15 July – 14h05 – I’m home from the laundrymat. It…

15 July – 14h05 – I’m home from the laundrymat. It’s cloudy, about 24°C and VERY humid today. I wouldn’t mind it if I was doing nothing and on holiday, but I’m not.

I’m working 40.66 hours this week. That’s a bit misleading, as those are pay hours, not actual teaching hours. The teaching hours work out to about 30.5 (pay hours and teaching hours are different). The additional hours come from a class at Deutsche Telecom on Tuesday at 10h15 and it’s my turn to teach the FCE class on Saturday (I’ll do it next week, as Paul will be on vacation). That’ll give me a total of 95.98 pay hours for the month so far. I expect to have about 30 pay hours next week, so that’ll give me a good paycheck at the end of the month.

21h – The photocopier was out of toner today. That made me have to change my lessons drastically.

16 July – 6h – I’m really tired. I couldn’t sleep last night.

12h30 – It’s my break time. I have from 11h45 – 17h30 free. I have to plan lessons in that time, but that’ll only take me five minutes for this evening’s classes.

14h32 – I’ve been busy. I tried to take a nap, but couldn’t sleep, so I got up and cleaned and organised my flat. I never really unpacked after I moved in, so I did a bit of unpacking, cleaning and collected a bag of trash. I like doing things like this during the week so I don’t have to do it at weekends. Now what? I still have three hours to kill and it’s cloudy and looks like it’ll rain at any minute (I think that’s normal for this city).

I’m starting to get used to my schedule. It’s not all that different than my schedule in Poland, things just happen at different times. In Poland, I never really did much other than prepare for work and work during the week. That’s about the same as I’ve been doing here.

15h15 – It’s raining now.

15h48 – It’s stopped raining now.

16h07 – I’ll have a quick look at the books for my classes today to see what I’m teaching.

16h11 – Well, that was quick. I looked the lessons over. There’s a lot less grammar in each lesson than I had in the books back in Poland, but the books here aren’t specifically for students studying for the Cambridge Exams. They’re just to help people learn conversational English. Also, I don’t have to correct any tests and essays! I have too much time. I really need a hobby.

21h – Still no toner for the photocopier. This makes my life very difficult.

17 July – Another rainy day.

Happy Birthday, R.

12h30 – As of 11h45, when I left the office, we still didn’t have any toner for the photocopier. This might be a big problem for me if we don’t have any later today, as Thursdays are my day out of the office and my Deutsche Bank group works only off of photocopies. Also my last two groups tomorrow are still waiting for books, so they’ve been working off of copies also.

I received an email from my friend Aileen (an American who teaches English in Japan) with a suggestion for the title of this website. She thinks I should include the word ‘lederhosen’ in the title somewhere. I totally laughed after I read it. Let’s see..what could a title with that word be? ‘The Search for Lederhosen,’ or maybe ‘Hiding from Lederhosen.’ Aileen, cheers for the idea, but I don’t think it’ll fly.

I also received an email from my friend Brad in Miami. His idea for my Germany website’s title was ‘Deutschland Diaries.’ I kind of like it, but not quite right either, as it’ll be more than just my personal diaries. It’ll also have photos and other things. Perhaps ‘Dispatches from Deutschland,’ but that’s not quite right either. When I named my Poland website, I knew exactly what I wanted to call it. Why is this one so hard?

I got a letter in my PO box today. It was from the post office, telling me that they are unable to verify my street address. This is the same post office that sent me a letter TO MY STREET ADDRESS thirteen days ago, informing me that my PO box was ready! So, I went to a window to talk to a postal employee. The first one didn’t speak English. She gave me to young lady (about 25) who did. I asked her to read the letter to me. She read it, but didn’t say anything. I asked her what it said, and she said that she didn’t know. My next question was going to be to find out if she spoke German or not, but a guy came over and she showed it to him. They then spoke German for a while and then looked at me, without saying anything. I said to her, ‘What does this letter say,’ in a slightly more inquisitive voice. She said that I couldn’t get mail at my street address, because I didn’t live there. I told her that I am registered with the police at that address and can bring a copy of my registration with me, if she’d like. She then spoke German to the guy and they just looked at me again and didn’t say anything. I said, ’Well?’ She said that I could do that. These people are idiots.

15h15 – It’s totally pouring out right now. I don’t want to leave the house, but have to, so that I can go back to the idiots at the post office, then see if there is any toner for the copier. If not, I’ll have to find a copy shop to make copies for tomorrow.

21h46 – It’s still raining.

18 July – It’s another dreary day. Won’t it ever end?

14h25 – It’s Thursday again, you know what that means, Burger King time (cheeseburger, onion rings and a small coke today). My third class cancelled again today, so I’ve been free for a while now. What have I been doing? I’ve been attempting to get set up for internet access at home.

I have to work tomorrow and Saturday. Tomorrow I have to teach the last class of the intensive class Paul and I have been sharing from 8h30 – 11h45, and then have to do a make up lesson for a student who went on holiday for two weeks in late June/early July. He works every day until 17h, and I work every day except for Friday at 17h30, so the only day we could arrange to meet was tomorrow. That’s okay, I get paid for it, and since I have to work 8h30 – 11h45 on Saturday (FCE class), I won’t be going out on Friday night.

Our students are on yearly contracts and get four weeks of vacation per year. After two weeks, the get one make up lesson and after four weeks they get two make up lessons (no more than two make up lessons per year).

15h05 – I’m off to do some grocery shopping, then browsing, so that’s it from Burger King this week. Tune in next week for the next episode.

19 July – 5h55 – Finally! A sunny start to a day! It’s about time!!!

21h – Weather wise, it turned out to be a nice day. Mostly sunny and about 20C.

20 July – Another workday. Oh well, you have to do what you have to do. At least it’s an easy class for me to teach. It’s an FCE class and the book we’re using is one that I am very familiar with, as used it back in Poland the last two years. Plus, I’ll throw in some extra listening practise, which will make the lesson go by quicker and mean less teaching that I have to do.

If the weather is sunny today, I’m going to visit a castle or two in the area after work. I wanted to go last week, but the weather sucked, so I didn’t.

8 July – 8h – A wonderfully sunny day! Back to wo…

8 July – 8h – A wonderfully sunny day!

Back to work. However, I have very little preparation to do. My first group is a beginners group, and I’m teaching them the same lesson I taught my other beginners group last Wednesday. The second group is a conversation group. I take an article out of an English magazine we have and we discuss it. So, my preparation today is reading an article and making three photocopies.

I do have to go to the laundrymat and wash clothes.

13h11 – I went to the laundrymat and washed my clothes. However when the time was up, the washer hadn’t completed the spin cycle (but the computer in the washer thought that it had, so some of my clothes were still quite wet (note to self, don’t ever use washer #5 again). I didn’t feel like paying again, so I put them in the dryer, and after an hour, my work clothes were dry, and the others were less wet (I put the clothes I’m wearing to work in a separate dryer to be sure that they would be dry). So, I came home and hung the rest up around the flat, like I used to do in Poland in the winter. Luckily, the way my windows open makes it very easy to do.

After I started my clothes, I went to the library to use the internet. I really wish I could send the emails I’ve written offline, but I can’t because they have the A drive blocked. To everyone I owe emails, sorry that I can’t send them yet.

I now have four hours and 15 minutes to kill until work. What shall I do? I think I’ll take a walk down by the rivers and take some photos. It’s still wonderfully sunny, with a few fluffy, white clouds.

21h – I’m home. It was a good day. I left at around 14h and went and sat down by the Rhine River and watched barges and people go by.

When I got to work, I found out that my schedule has changed a bit. I’ll have more hours than last week. We’ve started intensive courses this week, so I’ll be teaching from 8h30 – 11h45 on Wednesday and Friday as well as my regular hours.

I got my Bahn card in the mail today. Now I no longer have to use the paper temporary copy they gave me. It has a few other bits of discount information, but I can’t read it, as it’s in German. I’ll go to the train station tomorrow and have a customer service representative translate it for me.

9 July – I got notification of my PO Box today, so went to the Post Office and collected the keys. That didn’t take long. I’m very happy with how quickly things have been working out for me in Germany. After that, since I was right next to it, I thought I’d pop into the library and use the internet. However, for some strange reason, the library is closed on Tuesdays. That makes absolutely no sense to me.

10 July – 7h – a cloudy day, however it looks like there might be a possibility of some sun later. I’ve been up since 5h55, but have trouble getting up here in the morning. Perhaps it’s because the sun comes up at least an hour later than it did in Poland. Also, dawn starts quite a bit later also. I don’t know, but I never had problems getting up early this time of the year in Poland.

I’ve been preparing for my first class. I’m filling in to teach an intensive course from 8h30 – 11h45 (with a 15 minute break at 10h). It’s a two-week course, and I’m teaching it today only. I don’t agree with how they do it here. The course started on Monday and I’ll be their third teacher in three days. I think that one teacher should do an entire intensive course, so that the teachers aren’t repeating eachother. I spoke to Paul last night and know what he has done, so that shouldn’t happen today. The class level is between elementary and pre-intermediate.

21h – I have the light green car again. I had planned on taking the purple one, but Ross got the keys before me and told me that he has to have it because it has a CD player and he has a CD with him (that’s logic for you!). Perhaps I’ll bring a CD next week.

I taught the previously mentioned intensive class today, and it went well. After that, as I left the building, it was sprinkling, and it got heavier my entire walk. When I was two minutes from my building, it started pouring, so I ran. I had to go back to work at 16h to tell Paul what I had done with the class, and then I found out I’d be teaching it again on Friday. I was supposed to teach Sally’s intensive class on Friday, but she went to Iain and said that that wasn’t a good idea, as she had been jumping around in the book all week, so it would be better for her to do it. I completely agree. So, they gave me the same class as I had today for Friday. Paul and I divided up the work, since he will teach it tomorrow. I’ll continue on working on the future tenses with the class and other future related things (1st conditional), and other things, and he’ll work on the present and past, as well as other things. I hope the “other things” don’t overlap.

11 July – 7h – It’s Thursday again, my wonderful day out! I love it. I hope my Thursday schedule never changes!

However, it’s not the end of my workweek, as it was last week. I have to teach an intensive course tomorrow from 8h30 – 11h45, the same one I taught yesterday.

I still have problems getting up early in Germany. It must be due to lack of early sunlight. I used to have this problem in Poland in the winter.

12h25 – You guessed it, I’m at the Burger King near the outlet shops again today (Texas Double Combo – €3.99). I wish there was a normal restaurant in this area so that I could have a better lunch.

I have plenty of free time, as my 13h class cancelled. I love it when that happens. The weather is better, a but a chilly and very windy, but mostly sunny. According to attendance records, the 13h class is quite prone to cancelling at the last minute, or not showing up. I don’t care, as I get paid for it anyway. One again, I love Thursdays.

One of my students in my 11h class (Rolf) told me that the rainstorm we had yesterday hit Bonn much harder. There, it had high winds and blew down a lot of trees also. Some of the trees fell on the train tracks, so that cancelled all northbound train service for about three hours. I’m glad it happened on a weekday!

21h – I’m home now. I put petrol (gas) in the car today. It is VERY expensive in Europe. That little car took 29.07 litres and it cost €29.33!!! According to my Lonely Planet book, 1 litre = .26 US gallons (UK gallons are different). That would make 29.07 litres = 7.56 gallons. Since the US dollar and the Euro are almost the same now, that would mean that it cost $3.88 US per gallon!! I’m glad I don’t have a car here. I also put it through the carwash, which cost €5.50 for a basic wash (rinse, soap, rinse, dry). Also, the car went 360 km between fill-ups (the mileage of the last fill-up was 8730 km and it was 9090 km this time), which means that it went 12.38 kilometres per litre (360/29.07). So, how many miles per gallon is that? I have no clue. Perhaps one of you math geniuses can figure it out and let me know. Remember…I teach English, not Math.

12 July – 5h45 – A cloudy day.

Off to work I go!

13h – Our school still only set up for internet access on one of the office computers, so I got permission to use it after my class and sent a lot of emails. I was glad to get them off, as I don’t want my friends to think that I’d forgotten about them. However, I didn’t do any non-business related surfing, as I didn’t feel right about it.

22h02 – I browsed a few bookshops today looking for the Lonely Planet guide to Germany. We have two chain bookshops in town, and perhaps there’s another one in the mall. One of them told me that the book is sold out and they don’t have any way of ordering it. The other, Bouvier, told me that they didn’t have any copies in stock, but could get me one tomorrow. I gladly ordered it.

I’ve been using Lonely Planet guidebooks for years and love them. They are printed in English, Spanish and French, but not German, so that means in Germany, they are all in English. That’s great news for me!

I’ve been browsing through the photos I took in my last two or three months in Poland. Even though I annoyed a few people when I took them (sorry, Aśka), I’m glad that I did. I really miss Poland. I hope to visit again in late May 2003.

13 July – 7h45 – Another cloudy, gray day! It looks like it’s going to rain at any minute. That cancels my plans for the day. I had planned on going to a couple of castles in the area, but won’t since it’s not sunny. I don’t want to get rained on while sightseeing, also I won’t be able to take good photos. So, what should I do today then?

I’ll pick up my new guidebook this afternoon. Perhaps I’ll also stop by the mall and pick up some more reading material, such as the International Herald Tribune and The Times. Maybe I’ll bite the bullet and use the internet at an internet café as well. I want to upload the last of my journals from Poland to my ‘Adventures in Poland’ website. I’ve been delaying doing that, as that when I do, it means that there is no more text to add to it, only photos. I guess I’m hanging on to it for as long as I can.

8h25 – It’s raining heavily.

14 July – 8h39 – Another rainy day. This whole weekend has been a washout. I wanted to visit castles and have fun, but can’t. This whole weekend was a washout.

15h – I’ve caught up on my sleep this weekend. I got up at 8h30 and went back to bed from 9h – 12h. After being up for an hour, I went back to bed again from 13h – 15h. I don’t know why I’m so tired.

1 July – A new start to a new month! It’s cloudy today.

7h – So, what shall I do today? The first thing is return the car. I borrowed it (with permission) on Saturday so that I could move. I only needed it for about an hour, but since I had to move after work, I ended up with it for the whole weekend. It hasn’t moved since about 15h30 on Saturday. I’ll return it right when the office opens at 8h in case anyone else needs it, but I doubt if the will, as according to the schedule, there is only one class at 8h30 and it is in house. However, it looks better if I do. Also, the parking in front of my building changes to pay parking at 8h Monday mornings (it’s free from 14h Saturday – 8h Monday). After that, I have to organise my flat a bit more. I also have to meet with my landlord at 13h and pay rent, etc. I’ll also find out what paperwork I need to register with the foreigners’ office (every immigrant in Germany is required to do that).

8h30 – I’m back. I returned the car, had breakfast and picked up a copy of yesterday’s Sunday Times (of London). The times is very expensive, costing €5.10, so I probably Won’t make a habit out of it. Now the tea is on and I’m going to sit on the couch and read the newspaper and relax. Nothing interesting.

10h52 – It’s been sprinkling off and on all morning, but now it’s picked up and has turned into a steady rain.

12h13 – I totally love my schedule. I get off at 20h15 on Thursdays and don’t have to be at work again until 17h30 on Monday, with the exception of every other Saturday, when I go in for 3 hours and 15 minutes. Also, Mondays are easy days for me, as I have a beginners class and a second class that is basically an intermediate level conversation class.

20h – It turned out to be a good day. My second class was a no-show, so I only had to teach one. Also, I paid my first month’s rent (€270) and my landlord said that tomorrow he’d take me to the foreigners’ office to register at 10h30, because he’s out of forms that he needs. My boss, David, explained how the taxes work to me. Basically, I’m paying 25.82% tax, but that includes “social taxes” such as health insurance, unemployment, reunification tax and pension. The actual tax percentage for my tax bracket is 5.3%. It’s less than I’d pay if I lived in Pennsylvania, and includes health insurance! A good deal.

When I arrived at work today, I found a notice from Deutsche Post. It was in German, so I couldn’t read it, but I thought that it meant that I had a package at the post office (I was still waiting for a third package from Poland). I asked Jessica, one of the office workers, to translate it for me and it turns out that I have to go customs to pick it up. I wonder why?

2 July – 6h30 – I didn’t sleep well last night.

It’s been raining heavily most of the night. This quells my fear about how well my skylight windows will keep water out. It also means that I’ll get very wet walking to Deutsche Bank this morning. I meant to buy an umbrella yesterday, but I forgot. Oh well. I guess I could walk to the train station and then take a bus. That would leave me at Zentralplatz, and DB isn’t too far from there.

I’ve been doing some work on my presentation for my bankers today. We’re doing verbs such as fluctuate, hold, issue, invest, pay, quote, retrieve, sell, settle, take over and trade, as well as 0 – 3rd conditionals and Future Perfect & Future Continuous (they’re at a quite advanced level). They’re executive client account representatives.

My other classes today are at the school and are Upper Intermediate (17h30) and Beginner (19h10).

20h – Here’s how the day went. My bankers group went very well. After that, I went to the doctor’s office right next to our school and made an appointment for the medical check required by the government of all incoming foreigners. I then met my landlord at 10h30 as planned. We went to the Foreigners Office to register me, but there was a two-hour wait. The guy told him that there isn’t a wait between 8h – 9h in the mornings, so we decided to come back tomorrow morning instead (I’m meeting him at 7h50 at his car). Then, I went home and tried to sleep, but couldn’t. I got up and went to work and started preparing for my classes. I left the office at 4h10 and arrived at the doctor’s office at 4h13. The lady took my information and asked me to wait. Five minutes later the doctor came out and took me into his office.

3 July – Rain again!

13h – What a busy day! I met my landlord at 7h50 as planned. He wasn’t ready, so we didn’t leave his house until 8h05. We tried to get to the Foreigner’s Police Office the way we had gone yesterday, however it was rush hour and the exit was the same one for the army base, so it was backed up into the city. Luckily, he knew ways around it. We got there at 8h20 and the place was packed, kind of. They have the alphabet divided into five different rooms, and the one I had to go to, A – D, was the only one with a line. There were eight people ahead of us. Two hours later, I finally got in!!

After that, we went back to the centre and registered my address. This made me an actual person again! So, I went and opened a bank account at Deutsche Bank, and the applied for a PO Box at the post office near the train station, as I walk by it every day going to and from work, so I can check my mail then. Why a PO Box? Several people live in my building and we don’t have apartment numbers to sort out the mail, so some of it might not get to me if it is sent to my street address. PO Boxes don’t cost money here. They post office mails you a letter at your street address in 6 – 8 days with the box number on it and you go in, leave a €10 key deposit and get a box. There isn’t a service charge for the actual box. What a great deal.

My last stop was the library, which is right next to the Post Office. I went in and asked about internet access. They guy at the information desk told me that they have it the two terminals near the window. I wonder what the other 10 terminals are for? They don’t have signups, so you have to wait until one of them is free. I used it for an hour (15h – 16h) and it was good to be back online. However, they have the A drive blocked, so I couldn’t upload anything, nor could I access emails I’ve written already to send them. Bummer. After that, I came home.

I’m exhausted, but don’t want to sleep.

21h – I had a very traumatic day. Ross went to get the keys for one of the cars and showed me the colour coded key tag. Supposedly he had the “pink” car, but it had a purple thing on the key chain. I said to him, I didn’t know we had a purple car,” and he responded, “it’s for the lilac one,’ to which I said, “You the pink car isn’t really pink? It’s purple?” He told me that that was the case and he didn’t know why they called it the pink car. I was traumatised! I was looking forward to driving a pink car!

I brought the light green car home, as I had to bring home the packages that arrived last week.

4 July – 6h – Yet another cloudy day! Won’t it stop?

It’s Thursday, the last day of my workweek, but a busy day for me. I’ll teach my first class in town, take the bus back to the office to get the car, drive out to my second job, which actually is three jobs at one company, go to the customs house for my package (luckily, its right near that job), have lunch, go grocery shopping (the grocery store closest (and cheapest) to my house has another store near the outlet malls), go to my other out of town job (which is actually two jobs at a company) and them come home. At least I’m out of the office! Also, it turns out that I do have to go to the office tomorrow to drop off the car keys, as by the time I return from my out of town jobs tonight, it’ll be 20h30 and the it will be closed. Oh well. I’ll run in, do that and then catch the first train after that to Frankfurt.

Happy Independence Day to everyone in the USA. Until I wrote the date for today’s journal entries, I had forgotten about it. It would be nice to be in Philadelphia for it, and all the events leading up to it, again some day. Perhaps next year, since the 4th of July will be a Friday.

14h31 – So, here I am again on my normal three-hour break. My third class showed up today at the last company, so I had to work. It was a good class.

Once again, I’m at Burger King (chicken wrap and a coke again) at the outlet malls (there really isn’t any other place to eat around here, other than McDonalds farther down the road). I messed up on the roundabout again and ended up on the motorway (one wrong turn and you’re on the motorway), however this time I figured out my mistake, got off the motorway, came back and did it correctly. After this, I’ll browse around Media Markt (it’s like a Circuit City), do some grocery shopping, and then go to my last job.

This morning didn’t quite go how I had expected, but ended up working out for the better. I had planned on leaving the car outside of the school today, walking to my first job and then walking back to the school getting the car and going to my first outside job. However, both of our assigned parking spaces had red and while poles in them that prohibited people from parking there. I didn’t know what to do, so I ended up driving downtown and parking in the parking garage for Löhr Center, across the road from where I was going, and walking from there. I came out, got the car, and since I had saved myself about 10 minutes, I drove to the customs office to get my package. The parking fee only cost €1.60, so I’ll probably do it every Thursday morning. It’s easier than the things I had previously done.

The place I had to get my package was only about two minutes from the job I had to drive to. I went in and a non English-speaking guy called another of the same, and he took me to get it. I pointed it out to him and he handed it to me and said, “Open,” meaning that he wanted to see inside of it. That really shouldn’t have been a problem as it was half way open already (they had cut the tape on it). He dug around inside of it, through my small notebooks and other English teaching things and then said that I could go. I found out that he did understand English bit, so I asked why this came here instead of being delivered to the address. He told me that it was because it had come from a non-EU country, Poland. I knew that that was untrue, as the other two came through customs fine, but kept my mouth shut about that. I thanked him for the package and left.

14h58 – It’s still cloudy and windy out.

15h04 – That’s it for now. It’s browsing and shopping time.

22h36 – I think it’s starting to hit me that I’m not going back to Poland in September. Until now, it’s seemed like a holiday, however reality is now at my doorstep and I think I’ll have to deal with the fact that living in Poland is now part of my past. I’ll still make trips back there, however I don’t know if I’ll ever live there again. That makes me sad.

22h58 – Oh! I just looked at the date on my camera and was reminded, once again, that it’s the 4th of July in the USA. I had completely forgotten again.

5 July – 0h08 – I should really be in bed, but I don’t want to. I’ve been reading through my Poland journals and looking at my Poland photos and reminiscing. I really miss it.

The USA is the country I was born into and Poland was the country that I adopted as my home. In all actuality, I felt more at home in Poland than I did the USA, but I have no idea as to why. I just felt like it was where I was meant to be. Now I’m in Germany, the country that my ancestors left in the late 1800’s for the USA, but I feel no connection with it or love for it. I like it, but that’s it. I’m here for economic reasons.

0h30 – Time for bed.

6 July – 7h – I’m heading to Frankfurt soon. I’ll return the car at 8h and then walk to the train station. I love the fact that work and the station are so close!

1 July – A new start to a new month! It’s cloudy today.

7h – So, what shall I do today? The first thing is return the car. I borrowed it (with permission) on Saturday so that I could move. I only needed it for about an hour, but since I had to move after work, I ended up with it for the whole weekend. It hasn’t moved since about 15h30 on Saturday. I’ll return it right when the office opens at 8h in case anyone else needs it, but I doubt if the will, as according to the schedule, there is only one class at 8h30 and it is in house. However, it looks better if I do. Also, the parking in front of my building changes to pay parking at 8h Monday mornings (it’s free from 14h Saturday – 8h Monday). After that, I have to organise my flat a bit more. I also have to meet with my landlord at 13h and pay rent, etc. I’ll also find out what paperwork I need to register with the foreigners’ office (every immigrant in Germany is required to do that).

8h30 – I’m back. I returned the car, had breakfast and picked up a copy of yesterday’s Sunday Times (of London). The times is very expensive, costing €5.10, so I probably Won’t make a habit out of it. Now the tea is on and I’m going to sit on the couch and read the newspaper and relax. Nothing interesting.

10h52 – It’s been sprinkling off and on all morning, but now it’s picked up and has turned into a steady rain.

12h13 – I totally love my schedule. I get off at 20h15 on Thursdays and don’t have to be at work again until 17h30 on Monday, with the exception of every other Saturday, when I go in for 3 hours and 15 minutes. Also, Mondays are easy days for me, as I have a beginners class and a second class that is basically an intermediate level conversation class.

20h – It turned out to be a good day. My second class was a no-show, so I only had to teach one. Also, I paid my first month’s rent (€270) and my landlord said that tomorrow he’d take me to the foreigners’ office to register at 10h30, because he’s out of forms that he needs. My boss, David, explained how the taxes work to me. Basically, I’m paying 25.82% tax, but that includes “social taxes” such as health insurance, unemployment, reunification tax and pension. The actual tax percentage for my tax bracket is 5.3%. It’s less than I’d pay if I lived in Pennsylvania, and includes health insurance! A good deal.

When I arrived at work today, I found a notice from Deutsche Post. It was in German, so I couldn’t read it, but I thought that it meant that I had a package at the post office (I was still waiting for a third package from Poland). I asked Jessica, one of the office workers, to translate it for me and it turns out that I have to go customs to pick it up. I wonder why?

2 July – 6h30 – I didn’t sleep well last night.

It’s been raining heavily most of the night. This quells my fear about how well my skylight windows will keep water out. It also means that I’ll get very wet walking to Deutsche Bank this morning. I meant to buy an umbrella yesterday, but I forgot. Oh well. I guess I could walk to the train station and then take a bus. That would leave me at Zentralplatz, and DB isn’t too far from there.

I’ve been doing some work on my presentation for my bankers today. We’re doing verbs such as fluctuate, hold, issue, invest, pay, quote, retrieve, sell, settle, take over and trade, as well as 0 – 3rd conditionals and Future Perfect & Future Continuous (they’re at a quite advanced level). They’re executive client account representatives.

My other classes today are at the school and are Upper Intermediate (17h30) and Beginner (19h10).

20h – Here’s how the day went. My bankers group went very well. After that, I went to the doctor’s office right next to our school and made an appointment for the medical check required by the government of all incoming foreigners. I then met my landlord at 10h30 as planned. We went to the Foreigners Office to register me, but there was a two-hour wait. The guy told him that there isn’t a wait between 8h – 9h in the mornings, so we decided to come back tomorrow morning instead (I’m meeting him at 7h50 at his car). Then, I went home and tried to sleep, but couldn’t. I got up and went to work and started preparing for my classes. I left the office at 4h10 and arrived at the doctor’s office at 4h13. The lady took my information and asked me to wait. Five minutes later the doctor came out and took me into his office.

3 July – Rain again!

13h – What a busy day! I met my landlord at 7h50 as planned. He wasn’t ready, so we didn’t leave his house until 8h05. We tried to get to the Foreigner’s Police Office the way we had gone yesterday, however it was rush hour and the exit was the same one for the army base, so it was backed up into the city. Luckily, he knew ways around it. We got there at 8h20 and the place was packed, kind of. They have the alphabet divided into five different rooms, and the one I had to go to, A – D, was the only one with a line. There were eight people ahead of us. Two hours later, I finally got in!!

After that, we went back to the centre and registered my address. This made me an actual person again! So, I went and opened a bank account at Deutsche Bank, and the applied for a PO Box at the post office near the train station, as I walk by it every day going to and from work, so I can check my mail then. Why a PO Box? Several people live in my building and we don’t have apartment numbers to sort out the mail, so some of it might not get to me if it is sent to my street address. PO Boxes don’t cost money here. They post office mails you a letter at your street address in 6 – 8 days with the box number on it and you go in, leave a €10 key deposit and get a box. There isn’t a service charge for the actual box. What a great deal.

My last stop was the library, which is right next to the Post Office. I went in and asked about internet access. They guy at the information desk told me that they have it the two terminals near the window. I wonder what the other 10 terminals are for? They don’t have signups, so you have to wait until one of them is free. I used it for an hour (15h – 16h) and it was good to be back online. However, they have the A drive blocked, so I couldn’t upload anything, nor could I access emails I’ve written already to send them. Bummer. After that, I came home.

I’m exhausted, but don’t want to sleep.

21h – I had a very traumatic day. Ross went to get the keys for one of the cars and showed me the colour coded key tag. Supposedly he had the “pink” car, but it had a purple thing on the key chain. I said to him, I didn’t know we had a purple car,” and he responded, “it’s for the lilac one,’ to which I said, “You the pink car isn’t really pink? It’s purple?” He told me that that was the case and he didn’t know why they called it the pink car. I was traumatised! I was looking forward to driving a pink car!

I brought the light green car home, as I had to bring home the packages that arrived last week.

4 July – 6h – Yet another cloudy day! Won’t it stop?

It’s Thursday, the last day of my workweek, but a busy day for me. I’ll teach my first class in town, take the bus back to the office to get the car, drive out to my second job, which actually is three jobs at one company, go to the customs house for my package (luckily, its right near that job), have lunch, go grocery shopping (the grocery store closest (and cheapest) to my house has another store near the outlet malls), go to my other out of town job (which is actually two jobs at a company) and them come home. At least I’m out of the office! Also, it turns out that I do have to go to the office tomorrow to drop off the car keys, as by the time I return from my out of town jobs tonight, it’ll be 20h30 and the it will be closed. Oh well. I’ll run in, do that and then catch the first train after that to Frankfurt.

Happy Independence Day to everyone in the USA. Until I wrote the date for today’s journal entries, I had forgotten about it. It would be nice to be in Philadelphia for it, and all the events leading up to it, again some day. Perhaps next year, since the 4th of July will be a Friday.

14h31 – So, here I am again on my normal three-hour break. My third class showed up today at the last company, so I had to work. It was a good class.

Once again, I’m at Burger King (chicken wrap and a coke again) at the outlet malls (there really isn’t any other place to eat around here, other than McDonalds farther down the road). I messed up on the roundabout again and ended up on the motorway (one wrong turn and you’re on the motorway), however this time I figured out my mistake, got off the motorway, came back and did it correctly. After this, I’ll browse around Media Markt (it’s like a Circuit City), do some grocery shopping, and then go to my last job.

This morning didn’t quite go how I had expected, but ended up working out for the better. I had planned on leaving the car outside of the school today, walking to my first job and then walking back to the school getting the car and going to my first outside job. However, both of our assigned parking spaces had red and while poles in them that prohibited people from parking there. I didn’t know what to do, so I ended up driving downtown and parking in the parking garage for Löhr Center, across the road from where I was going, and walking from there. I came out, got the car, and since I had saved myself about 10 minutes, I drove to the customs office to get my package. The parking fee only cost €1.60, so I’ll probably do it every Thursday morning. It’s easier than the things I had previously done.

The place I had to get my package was only about two minutes from the job I had to drive to. I went in and a non English-speaking guy called another of the same, and he took me to get it. I pointed it out to him and he handed it to me and said, “Open,” meaning that he wanted to see inside of it. That really shouldn’t have been a problem as it was half way open already (they had cut the tape on it). He dug around inside of it, through my small notebooks and other English teaching things and then said that I could go. I found out that he did understand English bit, so I asked why this came here instead of being delivered to the address. He told me that it was because it had come from a non-EU country, Poland. I knew that that was untrue, as the other two came through customs fine, but kept my mouth shut about that. I thanked him for the package and left.

14h58 – It’s still cloudy and windy out.

15h04 – That’s it for now. It’s browsing and shopping time.

22h36 – I think it’s starting to hit me that I’m not going back to Poland in September. Until now, it’s seemed like a holiday, however reality is now at my doorstep and I think I’ll have to deal with the fact that living in Poland is now part of my past. I’ll still make trips back there, however I don’t know if I’ll ever live there again. That makes me sad.

22h58 – Oh! I just looked at the date on my camera and was reminded, once again, that it’s the 4th of July in the USA. I had completely forgotten again.

5 July – 0h08 – I should really be in bed, but I don’t want to. I’ve been reading through my Poland journals and looking at my Poland photos and reminiscing. I really miss it.

The USA is the country I was born into and Poland was the country that I adopted as my home. In all actuality, I felt more at home in Poland than I did the USA, but I have no idea as to why. I just felt like it was where I was meant to be. Now I’m in Germany, the country that my ancestors left in the late 1800’s for the USA, but I feel no connection with it or love for it. I like it, but that’s it. I’m here for economic reasons.

0h30 – Time for bed.

6 July – 7h – I’m heading to Frankfurt soon. I’ll return the car at 8h and then walk to the train station. I love the fact that work and the station are so close!

1 July – A new start to a new month! It’s cloudy t…

1 July – A new start to a new month! It’s cloudy today.

7h – So, what shall I do today? The first thing is return the car. I borrowed it (with permission) on Saturday so that I could move. I only needed it for about an hour, but since I had to move after work, I ended up with it for the whole weekend. It hasn’t moved since about 15h30 on Saturday. I’ll return it right when the office opens at 8h in case anyone else needs it, but I doubt if the will, as according to the schedule, there is only one class at 8h30 and it is in house. However, it looks better if I do. Also, the parking in front of my building changes to pay parking at 8h Monday mornings (it’s free from 14h Saturday – 8h Monday). After that, I have to organise my flat a bit more. I also have to meet with my landlord at 13h and pay rent, etc. I’ll also find out what paperwork I need to register with the foreigners’ office (every immigrant in Germany is required to do that).

8h30 – I’m back. I returned the car, had breakfast and picked up a copy of yesterday’s Sunday Times (of London). The times is very expensive, costing €5.10, so I probably Won’t make a habit out of it. Now the tea is on and I’m going to sit on the couch and read the newspaper and relax. Nothing interesting.

10h52 – It’s been sprinkling off and on all morning, but now it’s picked up and has turned into a steady rain.

12h13 – I totally love my schedule. I get off at 20h15 on Thursdays and don’t have to be at work again until 17h30 on Monday, with the exception of every other Saturday, when I go in for 3 hours and 15 minutes. Also, Mondays are easy days for me, as I have a beginners class and a second class that is basically an intermediate level conversation class.

20h – It turned out to be a good day. My second class was a no-show, so I only had to teach one. Also, I paid my first month’s rent (€270) and my landlord said that tomorrow he’d take me to the foreigners’ office to register at 10h30, because he’s out of forms that he needs. My boss, David, explained how the taxes work to me. Basically, I’m paying 25.82% tax, but that includes “social taxes” such as health insurance, unemployment, reunification tax and pension. The actual tax percentage for my tax bracket is 5.3%. It’s less than I’d pay if I lived in Pennsylvania, and includes health insurance! A good deal.

When I arrived at work today, I found a notice from Deutsche Post. It was in German, so I couldn’t read it, but I thought that it meant that I had a package at the post office (I was still waiting for a third package from Poland). I asked Jessica, one of the office workers, to translate it for me and it turns out that I have to go customs to pick it up. I wonder why?

2 July – 6h30 – I didn’t sleep well last night.

It’s been raining heavily most of the night. This quells my fear about how well my skylight windows will keep water out. It also means that I’ll get very wet walking to Deutsche Bank this morning. I meant to buy an umbrella yesterday, but I forgot. Oh well. I guess I could walk to the train station and then take a bus. That would leave me at Zentralplatz, and DB isn’t too far from there.

I’ve been doing some work on my presentation for my bankers today. We’re doing verbs such as fluctuate, hold, issue, invest, pay, quote, retrieve, sell, settle, take over and trade, as well as 0 – 3rd conditionals and Future Perfect & Future Continuous (they’re at a quite advanced level). They’re executive client account representatives.

My other classes today are at the school and are Upper Intermediate (17h30) and Beginner (19h10).

20h – Here’s how the day went. My bankers group went very well. After that, I went to the doctor’s office right next to our school and made an appointment for the medical check required by the government of all incoming foreigners. I then met my landlord at 10h30 as planned. We went to the Foreigners Office to register me, but there was a two-hour wait. The guy told him that there isn’t a wait between 8h – 9h in the mornings, so we decided to come back tomorrow morning instead (I’m meeting him at 7h50 at his car). Then, I went home and tried to sleep, but couldn’t. I got up and went to work and started preparing for my classes. I left the office at 4h10 and arrived at the doctor’s office at 4h13. The lady took my information and asked me to wait. Five minutes later the doctor came out and took me into his office.

3 July – Rain again!

13h – What a busy day! I met my landlord at 7h50 as planned. He wasn’t ready, so we didn’t leave his house until 8h05. We tried to get to the Foreigner’s Police Office the way we had gone yesterday, however it was rush hour and the exit was the same one for the army base, so it was backed up into the city. Luckily, he knew ways around it. We got there at 8h20 and the place was packed, kind of. They have the alphabet divided into five different rooms, and the one I had to go to, A – D, was the only one with a line. There were eight people ahead of us. Two hours later, I finally got in!!

After that, we went back to the centre and registered my address. This made me an actual person again! So, I went and opened a bank account at Deutsche Bank, and the applied for a PO Box at the post office near the train station, as I walk by it every day going to and from work, so I can check my mail then. Why a PO Box? Several people live in my building and we don’t have apartment numbers to sort out the mail, so some of it might not get to me if it is sent to my street address. PO Boxes don’t cost money here. They post office mails you a letter at your street address in 6 – 8 days with the box number on it and you go in, leave a €10 key deposit and get a box. There isn’t a service charge for the actual box. What a great deal.

My last stop was the library, which is right next to the Post Office. I went in and asked about internet access. They guy at the information desk told me that they have it the two terminals near the window. I wonder what the other 10 terminals are for? They don’t have signups, so you have to wait until one of them is free. I used it for an hour (15h – 16h) and it was good to be back online. However, they have the A drive blocked, so I couldn’t upload anything, nor could I access emails I’ve written already to send them. Bummer. After that, I came home.

I’m exhausted, but don’t want to sleep.

21h – I had a very traumatic day. Ross went to get the keys for one of the cars and showed me the colour coded key tag. Supposedly he had the “pink” car, but it had a purple thing on the key chain. I said to him, I didn’t know we had a purple car,” and he responded, “it’s for the lilac one,’ to which I said, “You the pink car isn’t really pink? It’s purple?” He told me that that was the case and he didn’t know why they called it the pink car. I was traumatised! I was looking forward to driving a pink car!

I brought the light green car home, as I had to bring home the packages that arrived last week.

4 July – 6h – Yet another cloudy day! Won’t it stop?

It’s Thursday, the last day of my workweek, but a busy day for me. I’ll teach my first class in town, take the bus back to the office to get the car, drive out to my second job, which actually is three jobs at one company, go to the customs house for my package (luckily, its right near that job), have lunch, go grocery shopping (the grocery store closest (and cheapest) to my house has another store near the outlet malls), go to my other out of town job (which is actually two jobs at a company) and them come home. At least I’m out of the office! Also, it turns out that I do have to go to the office tomorrow to drop off the car keys, as by the time I return from my out of town jobs tonight, it’ll be 20h30 and the it will be closed. Oh well. I’ll run in, do that and then catch the first train after that to Frankfurt.

Happy Independence Day to everyone in the USA. Until I wrote the date for today’s journal entries, I had forgotten about it. It would be nice to be in Philadelphia for it, and all the events leading up to it, again some day. Perhaps next year, since the 4th of July will be a Friday.

14h31 – So, here I am again on my normal three-hour break. My third class showed up today at the last company, so I had to work. It was a good class.

Once again, I’m at Burger King (chicken wrap and a coke again) at the outlet malls (there really isn’t any other place to eat around here, other than McDonalds farther down the road). I messed up on the roundabout again and ended up on the motorway (one wrong turn and you’re on the motorway), however this time I figured out my mistake, got off the motorway, came back and did it correctly. After this, I’ll browse around Media Markt (it’s like a Circuit City), do some grocery shopping, and then go to my last job.

This morning didn’t quite go how I had expected, but ended up working out for the better. I had planned on leaving the car outside of the school today, walking to my first job and then walking back to the school getting the car and going to my first outside job. However, both of our assigned parking spaces had red and while poles in them that prohibited people from parking there. I didn’t know what to do, so I ended up driving downtown and parking in the parking garage for Löhr Center, across the road from where I was going, and walking from there. I came out, got the car, and since I had saved myself about 10 minutes, I drove to the customs office to get my package. The parking fee only cost €1.60, so I’ll probably do it every Thursday morning. It’s easier than the things I had previously done.

The place I had to get my package was only about two minutes from the job I had to drive to. I went in and a non English-speaking guy called another of the same, and he took me to get it. I pointed it out to him and he handed it to me and said, “Open,” meaning that he wanted to see inside of it. That really shouldn’t have been a problem as it was half way open already (they had cut the tape on it). He dug around inside of it, through my small notebooks and other English teaching things and then said that I could go. I found out that he did understand English bit, so I asked why this came here instead of being delivered to the address. He told me that it was because it had come from a non-EU country, Poland. I knew that that was untrue, as the other two came through customs fine, but kept my mouth shut about that. I thanked him for the package and left.

14h58 – It’s still cloudy and windy out.

15h04 – That’s it for now. It’s browsing and shopping time.

22h36 – I think it’s starting to hit me that I’m not going back to Poland in September. Until now, it’s seemed like a holiday, however reality is now at my doorstep and I think I’ll have to deal with the fact that living in Poland is now part of my past. I’ll still make trips back there, however I don’t know if I’ll ever live there again. That makes me sad.

22h58 – Oh! I just looked at the date on my camera and was reminded, once again, that it’s the 4th of July in the USA. I had completely forgotten again.

5 July – 0h08 – I should really be in bed, but I don’t want to. I’ve been reading through my Poland journals and looking at my Poland photos and reminiscing. I really miss it.

The USA is the country I was born into and Poland was the country that I adopted as my home. In all actuality, I felt more at home in Poland than I did the USA, but I have no idea as to why. I just felt like it was where I was meant to be. Now I’m in Germany, the country that my ancestors left in the late 1800’s for the USA, but I feel no connection with it or love for it. I like it, but that’s it. I’m here for economic reasons.

0h30 – Time for bed.

6 July – 7h – I’m heading to Frankfurt soon. I’ll return the car at 8h and then walk to the train station. I love the fact that work and the station are so close!