Terribly BZ!

14th June 2005

I shall give up back-dating my blog for so long. I am nearly 3 weeks behind time. At the rate that I am going, I will never ever become a passable journalist=) So I shall just describe in little detail what has been happening…it is always like this, isn’t it? We are always too busy living life to reflect on the life we are living.

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Ruths Geburtstag!
After the Ritterfest, there came a holiday, Fronleichnam. I went over to Kassel to celebrate Ruth’s birthday with her. I had a very good time there, I remember it made Germany seem exactly like home! On the first day, Kailuo, Ruth and I went to the Orangerie. A bit about the Orangerie: as you might have already guessed, it is a place for…oranges. Apparently, in the 1700s, it became the trend for the dukes or Electors, or basically rulers of the various parts of Germany to travel to the south and bring back some exotic plants to grow in their own land. This must have been quite an important indication of their status, because these Electors spared no efforts in making their Orangeries the best in the country. We walked for half an afternoon in the Orangerie, and we did not even cover the entire place!

That night, we baked a cake together. Ruth insisted on baking her own birthday cake(!!) Later on, Asman told me that we should have locked Ruth up in her room while we baked the cake. This cake was supposed to be a healthier choice, with yoghurt and plant oil instead of butter in it. I loved it, for Ruth thought that it was a failure because it tasted like choco bread instead of choco cake.

The next day, Sam and Joshua came and joined us. We climbed up the Hercules, a Sehenswürdigkeit (or attraction) in Kassel. To cut things short, it was a very beautiful place, as we climbed to the top of the fountain of Herkules, Josh and I could see the entire town of Kassel, plus a nearby castle. It was breathtaking. The dinner that night was Singaporean curry, wonderful veg, and omelette with cai pok (the thing they put on top of chwee kuehs) Ruth refused to let us do any work, so she cooked the entire feast on her own. On her birthday(!!) I think she tired herself out, thoroughly. But the meal was truly delicious, and the conversation just flowed. I must admit that I found it quite hard to speak proper English at first, for German words kept coming to me whenever I try to express myself. I don’t think it is a good sign…it is comparable to the first signs of dementia: someone seems to be talking in your brain, telling you the German and Chinese versions of what you want to say, so you FORGET what you wanted to say at first, and worse, forget that you are speaking English after all. However, one gets used to it.

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Konzert Bonifatius in Erlangen
The weekend after that was my concert in Erlangen. We, the Motetten choir, sang in a church called St. Bonifaz in Erlangen, a nearby town, which is also known as the Siemens town, because besides uni students and Siemens employees, the rest of the population consist of bakers, restauranteurs who exist to serve the Siemens people. Everyone gets along on bicycles. (Did You Know? People can get their driving licences revoked if they were caught cycling recklessly in Germany) Back to the main topic, the concert was held in the hope of raising money for a hospice and a children’s home. We sang 10 songs, most of them Ave Marias, and even Bogoroditse Devo by Rachmaninoff! (NJChoir: great memories? =)) I had the fortune, or misfortune to be standing right in the middle of the performing stage, and by a stroke of luck, there were spaces on my right and in front of me, thus I seemed to be rather prominent. Magdelena, Angelika’s little grand niece, said that it was easy to observe me, and that it was clear that I sang as I opened my mouth rather widely (what observations 9-year-olds have, seemed to be a tactful way of saying that I have a big mouth=D) She made a further comment that she could tell that my mother tongue was not German, just from the shape of my mouth. I really had to laugh at that…she was sitting 5-6 rows away!

An article on the concert appeared on the Erlangen Newspapers on the Tuesday after that. It had a picture of us, and I was in it! =) The article said that our concert was a success on the whole, just that there were 1 or 2 songs that were not together. I just got the CD of our singing, and I am listening to it as I am writing this. Frankly, I think that the columnist is right, but since Herr Killer (our Chorleiter) said that it was all Quatsch, I could hardly say anything to the contrary. During practice, Herr Killer said that one of the most memorable compliments was that from a lady who lived near our practice room. She said that the concert was truly amazing: every Thursday night, she would close her windows to shut out our singing practices, and little did she know that our singing could be so wonderful.

Now, haven’t I told you that Germany is a land of opposites? Everyone thinks in circles here.

We went to the botanic gardens in Erlangen that weekend too. I loved those gardens, they were simply so beautiful, and great to walk in. There are little winding paths in the garden, not like the big paved roads in our gardens, and the entire place had a secretive feel to it. I learned the names of quite a few plants, such as Kiefer, Fichte (pines), Kakten (Cacti), Wasser Rose (water lily), Rosamarginata (a tree with dark red leaves, the edges of its leaves are pinkish red, thus the name), Schwiegermuttersessel (or mother-in-law’s seat, referring to a spiky cactus with a wide top; what a cute name isn’t it).

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Tang yuan-cum-Muah Chee-making
Last Wednesday, I went to Chen Su’s place to help her make Tang yuan or Muah Chee. Of course the China-chinese did not know what a muah chee was. Anyway, we made it as a treat for our colleagues because Su is leaving to work in another department. We brainstormed, she wanted to make ba1 bao3 fan4, I suggested Muah Chee or Konnyaku Jelly. Since the idea of Muah Chee was hard for her to imagine, we made tang yuan, and rolled them in roasted sesame or grounded peanuts. It tasted great, so great that Leila, a German-Lebanese colleague of mine, wanted to know how to make it. She is coming to my place tomorrow, then we will make tangyuan again! =)

After making the Tangyuan, we (Su, her bf Liu Xiao, and I) watched Forrest Gump. It was the first time that I have watched it in its entirety, and I must say that I was very impressed by Gump. The story line was very engaging, and the values it offers, those of the American Dream, were very attractive. The show offers a great history lesson too: I did not even know of the Ping Pong Diplomacy until after watching the show.

At around that time, I wrote my Motivationsbrief to Mannheim as well. It is about why I wanted to choose Pol Sci and why I wanted to study at Mannheim. Wwj helped me with it, and I really improved on my 2nd part after that, thanks man! Leila was a angel: she corrected every single word for me. My entire essay was filled with red marks after she was done with it, but I thought the essay was really much better after that! Terrible of me, though, to still continue to make all those stupid mistakes after nearly SEVEN years of studying the language. It is as if I am always stuck at Primary one. (!!)

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Visiting Sam!
Just last weekend, 11 and 12th June, I visited Sam in Dresden. Dresden is in Saxony (Sachsen), and it used to be a very major city. It was part of East Germany before the Reunification. There is truly a great difference between states in the East and states in West Germany. Somehow, everything seemed…greyer in former East Germany. The buildings are darker, as I later knew from Max, Sams Freund, due to the deposition of soot from the coal-burning power stations in the states’ communist days. There were also many identical buildings in the East, called Plattenbau, because they were all made from the same design to provide fast solutions to the housing problem in East Germany then, just like our older HDB flats. Dresden on the whole still seemed like a big construction site…everything is still under development. I saw many Trabbis there too! The Trabant is a former East German car…apparently you would have to wait about 15 years to get it after you have registered for one. They looked like beetles, or vehicles from a totally different era. I liked them so much, I had a photograph taken with one…and that is my dream car. =) Oh, apparently, I could even get a Trabbi at 1 euro! Jochen showed me how to get it online…and some people are selling Trabbis like scrap metal. Some are collectors’ items though. One just needs to look out for them.

It seemed so apt then that I was reading George Orwell’s 1984. Saw it in a bookshop going for 2 euros (!!) and it was in German (!!), so it was really a steal=) It seemed to me that East Germany was such a dreary place, it was a wonder that people actually tolerated it for so long. However, things are often not as simple as they seem to be. I have a neighbour, Herr Rübsam, and he came from former East Germany. There is a certain nostalgia when he spoke of East Germany to me, about how people would be much better looked after, wrt their pensions, social security and jobs. Everyone had a job to do in East Germany, the work was equally distributed so was the reward. Of course one would be rewarded for greater efficiency with small bonuses. But the main principle was:To each his own. What an impossible, and unworkable promise, you might say. However, it must be taken into account what kind of situation we have right now: unemployment rate is soaring at about 12%, and in most former East German states, unemployment can be as high as 25 %. With its ageing population, Germany can also ill afford to pay her citizens their promised pensions. The anti-capitalism debate, the calling of int firms as locusts waiting to strip German companies bare; these are all just backlashes to the kind of situation that has been worsening in Germany. People want change, and they might have a chance to vote for it in September.



14th June
I am so tired! Tried frying goring Pisang tonight, but they turned out tasting like banana love letters. I think I put in too much egg…and because I am too embarrassed to ask others to try my cooking, so I had to finish all of them by myself! How fattening! =( Terrible.

19th June
Just came back from trip to Mannheim, Heidelberg and Konstanz. Am really dead beat. Wanted to sleep the day off, but I guess I am done with growth, so my body refused to let me sleep.
Spent the entire day trying to make Singapore Curry puffs instead. It tasted ok, but the puffs unraveled whenever I tried to fry them. So I rolled them up like spring rolls, so they looks like little fat spring rolls instead. Thought they were failures, but Angelika thought that they were really good, so I will be making them for her birthday this Thursday (!!)
Am feeling kinda 'Housewifey' or shall I say Domestic? Cooked Green bean soup for pple in the office, am improvising on pancakes=) Can't wait to cook a few German dishes for pa ma gor jie and boon back home! =) Gosh, feel really like a housewife now.