We’ve returned to the Fatherland after the grueling process of packing up and moving a household of a family of five. We drove six hours from San Diego to Las Vegas listening to Die Zaueberfloete non-stop. We saturated in ueber-Americana for three days on The Strip. We flew eleven hours from Vegas to Frankfurt. We we drove three hours from Frankfurt to the tiny dwelling called Haeusles outside of Mitwitz which is nestled in Frankenwald (the Forest of Franconia) for a few weeks of decompression. read more…
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Comparing Germany and France and…
There was a time when I thought certain practices and cultural quirks were uniquely German (or Austrian or Swiss), but as I traveled around Europe more and more, I realized that some “German” things are actually European things. The fear of a draft or breeze, for instance, or tense and aggressive driving, and other cultural traits that differ from those in North America.
And yet there are also some interesting differences among the people in the various European countries. I was just in France for about a week. (And mostly without internet access in a remote area, which explains why this blog is a day late.) My wife and I drove across much of Germany, but as soon as we crossed the German-Belgian border (which is barely marked, by the way) I noticed a difference in driving styles on the autobahn (or whatever the Belgians call it). Since, unlike in Germany, there is a speed limit on freeways (130 km/h, or 80 mph) in Belgium (and most European countries), you don’t have to worry about someone suddenly coming out of nowhere in the left lane, doing literally 100 mph (161 km/h) as they zoom past you like you were standing still. In Germany you really need to look twice before venturing into the fast lane! read more…
Berlin’s desk revolution
“It’s like being interviewed for a shared flat,” my German friend, the freelance TV producer, says to me one Wednesday morning over one of those pungent Berlin coffees. Having left our laptops gently purring on our dining table desks, we are now sitting outside a local cafe reinvigorating our brains with caffeine and a vitamin-C-laden fruit salad. After three years working from home, the washing machine peeps have interrupted the flow of my friend’s creative juices one time too many and she has finally decided to find herself a real desk in a co-working space.
She is not alone: approximately 80,000 people worldwide are currently using co-working spaces, and Berlin is one of the capitals for it. In the post-financial-crisis digital age, swathes of ambitious young people are shunning traditional careers and looking instead to freelance projects or setting up their own business as alternative paths to professional greatness. And it turns out that not all of these digital nomads are happy to work surrounded by last night’s dirty dishes or with the ever-alluring TV in the corner telling them it really is alright to watching two hours of N-TV (the German new channel) every lunchtime because its ‘educational’. read more…
How being an Expat has made me a Better Canadian
It seems that every year, as I am doing the last minute prepping for our upcoming move back to Europe (Hamburg, Germany this time around), I get that same sad, longing feeling. Over the years of my on-again-off-again expat life, I have grown ever more fond of my home country, Canada, making leaving it each summer for the next hockey season, harder and harder. This is not to say that I am not also in love with life in Germany and Switzerland, but more so that being an expat has really made me appreciate being Canadian.
Auf Wiedersehen
This afternoon a crowd of my in-laws converged on our house for the traditional German Sunday afternoon Kaffee & Kuchen. This doesn’t happen very often, maybe once a year, as they all live over an hour away. Anyone with in-laws will sympathize with the latent stress involved in being so outnumbered in one’s one home, and yet, for the first time in the twelve years I have lived here, I didn’t stress at all: I just enjoyed it.
In just a few weeks, we’re embarking on a new adventure and heading back to North America – specifically, to Canada. read more…
Moving Back to Germany
I have an announcement to make. We are moving back to Germany next month. The timing of the move was a bit of a surprise, but it was always in the realm of possibility. We were away for two years, and as I’ve started the arduous process of organizing another overseas move now with three small kids, these are my passing Germany Way thoughts on the move: read more…
Football Daze
It is a perfect Northern European midsummer’s evening, the sky a delicate swirl of gentle pastels and the soft air just cool enough for a cardigan: we have our window open. Then, quite suddenly, outside a tremendous roar erupts. Men, women and children let out shouts and whoops of joy which ring in the street below. To us, inside, the noises are not so surprising, for we too are watching football (soccer). A German striker has just pounded the ball into the back of the opposition’s net. A goal! Across the city, fireworks pop and crack in the dusky sky.
In our street at least three cafes have erected large screens on the pavement for the occasion of the European Cup – and this is not unusual. Throughout Berlin, and indeed Germany, these screens (called ‘public viewings’) have become the focus for large crowds – from dozens to the hundreds of thousands, depending on the venue – to gather round and share the tribulations and elations of their fellow countrymen in each Germany match. read more…
These are a few of my favorite things . . .
I have been back in Canada for a few months now, for the usual hockey off-season, and I can’t help but continually make comparisons between my two homes. When nearing the end of the season in Europe, I start fantasizing about things at home in Canada: all the foods I’m going to eat, activities I’m going to do, people I am going to see.
Once here however, and all the Canadian foods have been devoured, summer festivals have been attended, and family have been visited, I start doing the same romanticizing about all the things I miss overseas. Read on to see what it is I adore and miss about Germany and Switzerland when home in North America, and those things I long for in Canada, when I am living the expat life in Europe. How many of the same would you include on your own list? read more…
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