I have arrived. And by that, I mean I’ve actually made it to my new place of residence–in Germany. And although my plane had me arrive on time, my suitcase (Koffer) preferred to be fashionably late. The airline company compensated me 60 Euros to get me by. Not much, considering I had nothing with me, but it did arrive just two days later, so not terrible. I did get a new pair of jeans out of the whole ordeal.

I have to say, I thought flying on Singapore Airways would be terrible. I was wrong, I should have remembered about Asians being all about service. In fact, it was nearly impossible to get up to use the bathroom because there was almost always someone walking down the aisles, offering drinks, snacks, hot damp cloths, extra pillows, complimentary socks and toothbrushes, etc. I think we were in the air just ten minutes before I had a bag of peanuts and a glass of wine. Cheap wine, but the way it hit my head after the second glass proved they didn’t skimp on the alcohol content. So, other than my Delta flight to JFK sucking with being very late, not getting my luggage to Singapore in time, my flight experience went well. I met some creative characters–including a cute elderly couple from Dublin who couldn’t stop telling me that the gum I offered them and they accepted was the best gum they had ever had and needed information so they could buy it again, and a German woman and her very young and mostly sleeping grandson, who could only understand minimal English. We spoke in short phrases, often mixed with German and English. But for an 8 hour flight, we saved each other with good company.

I’ve started settling into my room now that my suitcase has arrived. It’s a bit bare. There is plenty of furniture, but not enough art or color yet. I do have a whole wall made of floor to ceiling windows including a door to my own patio and room entrance. Did I mention this house is a smart house? The father here is big on technology and they just built the house over the past several months. There are blinds outside of every window we can control to close, for both privacy and darkness, 800 outlets in the house, every room has a network connection off of the primary outlet board, and even a touch screen control of all house lights, temperatures, blinds, various electrical options and selected RSS feeds. It’s very modern with a touch of that classic German home.

The family is wonderful, better than I could have hoped for. Laura is five and has so much energy and joy. Jan is three and from the first couple of hours here he is all over me. They both cuddle with me on the couch, fight over who gets my attention and tonight Laura woke me up from a brief catnap with a big kiss on my cheek. They are sweet. Stefanie is only ten months old and she is smiling 80% of the time. I think I am falling in love with all of the kids here. Julia and Patrik are very welcoming and shared a bottle (or two) of wine with me, chatting for a couple of hours late into the night. Patrik’s parents don’t speak any English, but I managed to communicate quite a bit with them through my (very) broken German. I should start German classes in June, but it depends on which level I test into. Tomorrow I will register with the town and open up a bank account.

I did rather enjoy being able to just pick up the phone and give Thilo a ring, not having to calculate his time and realize he is probably sleeping already. I believe he said “O-M-G” several times during our conversation. I can’t wait to take the train to visit.

So far, there are so many differences. This blog is getting long so I won’t get into them all. Although I will say that eating all this spreadable uncooked meat is playing a toll on my digestive system! And do you know that the bottle return here is 0.25 Euros? And the garbage collection is only every two weeks. Random stuff like that. Oh, also, it was nearly impossible to find hair conditioner. There are a few 2-in-1′s, but I guess using just shampoo is the standard. My hair nearly screamed at me for the millisecond of consideration there.

Right now, I do miss home, but mostly for the social interaction. I don’t have a local cell phone here, and even if I did, I think Thilo would tell me to stop texting him. Once I start classes I am sure I’ll meet a lot more people.

That’s all for now. Tschüs!