This and that

So, the weekend that's about to come to an end was a quiet one. However, here's some flotsam and jetsam.

I went into Basle on Friday night for a couple of pints with Karl-Heinz and Simonetta, two translators from CLS where I used to work until the end of 2006. I hadn't seen Simonetta for a long time, so it was good to catch up with her. Both of them told me about the latest goings-on at my old place of work and we basically had a good laugh.

The weather was fairly good on Saturday, as has also been the case today. I just pottered around, got some food in at the shops, made large meal of the day at midday and then ventured into Basle again at teatime to watch the Blackburn-Man United match.

Went on a bike ride today round the outskirts of Haltingen, then towards home via Friedlingen. Spring also finally seems to have sprung, which is nice.

SC Freiburg 2 - 0 Carl Zeiss Jena

Went to Freiburg today with two good friends, Karl-Heinz and Pete, to watch some second division football at Sportclub Freiburg. Attendance 14,050.

Jena scuppered Freiburg's promotion chances last season with a last-minute equaliser, so today was a bit of pay-back time for SCF. Not only that, but Freiburg disastrously lost 0-5 the previous Sunday at the home of anarchy that is St. Pauli. (Here is a fact well known to followers of German football, and quoted in, ahem, Wikipedia: "St. Pauli opens its home matches with AC/DC's Hells' Bells, and after every home goal Song 2 by Blur is played, turning the stadium into a giant mosh pit." Evidently no room for Freiburg's pretty passes with eleven hairy-ar*ed cloggers with a skull and cross-bones on their shirts chasing them.

For the first time in ages, we stood in the Nordtribüne instead of sitting elsewhere. Being the typical English-style fans we are, we arrived only a few minutes before kick-off, which meant that we had to settle for standing room at ground level right behind the goal - given that German fans arrive hours before the match to grab the best sun benches.. sorry, terrace spaces.

The match itself was a fairly entertaining affair and Freiburg were well worth their win. One of the notable features of standing in the Nordtribüne was that the crowd were egged on by some bloke with a microphone who stood on a few cardboard boxes about 10 yards from us. He would start each chant through his loudspeaker, then the crowd would follow suit. Not very spontaneous, if you ask me. This cheerleader was facing the crowd during the whole 90 minutes (although I noticed that someone else came on and replaced the original one for the second half). The first one probably got bored. Such a phenomenon is fairly recent and dates back to around 2001/2002 when the more dedicated (or extreme) fans of most Bundesliga clubs began to form Ultra groups - a way of mimicking Italian football supporters and their various groupings. I don't wish to cast judgment on such fans, but only to say that English football does pretty well without them. But then again, English fans are rather more spontaneous.

Incidentally, Jögi Löw, the Germany manager, was at the match today. He supposedly has a house on the outskirts of Freiburg in Freiburg-St. Georgen.

Another notable fact was that the flamboyantly monikered Alain Junior Olle Olle came on for Freiburg some time during the second half. He is from Cameroon and was signed from Uruguay's Nacional during the winter break.

To cap off the day, United beat Arsenal thanks to a stunning free-kick from Owen Hargreaves.

Opulence

I went into Basle this afternoon to have a quick look round "Baselworld - The Watch and Jewellery Show" (I must say, as a humble native English speaker, I'm glad "jewellery" has been written the British way and not subsided to the US spelling that is all-pervading in this day and age.) Anyway, there was quite a bit of opulence on show around town. Every year I'm fascinated by the business people who come to Basle for this annual trade fair - all dressed to kill in their suits and chunky watches. Supposedly, this is the world's most important trade fair for the watch and jewellery industry, so no expense is spared. Here are some photos I took of the to-ings and fro-ings on Messeplatz.

Fait accompli

Wolfgang Dietz, Oberbürgermeister of Weil, is set to be re-elected for another term as mayor this coming Sunday. It hasn't exactly been the most hotly contested of mayoral races, though that's because no one else actually bothered to throw their hat into the ring and take on Herr Dietz at the ballot box. However, such electoral processes must follow protocol, come what may, so Sunday will still see a vote taking place - but just for one candidate. How quaint. I wonder what the voter turn-out will be like?

I thought about putting my name forward, but I've decided to devote more time to my family.

It wasn't just "fluish symptoms" I had last week but full-blown influenza. Probably the nastiest bout I've experienced in many a year. After last Monday's post, I felt progressively worse and had to skip work for the rest of the week. It was only yesterday afternoon that I began to feel a bit better (after going to bed the previous evening with a temperature). This improvement has continued over the course of today. However, I still feel weak walking around, as I obviously still need to build up some strength.

White Easter

What with Easter being so early this year, Mother Nature decided to sprinkle some of the snow she couldn't be bothered chucking down over Christmas. Admittedly, it was really just a sprinkling in the strictest sense of the term, but the weather has been rather freezing and uninspiring these past few days. So much for blooming almond trees... Just as well that I've been kept busy translating various wine tasting notes. Other than that, I've been struck down with fluish symptoms, so I've been cooped up at home for virtually the past 72 hours.

I read the following item of news with satisfaction today:

Änderungen zum 17. März 2008
Am 17. März 2008 stellt Sat.1 sein Abendprogramm um. Im Zuge dessen werden die Sat.1 News, die von da an Sat.1 Nachrichten heißen (außer sonntags), werktags von 20:00 Uhr bis 20:15 Uhr ausgestrahlt. Neuer Moderator für die Werktagsausgaben wird N24-Chefredakteur Peter Limbourg sein. Die Wochenendausgaben werden weiterhin um 18:30 Uhr beginnen und von Katja Losch und Heiko Paluschka moderiert. Des Weiteren werden die Nachrichten aus einem neuen Studio gesendet. (Quelle: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sat.1_News)

Basically, the flagship news programme on Sat.1 is to be renamed "Sat.1 Nachrichten" - like it used to be before the pernicious influence of "Denglisch" meant it had to be rebranded as "Sat.1 News". I mean, why replace a perfectly functional German word with "news" [sorry, News...] in the first place? Finally someone has seen sense.

Mandelbaum

I thought I would sit outside the Sparkasse on Saturday (as you do..) and take this photo of the almond tree by the entrance. For me, it's always the first tangible sign that winter will soon be on the way out. It also reminds me of the vineyards of the Pfalz where countless such trees blossom at this time of the year.

Some rather shocking local news. On Sunday at around 1.30 p.m. a 49-year-old man stabbed his wife to death in Haltingen during a domestic row. The couple's two sons, aged 16 and 20, witnessed the incident and alarmed the police, who later arrested the man shortly afterwards in his car. While I was walking up through the vineyards to Ötlingen last Sunday lunchtime, I saw a police car racing from the Binzen motorway exit towards Haltingen, siren blazing, and a helicopter hovering over Haltingen. This explains it.

Beziehungsdrama endet tödlich

49-Jähriger ersticht Ehefrau in Haltingen / Ehemann hat Tat eingeräumt /Sohn alarmierte Polizei

Weil am Rhein-Haltingen (mib). Am Sonntag hat ein 49-jähriger Mann seine Ehefrau in der Hermann-Brian-Straße so schwer mit einem Messer verletzt, dass sie noch in der gemeinsamen Wohnung starb.

Mitansehen mussten diese Bluttat zwei Kinder des Paares, die sich in der Wohnung aufgehalten haben.

Es war am Sonntag gegen 13.30 Uhr, als der Einsatzzentrale der Polizeidirektion Lörrach mitgeteilt wurde, dass es in besagter Wohnung zu einer lautstarken Auseinandersetzung gekommen ist. Die ersten Feststellungen ergaben, dass der 49-jährige Mann mit einem Messer auf seine Ehefrau eingestochen hat.

Zwischen dem Ehepaar kam es in der Wohnung, in der sich auch die gemeinsamen Kinder, 16 und 20 Jahre alt, aufhielten, zu einem heftigen Streit. Grund war eine schon länger anhaltende Ehekrise. Im Verlaufe des Streits stach der Mann mit einem Messer auf seine Frau ein, die daraufhin zusammenbrach.

Der Familienvater verließ laut Polizeiangaben das Haus und der 16-jährige Sohn alarmierte die Polizei. Diese leitete eine Fahndung nach dem Flüchtigen ein und nahm ihn kurze Zeit später mit seinem Auto fest.

Das Beziehungsdrama hat gestern die Haltinger tief erschüttert. Viele konnten nicht so recht glauben, dass so etwas auch bei uns passieren könne. Für die Ehefrau kam jegliche ärztliche Hilfe zu spät: Sie starb auf dem Transport zum wartenden Rettungshubschrauber. Todesursache war die Stichverletzung, wie die gestrige Obduktion im Institut für Rechtsmedizin in Freiburg ergab.

Neben Notärzten und Hilfsdienst war auch die Haltinger Feuerwehr im Einsatz und richtete für den angeforderten Rettungshubschrauber einen provisorischen Landeplatz in der Weinbergstraße ein.

Die Staatsanwaltschaft Lörrach hat gegen den 49-jährigen Familienvater und Ehemann der getöteten Frau Haftbefehl wegen Totschlags beantragt. Das Amtsgericht Lörrach hat dem Antrag entsprochen und den Mann, der von Nachbarn als liebenswert und freundlich beschrieben, in Untersuchungshaft genommen.

Der Festgenommene hat zwischenzeitlich eingeräumt, auf seine Frau eingestochen zu haben, teilten gestern die Staatsanwaltschaft und die Polizeidirektion Lörrach in einer gemeinsamen Presseerklärung mit.

Muusloch

I took the chance to get out for a relaxing Sunday walk today. Caught the train to Haltingen and then walked up the hill to Ötlingen where I had a Schorle outdoors on the terrace at the Gasthaus zum Ochsen ("Ox Inn"). Afterwards, I walked a few metres along the village road to the Muusloch - which was just opening, so I stayed a while and had a Viertele of Weißburgunder sat under the pergola by the entrance [hic].

It was a pleasant hour and a half I spent up there in Ötlingen. One feature in the village which caught my attention was the series of artist murals and sculptures along the length of the village road outside houses. This arty theme is currently the village's leitmotif - and is seemingly all the work of just a handful of locals.

Actually, I've just spotted this (could be interesting...):

Sonntag, 13. Apr 2008
15:00 Uhr Das „ART“-Dorf Ötlingen - neu
Sigrid Droguet wird auf ihrer Tour durch Ötlingen von alten Herrenhäusern und deren Geschichte erzählen, Sie durch versteckte Winkel von Ötlingen führen und Ihnen dabei auch die „Art”-Galerie entlang der Dorfstraße erläutern.
Treffpunkt: Vor dem Gasthaus Ochsen

Quo vadis - eh?

I didn't study Latin at school, although I wouldn't necessarily say this has put me at a disadvantage in life. Learning French was hard enough, but at least that's a language I can use. Much to my genuine surprise then when I first came to Germany at how frequently certain set phrases in Latin appear in an everyday context such as the written press.

Quo vadis - or, "Where are you going?" - is one that's always puzzled me. Thanks to my knowledge of French, I was always aware enough to realise what it would roughly mean. However, the phrase seems to crop up everywhere, though most commonly in German-language newspaper headlines, and I increasingly get the impression it's plonked in there because the headline writer is too lazy to think up something more original. For example, you see an article about FC Basel - for example, an analysis looking at what the remainder of the season holds in store for Switzerland's best supported football club. The headline would look something like this: "FCB - Quo vadis?" I think it's safe to say that that sort of thing is not done by Fleet Street journalists.

Carpe diem is another one which appears a lot here in Germany. It's one of those terms Germans like to use in English, but which usually illicit blank looks on the part of English native speakers. In fact, I had to look up its meaning again (i.e. "Seize the day") just now in that, ahem, authoritative Internet resource, Wikipedia. " It has a nice meaning, though, I must admit. "Carpee Dee-em!"

Rude awakening

I know this is Germany, the country where school starts at 7.40 in the morning, but it really does take the biscuit when you have someone clearing the leaves and debris with a noisy suction machine along the path next to your bedroom window at 7.15 a.m. on a Saturday morning. I know that a lot of my neighbours are pensioners who tend to wake up at the crack of dawn anyway, but can't a job like that be done some time between Monday and Friday?

Yours,

Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells

Mosquito

Unbelievable for this time of the year, but I was bitten four times in total by a pesky mosquito on two successive nights while sleeping last week. To my satisfaction, I killed the midge in question on Friday morning in the kitchen. Now, some people might say this is all to do with climate change, but I say the reason is probably that January and February weren't cold enough, plus the neighbours opposite have a pond in their garden. Still, it's the first time I've been bitten by midges in February.

Weil gives the green light

Yesterday evening, Weil's councillors finally approved the tram extension from Basle to Weil, the result being 22 to 10 votes in favour of giving the project the green light. Amid all the excitement, it almost escaped everyone's attention that Oberbürgermeister Dietz abstained from casting his vote. Supposedly, he decided not to vote out of respect for his Christian Democrat colleagues, most of whom were against the motion.

The turning point in this whole saga came a week and a half ago, when Willi Stächele - who is due to become in the next finance minister for Baden-Württemberg next July - turned up at the town hall in person to confirm that the state would make a significant contribution to funding the project. This came as a huge relief, and certainly what Weil had been hoping for. Dietz subsequently intimated that the state of the town's accounts was now a little better than previously assumed and that Weil may yet be able to close the gap in financing that was originally the cause of so much prevarication on the German side.

Anyway, if all goes to plan, Weil should have a tram link direct to Basel from the beginning of 2012.

Queuing

A couple of months ago, I received a comment on this blog from someone in Weil who expressed the wish that I write more about my view as an Englishman of life in Germany. In reply, I said I would see what I can do.

I must admit that, up till now, I've consciously avoided going on big treatises in this blog about Germany and the Germans. It has a lot to do with the fact that I'm half-German myself anyway, although I was born and grew up in the UK. After having spent a total of nine years living in the Fatherland (or, technically speaking, the Mutterland), I'm certainly used to living here and have learned to adapt to (or accept) certain aspects of German life which didn't come naturally to me before.

For example:

1. I respect the house rules in my apartment block, such as "quiet times" forbidding loud music, farting and such like. Most of the time.
2. I am more direct with other people than I used to be. (Having said this, I still follow the rules of British etiquette most of the time, and I am still rather too wortkarg for my own good when trying to woo the opposite sex.)
3. I've picked up German dialect: "gleeechfolls" anyone?

On the other hand:

1. I don't necessarily think German bread is superior to bread in other countries.
2. I don't normally do Kaffee und Kuchen and still prefer a nice cuppa (milk, no sugar).
3. I like opening windows in trains (the older models without air con) when the weather is 35C and don't think the cooling draft will do me any harm.

However, one thing that I cannot and will never adjust to is the teutonic idea of queuing.

Now, I think plenty of young contemporary Germans have spent their obligatory six months learning English on the South Coast or in London and have reported back to their parents about strange people waiting orderly in lines at post offices, banks and the like. "Seeehr seltsam!"

You see, in Germany queuing is regarded as a weakness. Instead, Darwin's theory of the survival of the fittest is played out here on a daily basis. You wait at the bus stop with a score of other people. Bus arrives. Regardless who was waiting before you, average German must get on bus as quickly as possible and will take no prisoners in his/her mission to claim last free seat... If you are slow (or British), you resign yourself to letting the frenzy die down and get on the bus last - smiling smugly as you know you're now annoying everyone who got on the bus first a few minutes previously.

Just the other day I was pushed unceremoniously out of the way by some hoodie at the Badischer Bahnhof while waiting to get on the bus. My crime, I suspect, was trying to be competitive and joining in the scrum. I just sighed and let the idiot through. That'll teach me. It's just not worth getting hot under the collar about any more.

I find the younger and older generations are the worst - the younger because they don't know any better; the older because they couldn't care less anymore. Supermarket cash desks are where this game is most traditionally played out. This account describes what happens far better than I could...

Decision put on hold

After Basel-Stadt's cantonal government suddenly upped its financial support today at the death for the tram project, Weil has decided to postpone its final decision till 29 February. The Germans say they need extra time to assess the new offer. Oh well, at least they haven't said no.

Still kaputt

The electrician from Siemens left just now after inspecting the fridge. It took him about 3 seconds to tell me that motor was dead and needed replacing. This would take two and half hours, however. He'll be able to do it on Thursday morning, i.e. the day after tomorrow, but may be able to fit it in tomorrow. He'll call me again tomorrow. Thankfully, the cost of repairing the fridge won't be too bad, all things considered. Definitely worth it compared to shelling out for a new fridge.

To tram or not to tram?

Sorry, that sounds like one of those awful advertising slogans in "English" which only German-speaking marketing gurus could think up. Be that as it may, today could be a historic day in the life of the "border triangle" down here. Weil's councillors will decide today whether they want tram no. 8 to be extended all the way to Weil. They need to notify Basle of their decision by tonight at the latest. Wait any much longer and Berne will revoke its offer of financial support for the project. There has been a lot of hefty discussion about this question of financing over the last few weeks, with more twists and turns than Weil's über-roundabout. If you want some truly blinkered views from the Swiss about this whole affair, check this forum. It looks like the recriminations could soon begin.

Essentially, I'm in favour of the tram. However , it takes two to tango - and if the verdict from Weil is negative tonight, it'll be like sticking two fingers up at Basle's self-styled ideal of a trinational metrobasel area. In my opinion, metrobasel being a project conceived in Basle sums up the fundamental problem. No one seems to mention metrobasel here in Germany. How ever much Basle tries to persuade Weil of the fantastic prospect of having a tram, there seems to be a misunderstanding of each other's position and motives. And however much the individuals on the above-mentioned forum reason otherwise, the overriding impression I have is that this is a Basle project, so Basle should put its money where its mouth is.


[Postscript: Not that I'm suggesting that the decision-makers in Weil are against the project, but Weil as a town had a rather serious debt problem when I first moved here. The current Oberbürgermeister looks like he's succeeding in getting the books in order, then the Swiss come with their ambitious plans and you can understand the misgivings on the German side. Hopefully the state of Baden-Württemberg as a whole, i.e. Stuttgart, will agree to provide more funds.

Incidentally, someone in the above-mentioned forum wondered why Weil could afford the finance the pedestrian bridge over to the France but not this. Afforded it?! I don't think Weil would have been able to even contemplate building that bridge without the help of money from other private and public sources.]

kaputt

Not only have I had the 'flu over the last two to three days, but I woke up today to find that my fridge had ceased to function. It's a good job that it's nice and cold outside at the moment so I can put one or two perishable items on the balcony. Hopefully I can get the problem resolved within a few days.

Carnival

After finishing work for the day, I headed into Basle at the end of the afternoon for a couple of hours strolling past all the Fasnacht goings-on. Tuesday during Fasnacht is traditionally the day for Basler children to dress up and put on their Waggis masks. But it's more than just that. Being squeezed in between the two procession days on Monday and Wednesday, it's also quite an anarchic day when anything goes - from the piccolo players winding their way through the narrow streets of the Basle's old town, to the parent Waggis pulling their little Waggis (some barely aged older than two or three) through Marktplatz; from the Ladärneusstellig (exhibition of lanterns) on Münsterplatz, to the Guggekonzerte in the evening when thousands gather in Basle's three main squares for the official Guggemusik concerts. Talking of Guggemusik, the whole of the city centre is transformed into one big procession again at around 7 p.m. when the various bands march and play downtown on their way to their respective gigs.

I find it hard to convey to my friends who live further afield what Fasnacht is really like, as most of them haven't experienced it, albeit Morgestraich. Fasnacht is a lot more than just the set-piece event that is Morgestraich. It has a lot to do with the atmosphere around town.



























And a contentious election poster, which appeared in 2007 (see below), is the sujet of this lantern on Münsterplatz: