So just a quick update about recent events here in The Europe. Still, nothing earth turning to report, still working on those things, but hopefully soon more things will fall into place.
I'm searching for apartments right now, since I really need an address to register (so I can get a bank account, a visa, a job) and because I really need a home base from which to work. My sanity requires it. The garden hut is really beautiful, as is the area it is in, but it's REALLY far away and I'm going nuts already there. I'm looking at an apartment later today, let's hope it fits the bill, my sanity would benefit greatly from that.
I've still not met with the music school. I mentioned the fact that people really seem to take their sweet time getting back to you around here (the guy with the apartment took nearly a full week to finally write me back) and they all laughed and said "get used to it." :| I'd like to saw that there "are not many things that drive me crazy", but anyone can tell you that's a bold lie, but there are some things that drive me crazier faster. Like people who lie, people who don't do their jobs, and people who won't respond to business correspondences promptly. And I don't mean "it took him TEN MINUTES to write me back!! Can you BELIEVE that??" or needing people to be "available" at all times. I mean don't have me sitting in a foreign country for 12 days waiting for you to "pull some things together" before you can actually meet with me to discuss whether I can teach for you or not or see the room that is already empty that you want to rent. But, as my desktop tells me "Breath Deep and Let Go of Things" Sometimes that's easier to do that others.
I bought a German children's book yesterday, ages 4-8 :) It's FANTASTIC. I can read about 85% of it, and the pictures help a lot, I can look up the words I don't know and I will master the language before you know it. 4-8 year old language, but it's a definite improvement. So far the number of people that I've met that don't speak any English numbers at a whopping 0 though, so at least I can function. It's been made very clear, on numerous occasions, both overtly and covertly, that if I'm going to be taken seriously or respected at all here then I must learn German. This has of course always been the intention, but the Germans are a bit impatient with me, so out come the children's books. Literally, at breakfast on Sunday my friends Thorsten and Roman got a children's book from the restaurant and we had Kindergarden Reading Time. It was humiliating and fantastic at the same time, because it really was helpful, despite the waitresses giggling. Nothing like going from a fully functioning adult in one place to a 4 year old needing constant hand holding in another place to really put things in perspective.
My friend Chuck/Chas has arrived here to audition for opera houses in Germany, so we've become partners in crime. We're going to a free German class today and then to look at a rehearsal space to check out the piano. It's 10€ an hour, which is actually expensive around here, but we're told the space is great with a really nice piano, so that's worth a few more €'s. It will be GREAT to touch a piano again. It's not healthy for me to go this long without being able to play regularly. Hopefully someday I will have a piano over here, an upright would be MORE than enough. I'm still trying to reach the people I know at the University of the Arts to see if I can practice over there. If so I will be over there constantly, I have tons of music to get under the fingers.
So, we're waiting on an apartment, a job interview, a rehearsal space, a bank account, some sort of employment, and the holy grail off it all, a work visa. As each appears I will give an update. Also, I think I will be starting a blog, "Dude in Berlin" before too long here, and I hope to start posting on more things that just "this is what I did or didn't do today", but throwing some cultural things and pictures up. I have a million ideas on what to write about, there is much fodder here, so I'll pull that together soon. When I no longer have to go to coffee shops to get my internet I think.
Keep it Real (that's German for "real") don't forget my Name (that's German for "name") and keep your eye out for Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitäns (that's German for "Danube steamship company captains"), they're nasty as could be.
-Sean
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