And on the sixth day……
Feb 21st, 2006 by B.
Day six and here we are back at the airport making use of their handy-dandy vodaphone connection. Things are rolling along, but as I’m quickly learning, the deutsch wheel turns sloooooowly. Found out we can’t get dsl in our temp. housing, but wonref (our relocation ‘experts’) have set us up with…. sorry Haddock.. freenet. And by ’set us up’ I mean they told us this was the only option and to figure it out ourselves without bothering them. It’s like a dial-up, only god damn expensive. Monthly fee plus 3-4 cents per minute. Ouch. But right now my strong desire for the world wide web is overpowering Jim’s pocketbook. heh.
Other than that, things are looking up. Even though I’m still making lots of stupid, panicky mistakes when dealing with the locals… just the other day when a lady at the butcher shop asked me a question, I freaked out and told her “I’m american, I don’t speak english”. I’m actually starting to get used to feeling like an utter moron. At least now we’re almost-functioning utter morons. And tomorrow we’ll be utter morons with a deutsch bank account… Thursday, utter morons with our very own residency permits (that means they’re stuck with us).
Today has been the best day so far, I’ve felt down about how ugly the part of Dresden we’re currently living in is… until today when, almost magically, we took a tram ride across the river and… poof… it was just beautiful. Old, quaint buildings, great little shops, a bookstore that would put Barnes & Noble to shame (they even had a good sized english speaking section), and right across from it a common area with little children running around chasing birds, vendors selling fresh fruits & vegetables, and a mime entertaining everyone. Yep, today– for the first time, I thought “this is what it’s all about”. I could finally see where J. was coming from in his blog… today Germany didn’t suck, and I’ll take that.
Anyway, we have a ton of crap to look up for freenet, so I’d better close this out. I’ll echo my last post and say that hopefully our next one won’t be longer than a week, and we’ll be doing it from the comfort of our flat, courtesy of… ahem… freenet.
p.s. Jeanni, Bert, L, Michelle… I miss you guys! And someone needs to give Djack a big kiss for me. Oh, and tell BBD I said ‘hi!’… and, and, and.
apparently the word “free” is lost somewhere in the translation there…
oh, and a mime… now i am so jealous. i want pictures!
Miss you too B…….Glad things are sort of coming along……And yes, pictures would be good sometime soon….Of ALL of you
Hope it all works out with Freenet. We are now going with Deutsche Telekom. We ordered 3 weeks ago and say it will take another 3-4 weeks. As you know some things in Germany are really on the slow side.
Glad the days are getting better for you guys
I’m glad you got a “this is what it’s all about” moment, sounds beautiful. Hppy to hear that things are looking up.
Glad you found some nice places there … and it is winter … sunshine and green leaves always helps. Hopefully the Not-So-Freenet people will hook you up soon.
ok - I’m just cracking up at all of your mistakes. I mean they really are funny! I do hope things are better. And the flat - ouch! I guess it could have been that way in France too for me. I mean it was, and it was awful!