Foreign Languages, foreign food and foreign road rules:
The hobble to Paris’ Gare de L’Est train station was far more graceful than the previous rush. As was to be expected, since Murphy’s law effects Santas just as much as everyone else, my carriage was the second: second closest to the engine and therefore the penultimate one on the platform. To further rub my nose in it, Murphy also made sure that the door didn’t remain open for more than 10 seconds and so, after helping: an elderly couple co-ordinate themselves and their luggage onto the train between door closes, and another elderly lady, her luggage and lap-sized dog onto the train, I boarded the train myself.
Again, the God of ticket reservations had given me a seat facing the wrong direction, in a group of four. It was however a window seat, not that this really mattered as, to further dampen the train experience, the lady with the annoying dog (go on Marlowe, eat him!!) was sitting in my supposedly reserved seat, chatting away on her mobile phone, all the time blatantly ignoring all attempts I was making at eye contact. By now my French is “fluent” enough that I could have explained to her that:
1. she was in my seat, and
2. if she was not senile, she might remember that I was the kind young man, resembling a tortoise with a bandaged leg, who graciously assisted her, her luggage and her dog, onto the train before getting on himself.
STILL NO EYE CONTACT.
Now, had this been Christmas, and I still in my Santa uniform, I doubt whether it would have made any difference at all to this lady. Anyway, looking on the bright side as I am often doing, I decided a different tact: screw the reservation, find an unreserved seat that suits your needs and sit there. After turning 65° from my position I found a window seat, facing the correct direction and that was unreserved. Sweet!! Any apprehension about sitting in the wrong seat was quickly dispelled by the conductor who, upon realising that I was in the wrong seat, looked over to where my seat was and gave me a wry smile in response to my shrugged shoulders.
“Est-ce que vous comfortable ici?” (Are you comfortable here?)
“Oui, je prefere ici” (Yes, I prefer here.)
“Bien, bon voyage” (Fine, have a good journey)
“Merci, a toi aussi.” (thankyou, same to you.)
And so it was off to Germany. After a previous attempt, I was finally going to leave the comforts of France; a place with good friends, a language I understood and spoke and a culture I could get used to. Once over the border, everything changed. I knew nothing of the language, had no map or guidebook and pretty much felt like Captain Kirk: going were no man had gone before. Of course things were not that bad since I was being met in Stuttgart by a close friend: Volker, the German. As I travelled along the tracks, it was hard not to imagine the place 70 odd years ago during the War, with soldiers walking through the woods and tanks rolling down the roads. As a result of the war, almost everything has been rebuilt, but whilst still retaining a degree of charm in the style of houses built.
After safely arriving at the main train station, I met Volker and jumped into his car to go to his place, about 30 minutes from Stuttgart. After entering onto one of the freeways Volker asked the question I’d been waiting for:
“would you like to go via the autobahn?”
“um…..no not really?!?!”
Pedal to the metal and off we went, cruising at a comfortable 180 km/hr in the A4 Audi. (unfortunately there was some road works limiting us) If only we had the same laws in Australia. The plan for the following days is Stuttgart central for the Socceroo game against Croatia, Porsche and Mercedes museums and seeing if we can hire a Porsche for a day and go sick.
That evening it was off to my first German beer hall to watch what was essentially a boring game between Argentina and the Netherlands. Tried some of the local cuisine which I won’t even try to spell, let alone pronounce, but was basically the German pizza – pita bread flattened out to the size of two dinner plates and topped with cheese, herbs and meat. It was really tasty although I think that I prefer the thicker base in pizzas. Sampled a few different beers before collapsing into bed for some well earned rest.
Oh Rudolf, it’s just so much better in a car. Sorry but horse-power beats Reindeer-power any day!!
Tips for young drivers:
1. in Germany you accumulate points up to a total of about 18 before your license is threatened....Mr Harris you should move here!! How many points have you go left??
2. the fine for being caught driving 10 km/hr over the speed limit: 20 euro --> about AU$35
3. 38 km/hr over the limit on the highway is 3 points and 100 euro --> about AU$175 (Volker is a pilot and German....clearly speed is no object when flying at 900 km/hr is the norm!!)
4. there are speed limits on the autobahns but only in high accident areas and then these are really only advisory limits
5. people drive on the wrong side of the road here too.
6. seatbelts are irrelevant at 200+ km/hr but do provide a thin sense of security nonetheless.
7. Porsches are faster the A4 Audis
8. Ferraris are faster than Porsches (think it was a Ferrari..looked like a shimmering red blur really)
Again, the God of ticket reservations had given me a seat facing the wrong direction, in a group of four. It was however a window seat, not that this really mattered as, to further dampen the train experience, the lady with the annoying dog (go on Marlowe, eat him!!) was sitting in my supposedly reserved seat, chatting away on her mobile phone, all the time blatantly ignoring all attempts I was making at eye contact. By now my French is “fluent” enough that I could have explained to her that:
1. she was in my seat, and
2. if she was not senile, she might remember that I was the kind young man, resembling a tortoise with a bandaged leg, who graciously assisted her, her luggage and her dog, onto the train before getting on himself.
STILL NO EYE CONTACT.
Now, had this been Christmas, and I still in my Santa uniform, I doubt whether it would have made any difference at all to this lady. Anyway, looking on the bright side as I am often doing, I decided a different tact: screw the reservation, find an unreserved seat that suits your needs and sit there. After turning 65° from my position I found a window seat, facing the correct direction and that was unreserved. Sweet!! Any apprehension about sitting in the wrong seat was quickly dispelled by the conductor who, upon realising that I was in the wrong seat, looked over to where my seat was and gave me a wry smile in response to my shrugged shoulders.
“Est-ce que vous comfortable ici?” (Are you comfortable here?)
“Oui, je prefere ici” (Yes, I prefer here.)
“Bien, bon voyage” (Fine, have a good journey)
“Merci, a toi aussi.” (thankyou, same to you.)
And so it was off to Germany. After a previous attempt, I was finally going to leave the comforts of France; a place with good friends, a language I understood and spoke and a culture I could get used to. Once over the border, everything changed. I knew nothing of the language, had no map or guidebook and pretty much felt like Captain Kirk: going were no man had gone before. Of course things were not that bad since I was being met in Stuttgart by a close friend: Volker, the German. As I travelled along the tracks, it was hard not to imagine the place 70 odd years ago during the War, with soldiers walking through the woods and tanks rolling down the roads. As a result of the war, almost everything has been rebuilt, but whilst still retaining a degree of charm in the style of houses built.
After safely arriving at the main train station, I met Volker and jumped into his car to go to his place, about 30 minutes from Stuttgart. After entering onto one of the freeways Volker asked the question I’d been waiting for:
“would you like to go via the autobahn?”
“um…..no not really?!?!”
Pedal to the metal and off we went, cruising at a comfortable 180 km/hr in the A4 Audi. (unfortunately there was some road works limiting us) If only we had the same laws in Australia. The plan for the following days is Stuttgart central for the Socceroo game against Croatia, Porsche and Mercedes museums and seeing if we can hire a Porsche for a day and go sick.
That evening it was off to my first German beer hall to watch what was essentially a boring game between Argentina and the Netherlands. Tried some of the local cuisine which I won’t even try to spell, let alone pronounce, but was basically the German pizza – pita bread flattened out to the size of two dinner plates and topped with cheese, herbs and meat. It was really tasty although I think that I prefer the thicker base in pizzas. Sampled a few different beers before collapsing into bed for some well earned rest.
Oh Rudolf, it’s just so much better in a car. Sorry but horse-power beats Reindeer-power any day!!
Tips for young drivers:
1. in Germany you accumulate points up to a total of about 18 before your license is threatened....Mr Harris you should move here!! How many points have you go left??
2. the fine for being caught driving 10 km/hr over the speed limit: 20 euro --> about AU$35
3. 38 km/hr over the limit on the highway is 3 points and 100 euro --> about AU$175 (Volker is a pilot and German....clearly speed is no object when flying at 900 km/hr is the norm!!)
4. there are speed limits on the autobahns but only in high accident areas and then these are really only advisory limits
5. people drive on the wrong side of the road here too.
6. seatbelts are irrelevant at 200+ km/hr but do provide a thin sense of security nonetheless.
7. Porsches are faster the A4 Audis
8. Ferraris are faster than Porsches (think it was a Ferrari..looked like a shimmering red blur really)
posted by santas walkabout at 10:36 pm
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