Words of the Week: Sie and du

Every German class J and I have taken in the US (including in-person classes, podcasts, online classes, etc), heavily emphasize that Germans are very formal. In the German language, there are 2 ways to address someone in the first person, formally or informally (much like in Spanish and probably other romance languages). You have the formal "Sie," where you refer to someone as Mr./Ms. Lastname (Herr/Frau Nachname), and the informal "du, "where you refer to someone by their first name (Vorname).

All of our US-based German classes and resources told us ad nauseum that one should always use the Sie form except when speaking to relatives or very close friends. For example:

• You're talking to a coworker that you know well. What form should you use? Sie!
• You're talking to the person behind the counter at a shop. What form should you use? Sie!
• You're talking to your neighbor of 5 years. What form should you use? Sie!

Seems easy enough: just address everyone except family with the formal "Sie" and you're all set. However, here are the situations in which I have heard people use the informal address or been asked to use the informal address:

• With anyone remotely of the same age unless it's at the bank or immigration office.
• With coworkers.
• With neighbors.
• With the barista at Starbucks.
• With the hired catsitter.

All of these scenarios would, according to our US classes, require the use of "Sie" without exception. But in all of these cases, "du" has been used almost exclusively.

For example: Our apartment building hosted a cookout in the garden behind the building this evening, and everyone addressed each other (including me) with the informal "du." It was totally fine and expected for me to address people I had never spoken to before by their first names and "du," including people a good 40 years older than me. I had anticipated using the formal form of address, so it was a huge surprise!

For this reason, figuring out when to use the formal (Sie) versus informal (du) form of address is a source of endless confusion for me. I know it's safer to use "Sie" than to appear rude, but, at the same time, using Sie in the wrong situation makes one sound standoffish and stuffy. My current strategy is to wait for the other person to introduce him/herself. If the person says their last name, I do the same and address them with the Sie form and call them Herr/Frau Lastname. If the person gives their first name, I give mine as well and address them with the du form. It's not a foolproof method, but it's the best I can do. Sometimes if I'm really not sure, I'll just ask.

But a few situations don't work with my method: With the catsitter, I used "Sie" initially and then we mutually agreed to start using "du" and our first names. The landlord and I call each other by our first names, but continue to use the formal "Sie" in conversation. And at church, one refers to fellow churchgoers and the pastor as well as God and Jesus using "du."

So confusing! And I am not the only one who feels this way. Turns out even native speakers have the same difficulty (here, here, and here).

The US courses and materials paint the issue so much more black-and-white than it really is. I wonder if perhaps many US courses use outdated materials from a time when Germans were a bit (okay, a lot) more formal...Or maybe Köln is just a more informal city than other places in Germany?...Or maybe the curriculum authors figure it's better to train students to automatically use Sie in order to avoid being rude? Who knows...it may be one of those things that I never 100% figure out. And maybe some day before we move I can sit down with a native speaker and perhaps tease out the proper usage a bit more!

The Houses of Anne Frank & Corrie ten Boom

My mom and sister flew into Amsterdam on their way over from Texas, so I scheduled a bit of time to show them my favorite parts of Amsterdam. Namely, poffterjes, stroop waffels, and the Anne Frank House.

The Frank's house is an easy 15 minute walk from the main train station, along scenic canals. For some reason, when I read the book I didn't envision Anne living on a canal in such a tall, slim row house. I imagined the house in an old American city. And I never dreamed that the secret annex was so huge!

When J and I visited in May, the line wrapped around the building and took about 45 minutes. My mom, sister, and I only had about 4 hours in Amsterdam, so I bought our tickets online a few weeks in advance (they sell out quickly). There's a convenience fee of a few Euros, but it's worth it!

We don't have any pictures from the inside since photography is forbidden, but walking through the rooms brings the story alive. I especially loved seeing the walls where Anne carefully pasted images of her favorite movie stars to make the space cheerier--she was just a regular girl, in extraordinary circumstances.

Canals in Haarlem

When J and I visited the Netherlands in May, we also went to Haarlem (just a 15-20 minutes train ride west of Amsterdam) to visit Corrie ten Boom's house. This museum is such a different experience than Anne's house--free tours are offered as specific times and you can only see the house via a tour. When we visited, it was quite crowded and we barely got a spot on the tour even though it was 'low season'.

I loved Corrie's memoir, The Hiding Place, and the museum was a continuation of it. I didn't take many pictures since the tour was crowded, but you can find a virtual tour and good pictures here. The hiding place in her closet was quite small, so their guests stayed in the main part of the house most of the time--the opposite of the set up at the Frank's house. However, the hiding place was very cleverly disguised and it was never discovered by the Nazis.

The original plaque in the ten Boom house: "Jesus is Victor"

What I loved most about the museum, though, is that the house is not just a museum--it's the Ten Boom's living testimony. Never have I been on a tour where the guide asked the audience if everyone knew who Jesus is! He told the story of Corrie and her family's faith, how it gave them the courage to help and hide Jews in their community and to have strength through their arrest, imprisonment, and the concentration camps.

Both of these museums are not to be missed during a trip to Amsterdam. I loved not only visiting them, but getting to share Anne Frank's house with my mom and sister. More on the rest of our travels soon!

Ausflug: The Village of the Pied Piper

While my mom and sister were visiting, we rented a car and drove into the Harz Mountains, the home of many German fairy tales and the brothers Grimm. On our way, we stopped in Hameln, home of the Pied Piper story. Although we visited as part of a much longer trip, Hameln is only a couple hours from Cologne, so it's very day-trip-able.

The Altstadt includes a self-guided tour via rat cobblestones. It leads you along cute shopping streets, and to the Ratten­fängerhaus, aka House of the Rat Catcher, which is now a restaurant and guest house.

An inscription high on its walls reads:

“In the year of 1284, on the day of Saints John and Paul, the 26th of June, 130 children born in Hameln were deceived by a piper dressed in many colors, and lost at the calvary near the koppen." (not sure what the calvary or koppen are--perhaps a local landmark?)

Several fountains and paintings of the legend can be found along the 'rat trail,' as well as rat-themed goods in many shops (rat's "poison" in the perfume shop, rat-shaped pastries at the bakery, wooden pipes at the souvenir shop).

You follow the trail further to the Hochzeithaus (literally, "wedding house" or "high time" house, a venue for festivals and events), where at exactly 9:35 and 11:35 every day, you can see a very special glockenspiel. It begins with the sound of a haunting pipe melody, and then the doors open to reveal the piper leading a huge swarm of rats!

The music stops momentarily, then the piping begins again. This time, the piper emerges with the town's children following behind him, just like in the legend.

This was one of the cleverest glockenspiels I have seen in Germany. It turns out that in the 1200s, over a hundred children did disappear from the town (though records don't indicate that rats or a piper were involved). Although there are many theories, the event is unexplained to this day. We've been watching the TV show, Grimm, and we have read some of Grimm's (gruesome) fairytales, so it was neat to visit the home of one of the legends.

More about the rest of our trip soon!

Nippes, How I Love Thee

We're back! Four countries, 1500+ kilometers, and 2 weeks later, we're back home and (attempting to) get back in the 'every day' groove. This includes mundane things like grocery shopping, catching up on TV shows on the couch, snuggling the cat, and taking walks around the neighborhood--things I have missed while we were away! While my mom and sister were visiting, we stayed for three nights at our apartment, and I wanted to not only show them the main sights in Cologne, but also our neighborhood, Nippes. It has been home for the past 8 (!) months, and we have grown to love it.

I'll admit that the name, Nippes (pronounced 'nip-pez'), definitely made me giggle the first few times I heard it. But once I got over the name and we settled into our apartment, I began exploring and discovering what a fun neighborhood it is. Here are the reasons that I love Nippes...

1. The daily market

Every day (except Sunday) from 8am-12:30pm, a big outdoor market takes place in Wilhelmsplatz, just around the corner from our house. There are vegetable and fruit stands, clothing stalls, cheese and meat wagons, and everything in between. It was a bit smaller in winter, but now that the weather is warm the market has been growing and growing! It's a great place to get inexpensive produce, flowers, cloth for crafts, as well as household goods.

There's also a monthly flea market in the square, which is a lot of fun. I usually grab a curry wurst or reibekuchen to munch while browsing the stalls. In addition to professional vendors (including one guy who sells only lederhosen!), there are always at least a couple very enterprising kids with their old barbies and books spread out on blankets. So far I have resisted their cuteness and haven't come home with any used toys :)

2. Music, classes, and events

the view from our balcony
the white building on the right is the music school!

Nippes and the City of Cologne have really wonderful cultural programs, too. There's the music school just behind our apartment, and there's also another building complex just up the road where you can catch a concert or comedy act every Thursday at 4pm or grab a beer and snack at the outdoor cafe. Community classes are held at both locations, too.

There's nothing like hearing the strains of choir practice drift through our windows in the evenings or listening to piano (or tuba! or clarinet! or sax!) practice while working on my laptop on the balcony. I'm going to miss this happy apartment when we move!

3. Parades and Festivals

Nippes is the official kick off location of Karneval every January, and there's also a special local Karneval parade with the Nippeser Bürgerwehr and other local groups.

Nippes also organizes an annual street festival in May, called the Nippeser Bürgerfest (Bürger as in the German word for citizens, not as in a hamburger festival). They close off a huge section of the main street, Neusser Straße and set up 2 stages, tons of food carts, and games.

4. Luthurkirche und Kulturkirche

Just a 5 minute walk from our apartment, you'll find Lutherkirche Nippes. Cologne is a catholic city, so I feel pretty fortunate to have a protestant church so close! Services are auf Deutsch, so I get to practice my listening comprehension -- sometimes I'll catch 80% of a sermon, sometimes only 10%. It's always interesting, though, and I really enjoy singing familiar hymns (and new hymns) in German with the organ playing accompaniment.

The church is also the home of Kulturkirche (culture church), hosting entertainers, events, and town meetings. It's one of the few buildings that survived the intense bombings in WW2, and the inside is still painted with beautiful pastel patterns of flowers and stars. Old fruit trees (including a huge fig!) stand outside the church and shade the grounds where they hold festivals and events.

5. The Zoo & Botanic Gardens

The Cologne Zoo and the Botanic Garden are both located in Nippes, about a 30 minute walk to the east of our apartment. When I need a pick-me-up, the Botanic Gardens are one of the best places to go. Currently, they're working on refurbishing the beautiful old greenhouse (called the Wintergarten-Palast) that was destroyed in WW2.

6. The atmostphere

Nippes is filled with cafes, family bars with patios, fun little local gift shops, and pretty much anything you need to live and enjoy the European lifestyle. (I know I sound like an advertisement, but I really do love our neighborhood!) We also have a nice park just up the street from our apartment, and the Grüngürtel (green belt) is only a 15 minute walk. We love to take a blanket and beers to the park to relax and read in the shade. Even on week nights, the parks are always filled with families and friends having cook outs.

I'll be back to posting more regularly now that we're home, including some parts of our trip to Italy with my mom and sister. More soon!

In Flanders Fields

During our recent trip to Belgium, we stopped by Ieper (Ypres), which is where some of the heaviest fighting in WW1 took place. We stayed at a B&B that was built on trenches, near the Hough Crater and Hill 62.

Our first stop was the Menin Gate, a memorial to fallen British and Commonwealth soldiers whose graves are unknown. 365 days of the year at exactly 8pm since 1928, a ceremony at the gate honors fallen soldiers. Buglers play Last Post, poppy wreaths are presented in remembrance, and a few words are spoken. The crowd is completely silent during the ceremony until the end, when the crowd disperses to read the names on the walls and the messages on the poppy wreaths. Almost 100 years after the beginning of the war, soldiers are still being actively honored and it's very touching to see.

Word of the Week: Schultüte, or Why are German Schoolchildren Required to Buy Dunce Caps?

While on a recent shopping expedition at a local paper goods store, I realized (a) it's almost August and (b) most German kids start back at school in August. I love the smell of new school supplies--that was always my favorite part of going back to school--and so I got a kick out of looking through the types of things that German kids are required to buy for school. Imagine my surprise when I saw what looked like dunce caps of various sizes proudly and prominently displayed in several stores.

Although the German school system differs significantly from the US system, I figured that a BYO dunce cap policy probably was not one of the differences. And the label on the cones said Schultüte (literally, "school bag") rather than Narrenkappe ("fools hat", aka dunce cap), so I went home to consult Google and (surprise, surprise) these things aren't dunce caps.

proud dunce cap, er, school bag recipient, circa 1953
source

Nope, Schultüten are special school supplies containers for kiddos heading into their first year of school, an old tradition in Germany. They are made of heavy decorative paper, filled with necessary supplies and some treats, and then topped with netting or crepe paper to seal the top like a carrot. Sizes range from child-sized (3 feet tall!) to regular (2 feet) to small (1 foot).

This is such a cute idea--I imagine a first grader would be so excited to get a special gift bag for the first day of school. And the bonus is that it can turn into a princess hat, dunce cap, or (in cases where the first grader in question is male) some sort of sword/weapon. You can buy a huge assortment or sizes and designs, or make your own if you're feeling crafty.

Bruges in Two Seasons

One of the things I love about living abroad is that you can visit places in multiple seasons and get to know them in a way that is not possible on a one-shot vacation. I have so enjoyed seeing the church behind our apartment in different seasons and weather, as well as the city of Cologne itself. J and I have also visited a few other places multiple times this year. In particular, our two visits to Bruges, Belgium, have been strikingly different.

February 19-20, 2013

Weather: snowy and cold with a low of -5°C/23°F
Meals: hot chocolate, waffles, lasagna, and of course beer

July 21-22, 2013

Weather: clear skies and hot, max of 29°C/85°F
Meals: cool salads, cold beer, ice cream (and, fine, waffles and hot chocolate for breakfast because you just can't go to Belgium and not get waffles!)

We have enjoyed Bruges very much both times we visited. The flowers and ducklings in summer are lovely, but cuddling up with a huge mug of perfect hot chocolate in winter was pretty heavenly, too!