basically bum rush you to get to the front of the line and the whole thing becomes a lot more unpleasant and aggressive. Eventually, though, I got inside and 2 hours later had YET ANOTHER APPOINTMENT, this time for one week later.

The end result of all of this? On Tuesday, April 20th, at 12:30 pm I officially got my visa. A one-year Aufenthaltstitel (meaning I need to renew this bad boy by April 19th 2011, if I want to stay), as well as an Arbeitserlaubnis (Work Permit) to work as a freelance English teacher. Boom. Done. Almost 2 months after I showed up in this city, I’M LEGAL BABY.

So what else went wrong this month? Oh lets see, two failed trips to Ikea, one due to it being closed for Easter Holidays, the second because, surprise surprise! Ikea does not accept credit cards in Germany!!!! So! Being broke as I am, I literally did not have the cash for any of what I wanted. After spending close to 2 hours in the Ikea, carefully picking out all of my items for purchase, I had to leave it all sitting there at the check out and walk out in disgrace, basically. Oh there were tears. What else? Assorted other fails, really painful blisters on my feet due to inappropriate footwear, extra bureaucratic headaches at the Finanzamt as well, where I went to get my tax number (but I showed THEM who’s boss! sort of!)

I’d like to end this post with a review of all the GOOD things! Because as I’ve said before, it’s important to stay positive and now that I’m looking back on April, I think the good outweighs the bad, and the outcome has been overall quite good.

1. I conquered the beast that is the Ausländerbehörde, and after 1.5 months of trying, 4 separate trips there, waking up at 4 am to stand in line outside and watch the sunrise with dozens of other stressed out foreigners, €50, a lot of running around and a giant pile of paperwork – I HAVE A VISA. I set out with a goal, and I accomplished it, and now I can legally work and more importantly – legally GET PAID. No more one-meal-of-spaghetti-a-day. No more freaking out about paying my rent (well maybe one more month of that …) but really! I get paychecks now!
2. Related to the whole work/paycheck thing – I have a job! I have three jobs actually! I got invited to accelingua’s training and orientation seminar on April 10th and 11th which means that I am now officially an employee of accelingua GmbH and that I can start teaching as soon as a class opens up for me. I have already started working for Iberika and my classes there keep growing. First I just had Herr K., now I have an evening Business English Course that’s all ladies which is really fun, and I’ve picked up some days in an intensive course. All of this results in me getting my FIRST paycheck at the end of this month! And all of it going to pay my rent! Yippee! But this also gives me hope for next month, starting classes with accelingua and also going in to talk to the people at inlingua GmbH as well (aka my third job offer). If all continues to go well, I’ll be working more and more and earning more money and by the end of the summer, will be really comfortable.
3. I’ve also picked up more private students to replace the ones who have left the city or who don’t need class anymore, etc.
4. I’m starting a free Spanish class tonight with Iberika. It’s free because I’m an employee of the school, which is great! I’m hoping to really improve my Spanish this year and maybe even start learning Portuguese eventually! It’s also exciting to have something to do in my free time besides read/watch entire TV series online.
5. I’ve been reconnecting with old friends and have been feeling really good about my social life lately. This weekend was the first time since I’ve been back that my social calendar has been really full. Honestly, when I think about it, it’s practically the first time since I left Berlin originally that my social calendar has been this full! Meeting for coffee, for drinks, for outdoor bbqs in the park, teaching, parties, etc. This weekend I was all over the place! It was amazing, though, and it’s so good to have my friends back and have people to hang out with.
6. Tim was stuck in Berlin for almost an extra week! Due to my new best friend/favorite thing/lifelong obsession – THE ICELANDIC VOLCANO. Eyjafjallajokull. Just … yes. Basically the Giant Ash Cloud Of Death that hovered over fair Europe kept my best friend grounded and forced him to hang out with me, which was so nice. Lots of dinners, of eating Ritter Sport on the canal and enjoying the nice weather, going vintage shopping, eating yummy köfte sandwiches, swapping stories and listening to ridiculous German radio stations. I miss him even worse now, but I was lucky to get him for some extra time! Spoiled, even!
7. I’ve been making all kinds of new friends! I met up with a friend of a friend, for example, who is another expat and with whom I had a really amazingly fun time just drinking beers and eating currywurst. We had so much in common and got along so well and already have plans to hang again this week. I also recently met up with a girl from my accelingua training whom I also really adore – she’s Belgian (or actually Flemish? It’s a bit confusing), but grew up speaking French, went to NYU, speaks PERFECT English, even with an impeccable American accent, and is just so open and talkative and hilarious and sweet. She’s really wonderful and I know she and I are going to get along really well too. There’s something about making new friends that I really love because I swear it’s so much easier for me here and in the US I have the hardest time making new friends or even holding on to my old ones … I still haven’t 100% figured out why, but there must be some reason for it.
8. I got a new bed! A big comfy bed that takes up like 1/3 of my room and I LOVE it. Now I sleep like a baby every night.
9. I’ve also started dogsitting Ditte which is very good for my psyche, and also allows me to catch up on my MTV Deutschland intake.
10. I’ve been here for two months already and I really think that so far I’ve been successful. I’ve now got a job, I’ve got a visa, I’ve got a decent apartment (more on that later), I survived the Ausländerbehörde (much more on that later), and it’s now springtime! It’s nice outside, I might eventually be able to retire my wool coat (but not yet!), and the trees are blooming. May is going to be really good I just know it.

And so I leave you with this gem, a little old but still a sweet jam. For some reason The Gossip always feels springtimey to me and Beth Ditto is just fabulous in this video. I recommend this for all your cleaning-the-kitchen/dancing-around-in-your-bedroom/singing-in-the-shower needs.

This week is going to be really huge for me and I’m feeling rather apprehensive. I’m teaching tonight, which will be nice. Maybe they’ll even feed me again … but at the very least, it will be nice to leave the house and make some money. I’ll be teaching this student every night this week until Friday when she has her job interview. I’m not sure if the class will continue after Friday, but hopefully the interview goes well and they’ll want to hire me on a permanent basis. My last student who was preparing for an interview got the job, so I’ll just have to keep my fingers crossed that my luck continues. Tomorrow I am waking up early and heading to the Bürgeramt in order to register myself in my new dwelling place. This is an important step toward getting my visa, but luckily an easy one. Tuesday I have my first real official class with what I’ll call School #3. I’m teaching someone I’ll call Mr. K – a German businessman who, according to my boss, is pretty laid back about the whole “making progress” thing and just wants to kind of learn English for fun. I’m supposed to give him lots of homework and do whatever fun things I want, which is good news because I’m more than a bit scared to start out in the TEFL field and I want to seem professional and capable. Having a rather laid-back student means that I can be a little less stressed and probably have more fun. After that I have an Ikea date with Antje which is extremely exciting because, well,  Ikea is The Happiest Place On Earth. At least for me. I’ve spent all weekend fantasizing about what I will buy. The list includes a pillow, blanket, area rug, and some basic dishware, possibly some candles and knick-nacks! I’m so excited by all of this it’s almost pathetic … but you have to enjoy the small things, right?

Wednesday I will be mentally preparing myself for Thursday, aka The Day Of Reckoning, aka my appointment at the Ausländerbehörde. Just thinking about it makes my stomach turn … Sometimes I feel that it will be easy – I’ve got all the paperwork they need, I’ve got all sorts of proof of hireability, of established schools who want me to work there, I’ve got copies of my diploma, my transcript and my TEFL certificate, I’ve got pictures of myself, I’ve got letters from the health insurance company, I’ve got an apartment and a bank account and a job and I’m fluent in German … who WOULDN’T want me to immigrate into their country/city? Right?!? And yet … I’m terrified. What happens if I get turned away? Do I just book a flight back home? Do I try again? Will they kick me out? I’m not sure what exactly is so terrifying about the whole German bureaucracy thing, but it makes me feel completely irrational and out of control. I don’t want to jinx anything, but I will be praying and wearing every good luck charm I have (which is limited to lucky underpants and the evil-eye bracelet I bought myself in Istanbul) and if all goes well I will be celebrating in some fashion … most likely with a beer and a bar of Ritter Sport and ecstatically calling my mother.

What has really cheered me up this weekend has been having long-term thoughts and daydreams. The weather has also been helping – its been sunny and springtimey, a bit brisk but definitely nice enough to want to sit outside in a coat and soak up the sunshine as much as possible. The plans are thus: I plan on continuing to accumulate private lessons and also try to get some translation gigs while working as much as humanly possible, substituting, even babysitting, whatever it takes. As things pick up and I start making money, I plan on continuing my strict budget of spending next to nothing every day, which will also be aided by the purchase of a bicycle which will eradicate the need to ride the u-bahn. (Thinking about my bike is ALMOST as exciting as thinking about Ikea!!) So I basically will start raking in tons of cash while maintaining my current hermit crab habits and my penny-pinching ways. Once I’ve got my rent paid, next month’s rent saved, and an extra €300 in the bank, I’m sending it home and paying down my debt. I want to pay as much as possible now while I’m earning in Euros and I want to squash my credit card debt in 1-2 years. I’m also excited to make this little room just homey enough to be a nice retreat for the next few months, and to start looking for a new apartment this Summer, maybe even with Laura and Hannes! New clean and comfy apartment, best friends, bikes, sitting outside in parks, saving money … these thoughts are basically my best friend right now.

I’ve spent most of the morning reading the NY Times and the afternoon this far listening to npr. I miss my family so much at times like this, but yesterday I found a copy of The Ten Commandments online, and I watched all three-and-a-half-hours of it in my bed. It was surprisingly comforting, even if it’s not the same thing as actually being home. But spring is here and I’m going to put some faith into the power of positive thought and think the best for this week! In honor of my newfound (if slightly forced) positivity, here is my new springtime anthem:

nom nom nom nom nom

I decided to start this post off with probably the sweetest, most adorable bunny on the whole entire internet in an effort to ward off my terrible mood.

I have officially fallen victim to homesickness. It’s not pretty. It started yesterday, when I moved from the room I was staying in for the week to my new place. I was very excited to move into my new room because I could finally unpack and feel at home somewhere. Unfortunately when I got here, things weren’t really as I had hoped. Firstly, the room itself was filthy, disgustingly dirty. It’s an older apartment with this cool semi-unfinished wood floor and high ceilings, but that also makes it even more difficult to clean. The whole room was covered in dirt and hair and dust bunnies, the windows were disgusting, and the rest of the apartment isn’t exactly the cleanest place I’ve ever lived, but I can overlook that (or rather, I will remedy that this week). So instead of quietly unpacking, I spent all of yesterday afternoon cleaning – but first I had to buy Mr. Clean (or as he is known in Berlin, Meister Proper) and then run around the Bergmannkiez looking for a bucket to clean with (don’t even get me started on THAT adventure …) The other cute surprise in this room was a broken bed – somehow the piece of wood that holds up the wooden slats that support the mattress broke off. I don’t really want to envision how it broke, but the mattress now sits on the floor somewhat underneath the bedframe, which is extremely uncomfortable and awkward. I also have one thin blanket and no pillow, so I slept last night with a makeshift pillow I fashioned out of a sweatshirt stuffed with other clothes. Needless to say, I did not sleep all too well last night.

I had hoped to remedy this situation today  regarding the bed, the lack of blanket/pillow/general comfort, and also buy some room basics like a rug, a lamp, a curtain rod. This plan was thwarted by the fact that it is Karfreitag – also known as Good Friday – and therefore every store, supermarket, and most importantly Ikea is closed. Of course I only realized this AFTER I made the trip over to the Ikea, thereby wasting 4 euros and 2 hours of my day. Tomorrow, on the other hand, is not an official holiday and I am assuming the Ikea will be open, so I will just have to try again.

On top of all that, my roommate reminded me that I agreed to pay my rent on the first of the month, which is a huge problem at the moment. That is really what set off the severe homesickness and subsequent crying jag. In my experiences here, the onset of homesickness is generally triggered by two things: 1. a series of small frustrating events, most of which having to do with something cultural, and 2. holidays. Being an expat during a holiday is the most isolating experience, and I’m not even religious. It mostly has to do with the combination of stores being closed, missing family and friends, being unable to connect with usual holiday traditions from home, coupled with the fact that people tend to leave the city and stay with their families, making you feel like an orphan with no friends.

Today the various components that led to my big pity party were the feeling of loneliness, the weird feeling of being in a new apartment with a new roommate whom I barely know, almost every single store I needed being closed, the nasty bleeding blister I got on my heel while trying to find a store that was actually open, the guilt I felt realizing that I couldn’t exactly pay my rent this week and having to tell my new roommate that I’ll get it to him in like, a week or two … and then the fear that I won’t be able to afford it this month and then again next month on the first, and also pay my health insurance … basically the frustration and anxiety came together and made the whole thing a big mess. On top of it all, when I finally discovered the teeny little Turkish supermarket across the street was open, the man working there gave me a yellow-dyed Easter egg which was so sweet and kind, I nearly started bawling right there in the store. Even nice things are making me want to cry! I just really miss my mom at times like this. Seeing the dyed Easter egg made me wish I was home with my mom, cooking our traditional Easter lamb with garlic and watching The Ten Commandments on tv while munching on all manner of peeps, chocolate eggs and my personal favorite, Fannie Mae pink chocolate bunnies. If I really wanted to, I’m sure I could finagle a video rental card and try to find The Ten Commandments here, I could go find some lamb and I could sit in my room watching Charlton Heston and Anne Baxter while munching on some chocolate, but it’s just not the same.

The good news is that I have gotten more jobs in the last few days, and also the people I currently teach are all very sweet and generous and are constantly feeding me, which is always very comforting. Last night I had a tradition Uyghur meal with the woman I’m currently teacher, her husband and their adorable 18 month old son. Tomorrow I’m looking forward to seeing the Neumann family again, whose daughters I tutor, and who also insist on feeing me every week and chatting with me over tea about anything and  everything. I’ve been extremely lucky to meet such kind and generous people who make my job so enjoyable. 

It’s always hard to know what to do in these situations of depression and homesickness. I used to just call up a friend, generally an American friend, and get out of my apartment, but that has proved challenging this time around since most of my friends are temporarily (or permanently) out of the city and I’m no longer “studying abroad”. Today I was lucky. I talked to a friend on gchat, drank some water, calmed down, continued unpacking/decorating my room, and then, just as the crying had stopped, an old friend invited me out for the night. What would I have done if he hadn’t called? I guess I would have made dinner and eventually curled up and watched a movie until I fell asleep. I still wonder if there are better homesickness cures that I’m ignoring. Sometimes I used to call my parents, but given my current dire monetary state, spending more money on transatlantic calls seems a bit wasteful.

So to end this entry on a positive note, here is a list of positive things that are happening soon:
- next week I start my first real, official, paid job as an English teacher with a small school in Charlottenburg
- tomorrow Ikea will be open and then I will have a pillow and a blanket
- next week I will see Kathi (which is basically at this point like seeing an older sister, and just as comforting) and she has offered to give me her old bed/mattress which will solve the whole broken-bed-debacle going on right now.
- tonight I am seeing an old friend, next week another old friend is coming back (for permanent ), and it’s only 3 more months until Laura (my best friend) comes back for good (!!!!!)
- now that I have some postcards and my curtain up, this room is feeling a bit cozier and more liveable

So on that note …

nom nom nom nom nom nomnomnom

 Oh, and one last thing.

In Mark Vanhoenacker’s article, he details the joys of sitting in the window seat on commercial airliners, something I have been aware of since I can remember. The piece is a concise, articulate detailing of some of the best landscapes to hover above in the anticipation of arrival. What I found most relatable was his admission that he used to set up certain soundtracks to accompany the stunning views of cities below him, which is something I constantly find myself doing. Making soundtracks for certain events, landscapes, times is one of my longest past times – ask me about my many On The Road To Pittsburgh mixes. They’re sort of beautifully dismal in the same way Pennsyltucky Mountains are in that gross freezing November gray drizzle, but some songs are a little more epic feeling and some encompass the exhilaration of driving through, and then emerging from, tunnels cut through giant mountains. It’s hard to put into words, but it’s so easy to put into songs.

The reasons that I always insisted on window seats were multiple. It started with the first flight I can really remember. I was shuttled back and forth to Pittsburgh to see my grandparents as a baby, but I don’t remember it. My mother claims I was always very quiet and calm and slept, which is probably true because since birth I’ve loved nothing more than to sleep all the time. After those first few years of short 45 minute flights, my first big flight was from Philadelphia to California at the age of 4. Apparently on the way out to the Left Coast I was fine – I dutifully colored in a few coloring books, I got to go to the cockpit to see the captain, they gave me little wings to put on my shirt and I got to walk around collecting everyone’s trash. I probably asked to do this because four year old Rachael was a bit weird, but it was probably fun! Pretending to be a flight attendant! Getting lots of attention, etc! It was the ride back that was miserable: according to legend (aka my mother), I was so airsick, I vomited so much, that I actually cleared out most of the seats around us, which was fortuitous, because we could then utilize their airsick bags. Ew.

The first flight that I properly remember, however, was trans-altantic, Philadelphia to London. I was 15 and more than a little scared that my plane would blow up into a million pieces a few seconds after takeoff. Blame it on September 11th (which had happened just a few months prior) or my affection at the time for horror films (boys like them!), but I was pretty tense. My mother suggested that I take the window seat and that way I could look out the window and feel calmer. I’m not exactly sure where that logic lies … it would certainly make me less claustrophobic, but watching the land slowly curve away from me was not necessarily “comforting” by itself. Nonetheless, I was so taken with the beauty of watching night-time Philadelphia fade beneath me I managed to forget my panic at each slight shift, noise, ding, cough that I sensed. Even better was the dawn breaking over Europe a few hours later. I was so taken with all the bells and whistles involved in flying trans-atlantic (video screens in the headrests! music videos! including my omg omg favorite band ever incubus music video that I probably watched 25 times in a row! who wants to sleep!?), I was most definitely up for the sunrise and remember how stunning it was – the sky first subtly turning increasingly lighter shades of blue, then suddenly the clouds tinged with purple, pink, orange. I had never seen anything like it in my life. It was then that I was a window seat junky for life.

The other most memorable window seat moments for me occurred during my  year abroad. Before then I had never flown within Europe, but the absurdly cheap tickets and the ability to crash on friend’s/family members’ couches and floors in new cities drew me out of Berlin. Just as Vanhoenacker describes, gliding over the alps from Berlin to Milan was probably the most breathtaking scene I’ve ever watched from an airplane. At first I was unsure if I was looking at some strange weather pattern in the clouds, and then I realized – these were the Alps. I’ve still never really seen the Alps in person on the ground, but flying over them for the first time will be etched in my memory forever. Another fabulous city to land near was Istanbul. Much like the description of viewing London from Heathrow’s distance, the airport was far enough away from the city that I could take in the entire thing – the Bosphorous splicing it in two, the brilliant flashes of the brightly painted mosques, the sheer size of the city and how packed together all the buildings were – all of it coated in the sheen of mid-June sunshine. 

What this article really made me think about, however, was that there is something else related to being a window-seat person. There is the personal connection that you have with a city, or the lack thereof, that makes these views even more important to you. When I travel to a new place I find that the window seat offers me a sneaky glimpse of adventure before anyone else. I get to watch the countryside fly by, I get to see the interminable horizon of clouds. That first glimmer of city, the first indication that I’ve arrived is enough to make my heart pound with anticipation and excitement of what’s to come. Soon I will land and I will be somewhere completely new, I will have my own adventures and I will be set loose somewhere where I am a stranger. This kind of exhilaration is naturally amplified by the beauty of the city, but even if it is cloudy and dreary, or if it’s nighttime and I can’t make out north from south, just knowing that I’m landing and watching the plane descend into an airport is enough to make the view out of the window seem special.

The other side of this is obviously when you fly into an extremely familiar city. Whenever I circle over Philadelphia, I always notice the oil refineries belching flames, the squat look of South Philly, and only then do I see the familiar skyline. None of this is particularly breath-taking, but it’s so familiar that it takes on a new meaning for me. It signals to me being greeted at the airport, most likely by my mother, with her familiar teary smile, the look of relief and happiness on her face and her bright white hair. It means the smell of my room, the feel of the old cotton sheets that used to be my grandmother’s, it means my dogs yapping, straining on their hind legs to greet me at the door, sniffing me momentarily as if I had rolled around in a pile of pork fat, and then rejoicing in my return. These are the feelings that tug at my heart when I start to land in Philadelphia. The stress and strain of packing and traveling is essentially over. I am similarly enchanted with the view of Berlin that one gets from coming in to either Tegel or Schönefeld – they’re both equally beautiful for me. The first thing you can really pick out is the Fernsehturm at Alexanderplatz. Then you inevitably see the Siegessäule in Tiergarten and from there everything else falls into place. It’s like those two historically-loaded structures are arms, reaching up from the city to welcome me back. I doubt that Berlin’s cityscape is as impressive as seeing the Golden Gate Bridge or the New York skyline appear beneath the silver wing of an Airbus, but it overwhelms me every time because it’s another kind of homecoming. Whether my flight was 8 hours 45 minutes, I’m back home. And unlike the home where I grew up, this is the home that I’ve made and am making for myself. It’s important to me, and for that reason it’s more beautiful than any other city I could watch from a plane window, because I feel, like so many other people must, that part of the city is distinctly mine.

This is a painting by Hans Baluschek called Großstadtwinkel (Dirnenwinkel) from 1929. I really love it, so I decided I wanted it to live at the top of this post.

I should probably update this blog more than once every ten days if I want to feel more accomplished, but somehow I have been in a weird time warp lately. I have very little scheduled “to do” on any given day, and my whole goal every day is to spend as little money as humanly possible, which does not always make for an interesting lifestyle. The last week seems to have gone by quickly, but then again each day goes by rather slowly, especially lately because I have been waking up (of my own accord! naturally! sans alarm!) around 9 am. This is insane for me, and I am ill-adjusted to having days this long … add to this the fact that the sunlight is lasting longer and longer, daylight savings time is happening this weekend, and I also, as previously stated, have almost NOTHING to do, time has passed sort of funnily.

Last week I got together all the final pieces of paperwork that I would need and finally went to the Ausländerbehörde. Of course I was expecting it to be slightly hellish, but for some reason it was a hundred times worse than I remembered it being. I went up to the third floor and found the line for room 330. This little waiting room was designated for people from North, Central and South America, as well as Africa and random parts of the Middle East and Asia. I stood in a weirdly formed line for about 45 minutes to an hour, waiting to get into room 330, only to be handed a piece of paper and sent back out into the waiting room to fill it out. I filled it out, then went back into the line, only to stand there for another 30 minutes waiting to hand it back to the gentleman behind the window in Teeny Room 330. Then I was told to go back outside and patiently wait to be called. My number was 701. The funny thing is that there is ABSOLUTELY NO RHYME OR REASON to how the numbers are called or what numbers are given! None! No order! So the numbers that pop up on the screen at any given time could be 017, 358, 712, 214, and 359. The whole 358/359 thing makes you THINK that there is an order. But there isn’t. So then I spent another 3.5 hours sitting there, waiting. And waiting. And waiting. And then finally, when my number came up, I was greeted by the SAME exhausted looking unfriendly bureaucrat guy who was behind the window originally. He handed me a piece of paper and told me I now had an appointment to come back in THREE WEEKS. No sooner. No way no how can’t be done. THREE. WEEKS. Now … had I known that there would be this fun three week lapse, I would have gone to the stupid Ausländerbehörde on my FIRST DAY HERE and not waited till everything was together, only to be told to FEND FOR MYSELF FOR THREE WEEKS. Infuriating as it all was, I held it together until I got home, at which point I broke down into tears. The last week has since consisted of trying to amass as many private students as possible, trying really hard not to freak out and have a nervous breakdown, and figuring out how to tell my roommate that I probably can’t exactly pay, um, all of my rent right away …

Part of the problem of doing this whole thing on my own is that I don’t have anyone to go through any of it with me. The few people I do still know here have generally already gone through this, or are Germans. Everyone still in the city has a very different schedule from mine- aka they are Gainfully Employed People or Responsible, Serious University Students. These people have “Things” that need to be done on a given day, like giant papers to research and subsequently write, or offices to go to in order to “do work”. I, on the other hand, am languishing away the next two weeks trying not to panic or have a breakdown because of how poor I currently am. I foresee a lot of pride swallowing in the next few days, and at least one phonecall to my father asking for money.

The reason for all these doldrums is mostly because I came down with The Cold From Hell this weekend and I’m still recovering AND IT’S THURSDAY (and my Lovely Ex Roommate decided to remind me that it could be Swine Flu and that I could have contacted some awful European Swine Disease somewhere along the way, you know, to be supportive). Having been sick oh, maybe 4 times during my entire adolescence, I do not handle sickness well, even if it’s your average, run-of-the-mill sneezy, stuffy nose, clogged head, nasty bronchitis-sounding cough sort of thing. I’m not on my death bed. I’m not incapacitated. Sitting in the next room doesn’t exactly sound pretty, but it could be SO much worse. I’m just a big baby, essentially. But! I have decided to try to be more positive about things, so the rest of this entry will be positive!! 

So. Positive. Being Positive. (Talking about “Being Positive” makes me think of old inside jokes about posi-hardcore music and staying posi! … but I digress …) The best part about this cold is that it has totally cured me of my weird partylust (sort of like wanderlust, but involving nightclubs and booze) that I had been feeling over the last few weeks. Who cares if no one is texting me!? I am perfectly content to stay in bed, leafing through whatever reading material I find in the apartment. Another positive aspect of my cold: it was timed perfectly with me moving into a friend’s room for 1.5 weeks FOR FREE. So much less stress during this weird free-rent time, I tell you! And my current roommate is very nice! And just made me fresh peppermint tea from fresh peppermint leaves! That’s how nice she is! She also helped me move all my crap here, which was arduous and annoying, which is further proof of her amazing niceness. I am officially adding her to my list of people who need to be taken out to lunch/dinner/drinks once I start receiving paychecks and am no longer afraid of being homeless.

In addition to all of this positivity, I say cold shmold! It’s FINALLY springtime here! After hearing everyone back home on the East Coast talk about how BALMY and FLOWERY things are getting, I can finally make them feel jealous because HEY! it’s not only springtimey here! It’s also BERLIN. So there! Take that scary, dangerous Philadelphia. Despite my sickness, the weather is making me feel lovely inside, and I spent all afternoon today taking a lovely stroll across literally half the city - (6 km!) and then had a leisurely stroll through the supermarket picking out the best and least expensive groceries I could find. And I lingered in and around Viktoriapark, pictured below, which is probably my favorite park in the whole city! It’s better than the Tiergarten. And it’s hilly and that makes it romantic. All of this has inspired me to create a list! of fun things to do when you are unemployed in Berlin, which I will be for at least the next two weeks.

Viktoria Park in Berlin circa 1900

A List Of Fun Things To Do When You Are Unemployed In Berlin

1. take a daily 6 km Spaziergang just to look at everything. then map it out on google maps and feel proud of yourself
2. spend well over an hour in the supermarket comparing prices and finding the best combination of groceries to buy for under €10 
3. babysit your old roommate’s dog. for money.
4. spend hours reading blogs and remember to finally update your blog
5. waste time looking at people-you-went-to-fifth-grade-with’s pictures on facebook. like every single one of someone’s 800 drunken pictures. think about how slutty she looks and wonder if she’s really happy. start to wonder if anyone is really as happy as they look on the internet. think of all the articles you’ve read recently about social media and self-presentation. then decide to delete your facebook.
6. don’t delete your facebook, but instead vow to look at it once a week.
7. write everyone in your life an email. your mom. your dog. your former professors. your aunt and your best friend. consider sending a postcard, but then remember that it’s too expensive. put it on your list of “Things To Do When You Have Money”
8. make a list of things to do when you have money/a job/aren’t afraid of being homeless. tape it to the wall so you can feel motivated.
9. take the list off the wall because it’s too overwhelming. make a new list of things to buy for your new apartment once you have some money. tape it inside your planner somewhere in July, when you will hopefully have money.
10. watch terrible german television until you feel sleepy and bored. wonder if some of these teenager-focused music video shows would be popular in the US and would make you fabulously wealthy. decide that someone has already thought of it.
11. think of new creative ways to make a lot of money that are probably unrealistic. this includes your life-long dream of owning a yarn store/cafe/concert space that does not show lillith fair acoustic guitar shows. also included: a store that makes cool wallpaper for people’s apartments (and also duvet and slip covers that match!), a store that sells GIANT stencils. like humongous ridiculous stencils. and ships them to your house so you can paint your walls/ceiling/floor/neighbor’s driveway with them.
12. unpack and repack your suitcases. try to think of the best way to pack them so they will most easily be unpacked in the future. try not to think of how much your mom would yell at you for how wrinkly all your stuff is.
13. find every free museum day/outdoor concert/gallery opening and write it in your planner. convince yourself you will go alone, but also nag your friends into going with you and then maybe buying you a beer.
14. spend an entire morning perfecting the art of making a milchkaffee in your kitchen, using various devices/milk temperatures/coffee making methods. spend the rest of the day really hyped on caffeine. worry that you will have a heart attack, but then decide that you won’t, that it’s just the 8 cups of coffee making you CRAZY hahahahaahahahahHAHaha. then crash and watch more tv.
15. clean the entire kitchen and bathroom. wash dishes that were there from two weeks ago when you didn’t even live there. clean out the fridge so it stops smelling weird. organize the toilet paper and shampoos and body washes in the bathroom. act like it was totally normal when your roommate comes home.

I think that list is good for now. More to come when I think of/actually do more things.

The last few days have been full of moments of elation and moments of dread and panic, which is in large part due to the alcohol I have consumed. Today was the kind of Sunday I haven’t had in a while – hungover, dragged myself to my private lesson, spent the rest of the day in bed eating weird foods, trying to ward off the blues and failing. I watched some unsettling movies, which is always a terrible idea. I have been feeling very homesick lately, but not exactly for New Jersey or any one in particular. I mostly miss my mom. I miss moments. I miss laying in bed with my dog, knitting in my room and watching the daily show while he snores and farts under my sheets. I miss taking the PATCO into Philadelphia. I have been missing moments from college as well – old ones. Going to parties my sophomore year. All the hours I logged in the radio station, playing songs as loud as I wanted. I knew I would feel lonely, but just like anything else, the form that the loneliness takes is always new and somewhat surprising.

Tim and Deborah came to Berlin this weekend. Luckily for me, Tim is staying until sometime next week, but even that makes me sad because I know he will only be here sporadically. I knew that the city would be different, that my life would be different and that I’d have to make new friends, but despite how much I convinced myself it would be different – the fact is, it’s still different. Strange and alien but simultaneously everything I remember. Everyone I talk to thinks I should feel good about all that I’ve accomplished in the last two weeks here – I now have an apartment, I have at least one job lined up, I got my first private student (a temporary job, but still nice to have some cash trickling in). I have also started the process of dealing with my bank issues, transferring money, changing addresses etc. 

The to-do list continues, however.
Tomorrow:
1. clean my room and do some laundry
2. briefly prep,then teach my lesson 
3. print out fliers, cut them up and make copies
4. buy scotch tape and a day-pass for the train and hang up my one flier at all the universities, and the other in the city-center
5. start researching possible german health insurance 
6. get in touch with johanna, a friend’s roommate, about staying in his room for 10 days while he’s out of town 

Then I have plans to have dinner at Tim’s tomorrow evening. He knows that I’m broke, so I’m sure he’ll insist that I don’t buy or bring anything, but we’ll work that out. Maybe some wine or some dessert. Friday night I met up with Tim, brought some from-scratch chocolate cake and sparkling rosé with me. We then began steadily consuming beers, spent a while in a bar, then ran to a club, another bar, ending the night finally at my house alone at 5 am. I managed to get out of bed at 11 am to teach on Saturday, then met Deborah for lunch. Spent the dreary afternoon in her apartment, cuddled on the couch catching up, went home and tried to nap but totally failed – when I really want to nap, I rarely can, and this was one of those instances. Either way, I rested and ended up going out with her and a few of her friends last night, got rather drunk on beer and have spent today in the general malaise/depression that always accompanies my nights of drinking. It’s been a while since I felt this lazy and useless, but I know tomorrow everything will feel better.

As for the panic, I know that once I put up these fliers and start getting responses I will feel better. I need to find some decent in-between work until I sort everything out with my more permanent job and getting my visa. I have to register my apartment at the local registry office, then I need to get my insurance papers together, in that time I’ll know more about other job offers and I can get everything lined up and head to get my work visa. I feel like I’ve gone over this to-do list so many times in my head and explained it to so many people, but it still doesn’t seem any more feasible than it did two weeks ago really. It almost seems to be getting farther away as my money is dwindling. If I can teach students for €20/hr, all I need is 11 individual classes to pay my rent, which can easily be done in the span of one month. It’s just stressful at the beginning because I feel like I am waiting, suspended, and I could crash and burn.

Last night a girl was walking down my street screaming and sobbing while staring at her cell phone. As she walked by me she was sobbing and howling in a way I’ve never witnessed another person behave. She seemed genuinely anguished. There’s no other word for it. I assumed someone had cheated on her. I walked to the spätverkauf to buy a beer and some chocolate and found out that she needed to mail something by midnight, and it was only ten pm and she thought she couldn’t do it, but her friends ended up pressuring the guy behind the counter until he stamped it anyway. It felt like a David Lynch movie. To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure that my life more closely resembling a David Lynch movie is necessarily a bad thing.

Another day in Xberg. Technically unemployed and broke. Feeling less homesick than I was in my last post. I spent most of today reading One Hundred Years Of Solitude and drinking coffee. I visited an apartment im Bergmannkiez. Tiny, € 240 warm, with one roommate. Its a quiet, tiny room with old, unfinished wood floors and an equally tiny kitchen and bathroom. The guy who lives there seemed nice, but sort of strange, but I really don’t mind. He definitely was less strange than most of the people I’ve met so far while searching for a place, and he agreed that the whole thing is a nightmare. He’s supposed to call me tomorrow and I really hope that it works out because it would be a great little place for me. (I’m also visiting another apartment tomorrow evening, so who knows …) I also made a fabulous dinner for myself and my roommate, and made some plans for this week: meeting with my former roommate and her sister tomorrow, meeting with an American student to offer some advice on Tuesday, scheduled some English lessons for the upcoming weeks. I am also going to apply for a job with a political PR firm (fingers crossed!) and some other things this week, deal with the bank, look into getting health insurance, and, if things somehow don’t work out the way I’d like, unfortunately continuing my search for an apartment. It’s hard to believe that I’ve been here for over a week, and I hope that time stops moving so quickly because I want to enjoy my life here as much as I possibly can over the next few months, despite the nagging homesickness and pangs of fear that I will run out of money and become homeless and destitute by sometime in April, selling the Straßenfeger on the S-Bahn.

Yesterday I saw another apartment. Even though I have only gone to see six apartments in total, it feels like I’ve already made an exhaustive search and half of the time I am convinced that I will never find anything even somewhat decent in my price range (which is severely limiting). Especially now when I am slowly accumulating private students and the idea of getting my work permit is very far away. I found a place advertised by an English-speaker and I decided to jump on it. It sounded perfect. € 200, perfect location, tiny room with a few roommates hailing from various european countries. This all seemed great and on the short walk there I mentally prepared myself as if I were walking into a job interview. Determined to impress these potential roommates, to shake hands correctly and make eye contact and be interesting and positive. Unfortunately the entire situation was a smidge different from what they had advertised: a tiny room on the first floor of a newer building, absolutely no furniture, no light fixtures installed, no internet for a few weeks, the entire place was only available for two months anyway and they were renting it out “first come, first serve” which essentially meant that I could say yes in that instant or get nothing. So I naturally said tschüss and dejectedly walked the three blocks back to where I’m staying now.

Since I was feeling thoroughly depressed after this whole bizarre interaction, I decided to treat myself to a movie. Metropolis at Kino Babylon.

The live accompaniment was a famous silent-film accompanist / pianist / violinist who was absolutely incredible and at times played both the piano and the violin simultaneously! Unfortunately the tickets were way more expensive than I had thought (€16.50! For one show!) but I consider it my donation to the arts for the rest of the year and I’m already moving on. The film was recently reconstructed after major scenes were found in Buenos Aires in 2008, and as a German student and cinephile I decided I needed to see it for myself. I understand why those sections were cut out of the original – it is an extra, slightly unnecessary plotline about a private detective hired by Joh Fredersen to watch his son. The actor who plays the brutish detective has a ghoulish, Nosferatu look to him. The other cut scenes definitely made the film feel more complete, but also brought its run time to well over two hours. Still, I could watch Metropolis over and over and not get sick of it. Unfortunately I won’t be able to afford it. At least not for a few months.

After that I was talked into going out to a nightclub with an ex-boyfriend and his friends, a decision which I’m still regretting. I quickly bought dinner and a beer for the road, hopped on the train and headed to Friedrichshain, where I spent the majority of the evening watching my two somewhat pathetic escorts do their best to successfully hit on as many women as possible. By the time 4 am rolled around I was certainly not drunk enough, and had witnessed enough machismo for one evening. I bid farewell to the boys, and contentedly walked to the train, looking forward to sleeping soundly in my bed alone. It was only after I got off the train and was halfway to the apartment that I was struck with the realization that I didn’t have my keys. In rapid succession I realized that I had left them in the apartment, I did not have my roommate’s number, I didn’t know where she was or when she’d be back in the apartment, and my cell phone was nearly out battery charge. It was then that panic set in. As I neared the apartment door I just knew that she wouldn’t answer the door for some reason … maybe she wasn’t even home. I rang and rang and rang the doorbell and she didn’t answer and then I was faced with a decision: do I wait here outside in the freezing cold for her to come home (without even enough money to buy a beer while I wait), or do I ring up Ex-Boyfriend and politely ask to crash with him. I chose the latter.

I called him and explained the situation and his response perfectly encapsulated a drunken attempt to be lighthearted and charming which comes out as overbearing and slimy. When I politely told him that I was having a CRISIS and that this was NOT THE TIME to make SEXUAL INSINUATIONS he got the hint and backed up, telling me he’d make up the spare bed and wait for me to trek all the way back to his place. I spent the 15 minute wait at the Görlitzer Banhof hating myself for being so childish and irresponsible, openly crying and chain smoking, which elicited a few comforting looks from my fellow 4:45 am passengers, but little else. I tried to calm down and make a logical plan for how I would eventually get back into the apartment and started to take deep breaths and stop crying.

I got out at Warschauerstraße and walked down the street for the second time that night, furious with myself, headed toward Ex Boyfriend’s apartment. I walked past the S-Bahn station and was bracing myself against the cold, deciding whether or not to try to take the tram or just walk the rest of the way, when I spotted her. My roommate. And her friend. Walking toward the Ubahn station I had left minutes before. Out of the 3.5 million people in the city, I found my roommate by chance at 5 am at the exact moment that I needed her most. Needless to say this was one of the most insane, kismet, and wonderful things that has ever happened to me in my entire life! And I once found €50 at the Warschauerstraße S-Bahn station, and this was EVEN BETTER! Come to think of it, these two incidences are also making me wonder if I have some mystical connection to this station and should move there or  light incense and put up a shrine there or something. But I digress. Merle saved the day (or the night) (or the early early morning, I guess) and I got to snuggle in my own bed, where, after crying for about five more minutes out of residual fear and exhaustion, I promptly fell asleep.

For the last two days all I have listened to has been this home-recorded album that a friend sent me. I’ve been thinking about the people I’ve left behind and about being in love with people. Now that I live 4,053 miles away from everything and everyone, my perspective has changed but I also think it’s gotten clearer.

These in between times, these first days and weeks of any great adventure tend to be boring and not very glamorous. I envisioned myself being welcomed back into the city I once was so infatuated with. I assumed that I would pick something up immediately and start my life again as full and interesting as it once was. Instead I feel like I have way too much time to myself, and I spend it creeping around the internet, stalking old acquaintances and reading blogs and international news stories. I tend to pick up a book and put it down after 8 or 9 pages. I’ve been going on long walks alone, but only until it gets dark. Otherwise I float around the apartment like a ghost, making endless cups of tea and doing very much nothing.

i’m not sure if my homesickness is emphasizing certain feelings, or if they were there all along and I’m only just realizing it, but either way it’s a terribly lonely state of mind. I think this is the time that you look back on and realize that it’s made you a stronger person. At least I hope so. Knowing myself, I’ll probably look back and feel foolish for being so mopey, but for now I’m letting myself have a big giant pity-party as much as I want.