Thursday, December 20, 2007

Of grease and gluehwein.

As indicated in my previous post, I had a lovely bratwurst (and a couple of kraeppfelchen) for breakfast. After that, I ran off to the English Club Christmas Party, which I was expecting to be an hour or so of awkward chat over, I dunno, potato salad or something.

It actually turned out to be quite fun. The gluehwein flowed like water (provided by our dear Clemens), and Frank (one of my 12Ls who is currently in training to be a chef) brought some lovely pralines, which were possibly the most delicious thing I've ever tasted. I was very responsible and all and didn't get drunk, but a ratio of about 1.5 glasses of gluehwein per hour is brilliant for loosening the tongue.

We played a very enjoyable game of Taboo, which is hilarious with a bunch of non-native-speakers. I kicked ass all around, of course, but my team still came in last. It was really fun though. Much laughing.

After this, I wandered out with Daniel and we had an excellent chat. He baffles me, really. His English is great when we're just talking - his grammar isn't great, but it's okay, and his pronunciation isn't great, but it's understandable. When we get into the classroom though, he goes completely afraid of speaking English and doesn't say anything. I think he's afraid of the other students making fun of his English or something (which is crap, because his English is by no means the worst in the class).

Anyway, we wandered around for three or four hours and eventually stopped at "McDoof" (an amusing nickname for McDonald's) when I realized I hadn't actually eaten since my breakfast bratwurst. Grease and gluehwein are both lovely (and both in wild abundance in Germany at this time of year), but subsisting only on those for ten hours apparently leads to a very displeased gastrointestinal system. So I had a cheeseburger. Then I went home. Then I wrote this. Now I'm going to sleep for ages.

No comments: