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Sorry for not providing a weekend update, but I had to correct exams for four hours this morning, and then teach 12h40 – 20h40. I know I won’t have any time for it tomorrow, but I’ll try to get it done on Wednesday. I got my bike back today, which of course means that it’s raining so I can’t take it for a proper test ride. €50, just like Bernd (the bike shop owner) had said. €21 parts and €29 labour. I’m getting a bit impatient. The results of the Cambridge exam that some of my students took in early December are due out soon. Actually, I believe the date of dispatch was yesterday. Jessica was able to get the results for one of the other exams on the internet somewhere a few weeks ago (most likely a Cambridge website), a couple days before we go the results in the mail. However, she’s been on holiday for the past week and no one else, not even David, knows how she did it. I’m glad she’ll be back tomorrow. How the heck did my Webshots account get 544 views in the last week (according to the weekly stats they send me)?
This and that
Hayley’s mom just called. I think I remember Hayley saying (a while back) that they talk every Sunday morning, so apparently Hayley gave her my phone number. My mobile phone displays the number that is calling, and I saw the country code of Australia (61), but had no idea who it might have been (I have the phone #’s of the people I know in Australia in my mobile with the names of the people, so the name shows up when they call). What a pleasant surprise. I have no problem with her giving her mom my number, because her mom knows that she and I are good friends.
Surprise
Bernd from the bike shop called me yesterday at 11h30, while Hayley and I were walking along the river, and said that my bike was ready and I could pick it up anytime. I told him I’d be in on Monday. The charge is €50. Funnily enough, when we were walking around old town yesterday, we went by a bike shop there (the biggest one in town), and they had a brand new bike similar to mine on sale for €100, 50% off of the normal €200 price. Odd how I had never seen a bike for under €250 at ANY bike shop in Koblenz, and when mine was being fixed I saw a brand new one for just €50 more than I was paying to have mine fixed. Life isn’t fair. By the way, on Saturday I bought a second bike lock (180 cm long) at Real (a hypermarket) for €4.99. After I get my bike back, I’ll be locking both wheels to the frame instead of just the front one.
Bike Update
My friend Hayley is visiting this weekend from the UK. She came in last night and leaves tomorrow afternoon. We’ve been having a great time.
Visitor
Can’t sleep.
Blah!
My ticket for the 2006 Olympics has been approved. Here are the details: Event Ice Hockey – Women’s Semifinal 5-8 Why ice hockey? I had to put in an order in the December phase to be able to buy more tickets in the Feb phase that is only for EU residents. Ice hockey was the cheapest of the tickets for the dates that I plan on being in Torino. Plus, it’ll have been about ten years since I’ve been to a hockey game. The darn Italians are charging a €20 ticket delivery fee! That wasn’t done for tickets for the Athens Olympics. I hope it’s not €20 per ticket.
Olympics Tickets part 1
Venue Torino Esposizioni
Date 17/02/2006
Time 13:00
Price (euro) 20,00
Tkts 1Cat B – Stands seated
Tot €20,00
Total of Tickets Awarded €20,00
Service Fee €20,00
Order Total €40,00
Angelika and I took it to the bike shop today, but it turns out that I didn’t really need her – the guy spoke okay English. He said that I needed a new wheel (€59), a new chain (€20), a new chain wheel (€29) and a new tire (€5). I then told him that I could probably buy a new second hand bike for that price, so he asked me how attached I was to the bike. Angelika translated the fact that I had no emotional attachment to it (some people do to theirs), so we went into the area behind the shop and he started looking around for second hand pieces he could use. He found a few and said that he might be able to get the price down to €50 – €60, which is fine by me (even though I had only paid €50 for the bike). It’s still cheaper (and much easier) than finding another €50 bike. He also estimated that my bike was originally bought in 1991 (based on the model). I have to go back on Friday for more information. This leads back to something my friend Chris said to me many months ago, after I told him that I had only paid €50 for my bike and that I didn’t care if anything happened to it. He said, ‘Think of it as ‘How much would it cost to replace it?”. However, I won’t tell him that he was right because hes quite arrogant and would like that too much. A couple of notes: 1. In my 10h class today, a (21 year old) student looked at me and said, ‘What did you do to your bike?’ I replied, ‘You mean what financial burden has one of your idiotic fellow countrymen caused me?’ She got the hint and said, ‘Oh.’ I then said to her, ‘That was probably the dumbest question I’ve had in years,’ to which she replied, ‘Thank you.’ 2. I told my 19h10 class about this and a (55 year old) student said, ‘A German would never do something like that, it must have been a Russian.’ Coming from him, that didn’t surprise me because he’s one of those Germans who is convinced that all the crime in Germany is caused by immigrants from Eastern Europe and Turkey. I told him that 92% of the population of Germany is German (I looked it up last night), so that means that there’s a better possibility that a German did it than a non-German. He still refused to believe that a German would steal part of a bike.
Bike Update
Angelika and I took it to the bike shop today, but it turns out that I didn’t really need her – the guy spoke okay English. He said that I needed a new wheel (€59), a new chain (€20), a new chain wheel (€29) and a new tire (€5). I then told him that I could probably buy a new second hand bike for that price, so he asked me how attached I was to the bike. Angelika translated the fact that I had no emotional attachment to it (some people do to theirs), so we went into the area behind the shop and he started looking around for second hand pieces he could use. He found a few and said that he might be able to get the price down to €50 – €60, which is fine by me (even though I had only paid €50 for the bike). It’s still cheaper (and much easier) than finding another €50 bike. He also estimated that my bike was originally bought in 1991 (based on the model). I have to go back on Friday for more information. This leads back to something my friend Chris said to me many months ago, after I told him that I had only paid €50 for my bike and that I didn’t care if anything happened to it. He said, ‘Think of it as ‘How much would it cost to replace it?”. However, I won’t tell him that he was right because hes quite arrogant and would like that too much. A couple of notes: 1. In my 10h class today, a (21 year old) student looked at me and said, ‘What did you do to your bike?’ I replied, ‘You mean what financial burden has one of your idiotic fellow countrymen caused me?’ She got the hint and said, ‘Oh.’ I then said to her, ‘That was probably the dumbest question I’ve had in years,’ to which she replied, ‘Thank you.’ 2. I told my 19h10 class about this and a (55 year old) student said, ‘A German would never do something like that, it must have been a Russian.’ Coming from him, that didn’t surprise me because he’s one of those Germans who is convinced that all the crime in Germany is caused by immigrants from Eastern Europe and Turkey. I told him that 92% of the population of Germany is German (I looked it up last night), so that means that there’s a better possibility that a German did it than a non-German. He still refused to believe that a German would steal part of a bike.
Bike Update
Angelika and I took it to the bike shop today, but it turns out that I didn’t really need her – the guy spoke okay English. He said that I needed a new wheel (€59), a new chain (€20), a new chain wheel (€29) and a new tire (€5). I then told him that I could probably buy a new second hand bike for that price, so he asked me how attached I was to the bike. Angelika translated the fact that I had no emotional attachment to it (some people do to theirs), so we went into the area behind the shop and he started looking around for second hand pieces he could use. He found a few and said that he might be able to get the price down to €50 – €60, which is fine by me (even though I had only paid €50 for the bike). It’s still cheaper (and much easier) than finding another €50 bike. He also estimated that my bike was originally bought in 1991 (based on the model). I have to go back on Friday for more information. This leads back to something my friend Chris said to me many months ago, after I told him that I had only paid €50 for my bike and that I didn’t care if anything happened to it. He said, ‘Think of it as ‘How much would it cost to replace it?”. However, I won’t tell him that he was right because hes quite arrogant and would like that too much. A couple of notes: 1. In my 10h class today, a (21 year old) student looked at me and said, ‘What did you do to your bike?’ I replied, ‘You mean what financial burden has one of your idiotic fellow countrymen caused me?’ She got the hint and said, ‘Oh.’ I then said to her, ‘That was probably the dumbest question I’ve had in years,’ to which she replied, ‘Thank you.’ 2. I told my 19h10 class about this and a (55 year old) student said, ‘A German would never do something like that, it must have been a Russian.’ Coming from him, that didn’t surprise me because he’s one of those Germans who is convinced that all the crime in Germany is caused by immigrants from Eastern Europe and Turkey. I told him that 92% of the population of Germany is German (I looked it up last night), so that means that there’s a better possibility that a German did it than a non-German. He still refused to believe that a German would steal part of a bike.
Bike Update
My bike is still status quo…what’s left of it is still locked to the pole in front of the school, as I didn’t have time to go to a bike shop today to get a new back wheel. A few notes: Last night, a student told me that there’s a bike shop two minutes away from the school. The problem: none of my students know that I speak German, so if I went there and spoke German to the owner, a friend of the student, he’d most likely tell her I spoke German to him and then she’d probably blab it to the whole world. So, I asked one of our German teachers, Angelika, a fellow cyclist and someone I consider a (fair weather) friend, to go with me and pretend to translate, but she couldn’t because she had a class fifteen minutes after I asked her. However, I think she’s still mad at me because of yesterday. After I discovered that the wheel was gone yesterday, I went to the teachers’ room to prepare my lessons. She asked me how I was, and I told her the situation. I then said, ‘All Germans are thieves,’ in a joking manner, but being that she has the German sense of humour (read: none), she took it seriously. Why did I do that? It was kind of revenge, as most Germans consider Eastern Europeans to be thieves, and everybody at the school knows how much I love Eastern Europe. She then told me that it might not have been a German, but one of the Russians that lives in Koblenz (though, most live on the other side of the river). She went on to say that she was sure a German wouldn’t have done something like that. I left it at that and went on with life. Today, BossD and I just happened to be walking to the school at the same time and I told him what had happened as we passed my bike. I then jokingly said, ‘So, this means all Germans are thieves,’ (once again in a joking manner) to which he responded, ‘You’re right about that,’ in a non-joking manner. I then went to the teachers’ room and Angelika was there. She decided to egg me on and asked me about my bike and got under my skin a bit (she knows how important my bike is to me), so I told her what BossD had said and that brought a look of shock to her face. She was stunned that he would dare say something like that about Germans. Perhaps I’ll ask someone else to go with me on my break tomorrow.
The Bike Saga Continues
