Monday, January 16, 2006

What Burg is like when the Tourists are Gone:

Before I came here, I wrote in my application that I would "immerse myself in the local culture" and see German life as it truly is. The sentence itself is crap, written in that special language reserved for applications where you try to make yourself sound like an earth-shaking figure in the mould of Jesus or Buddha, but the sentiment is basically true; I did, and still do, want to get to know people who aren't Americans, learn their language and culture, and generally make friends.

So you can understand it when I started feeling a little upset that, well, I wasn't really doing it. True, I did go to the Weihnachtsmarkt (see brilliantly written post of December 5 for further details), go to some peoples houses when they invited me, but something always felt lacking, out of place, and tainted by the smell of unfulfilled potential. Most of my weekends were, and are, spent watching TV and reading, which aren't bad, but you really can't replace them with human contact and an activity now and then.

What am I talking about? Sure you can. I have learned finally that what Germans (or these people on Fehmarn) do is, you know, pretty much what I do most of the time. Which is to say: nothing.

The movie theater is closed for what the sign calls a short business vacation, but doesn't say when that will end. And no one in town, including those who have lived here up to 30 years, seems to know either. They just know it isn't open and that this always happens about the same time every year. It's resurrection is something of a mythic concept rather than a physical reality; "Yeah, it closes in January every year....or is it Febuary? It closes every year and stays closed for a about a month until the middle of Febuary. Or is it March?"

This is a movie-going people up here, let me tell you. A lot of shops and restaraunts are closed too, giving the town a nice Spagetti Western set feel. Ennio Morricone plays me to the grocery store everyday. The town is what Germans would call "toten Hosen," or "dead pants."

But it has it's charm; the empty streets after 18.00 (everything is military time) are great for walks, and waving to bent old men in the neighborhood is a lot more fun than it should be. I guess you trade a social life for a kind populous, which is fine by me, at least for this year, but God, I wish they had a good bookstore I could walk around in.

Well, off to buy food for dinner, then watch me some Star Trek. And please, I know the urge to call me "Earth's # 1 Coolest Guy" is both obvious and warranted, but it's making all the other uncool people self-conscious. Be kind.

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