theinbetweenismine

just a girl living the expat life

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Things you wouldn’t know: The thing about middle names

February 11, 2014 filed under: Expat stories, Germany, Things you wouldn't know, USA

I started this series “Things you wouldn’t know” a while back, because as an expat, living in a different country away from home, you encounter a whole lot of things that are just different from what you’re used to. Some things are significant, others barely noticeable. After 10+ years, I am pretty much used to most things in the US and I hardly ever bring up when something is different from back home. Every once in a while though, you strike up a conversation and while you’re talking about something, you realize that your counterpart is giving you this strange look of non-comprehension. You can find the archives here.


Last week, Doni and I had the following exchange on  Twitter:

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An interesting conversation ensued after that because as it stands, in the USA it is very common to have (a) middle name(s). In fact, I don’t think I know anybody (you?) who doesn’t have a middle name. Whenever I say that I don’t have a middle name, people are surprised (as was Doni).

So, I thought it would be a good idea to shed some little light on the differences between middle names here and in Germany, because technically there is no such thing as middle names in Germany. Well, I am not saying there aren’t any names that are placed between the given name and surname  in Germany at all, because there are, but it all works a little bit differently.

Most European countries (as far as I know) use middle names, which are, however, often referred to as second (or third) given names followed by the surname. In Germany, first, second and third names are legally equivalent, therefore the parents get to decide which name the child actually goes by. Other than in the US, it’s not common practice to use the surname of a relative as a middle name in Germany, in fact, using a surname (e.g. the mother’s or grandmother’s maiden name) is not even allowed, unless that name is also officially accepted as a first name. (I’ll explain that later.)

My Dad, for example, has the same three given names as his father (and his grandfather and great-grandfather). He goes by his first name. My Mom only has a first and second name and also goes by her first name. My aunt, however, has a first and second name and goes by her second name. Ah!
In my parents’ generation, those second (and third) forenames were traditionally picked from the names of relatives (this is, however, not necessarily true anymore).

In the 70’s (when I was born – spoiler-alert!) middle names seemed to have gone out of style a bit. My sister, myself and many of my friends do not have second (or third for that matter) names at all (although some do!). Both, my niece and nephew, also don’t have middle names, although the practice of giving more than one name seems to have come back in recent years.

In general, naming laws in Germany are pretty strict. If you chose a name for your child that is considered unisex (e.g. Robin or Kim), at least one additional, unambiguous name must be chosen. I don’t know if they keep a list at the Standesamt (German civil registration office), but you also can’t just choose just any name for your child (as you can here). If the name is not accepted as a legal first name or if it is a name that is likely to expose your child to ridicule or bullying, you’ll be prohibited to use it. You also can’t use names that are surnames as either first or second names. (J’s middle name – which is a compound word (!) made up of both his grandmothers maiden names – would have been so not acceptable!).
Foreign names are generally allowed if you can establish that the name is actually used somewhere else in the world.

When I got married, I thought about keeping my maiden name as a middle name. I have a very (!) common German surname and I was not particularly (but a little bit!) attached to it and I liked the idea of having a middle name and be able to keep my cultural heritage. However, since my maiden name is not accepted as a proper first name, the German Standesamt didn’t allow it. Stupid, ey?
I could have decided to keep a hyphened “double-surname”, but a) my maiden name in combination with J’s surname just didn’t sound good (two one-syllable words) and b) I really didn’t want the hassle of a double-name.

I also could have decided to have two different legal documents – a California ID with my maiden name as my middle name and a German ID without it. But I feared that that would make things unnecessarily complicated.

So there you have it. It’s always interesting to learn about different countries, cultures and traditions, am I right? The more you know.

Share your middle (or second) name(s) in the comments! Or leave any questions that you still might have!

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6: Things you wouldn’t know: more German idioms

November 6, 2013 filed under: Germany, NaBloPoMo, Things you wouldn't know

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Last year, I posted a list of German idioms that I’ve been teaching J over the years. Idioms are awesome, they are fun to try and translate… especially when there is no easy translation. My usual approach is to literally translate the phrase into English and see if J can pick up what it means. Then, we’ll try to find a corresponding idiom in English.
We do speak a mix of English and German at home, so some phrases just make it into our bilingual vocabulary in literal translation which totally works for us, but can be awkward – and frankly, quite hilarious – when you start using those phrases with other native speakers.

Since some of you enjoyed my post last year, I thought I’d make a second edition this year. Find the first round of idioms here.

“In den sauren Apfel beißen.”  To bite into the sour apple.  I guess this one is quite easy. It means ‘to bite the bullet” and to accept a negative aspect or punishment.

“Ich verstehe nur Bahnhof.” I only understand train station. Haha, this one always makes me laugh, because I don’t even know where this idiom has its origin and it doesn’t seem to make any sense at all. It means ‘to understand nothing at all’ or to not know what someone is talking about.

“Das ist nicht dein Bier.” That is not your beer. I mean! Could there be an idiom that is more German than this one? The Germans like their beer…. and if something is ‘none of your business’, then it’s also none of your beer. Ha!

“Ich drücke dir die Daumen.” I squeeze my thumbs for you. Yes, in German, we don’t cross fingers, but we make a fist and squeeze thumbs for good luck (try doing both at the same time = twice amount of luck!)

“Du gehst mir auf den Keks!” You’re getting on my cookie. Also a favorite. It means ‘you’re getting on my nerves’, but doesn’t ‘getting on my cookie’ sound so much more fun?

“Einen guten Draht zu jemandem haben.” To have a good wire to someone. I guess this one is pretty self-explanatory. It simply means ‘to have good connections to someone’ or ‘to be on good terms with someone’.

“Das Ende vom Lied ist….” The end of the song is… Not much of a mystery here, but since I love music, I like this saying a lot.  It means ‘the end of the story is…’ or ‘the bottom line is…’.

“Das Leben ist kein Ponyhof.” Life is not a pony farm.  Not sure where this one has its origin, but it’s probably something that girls say a lot, because every girl I know has gone through a phase in their young lives where all they wanted to do is live on a pony farm forever and ever, amen. But, alas, life is no walk in the park.

“Sich eine Eselsbrücke bauen.” To build a donkey bridge. This means to ‘find a mnemonic to remember certain things’. I’ve taught this phrase (in literal translation) to all my co-workers and ‘donkey bridge’ is now an established phrase around the office.

“Die beleidigte Leberwurst spielen.” To play the miffed liverwurst. Haha. Also a classic. It sounds hilarious in English. It basically means that someone is easily miffed and offended and everybody knows it, so people are calling the person out on it.

Teach me an idiom!
Or ask me for any other idioms you’d like to know the German translation for!

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Things you wouldn’t know: Tanz in den Mai (“Dance into May”)

May 2, 2013 filed under: Germany, holidays, home, Things you wouldn't know

I started this series a while back, because as an expat, living in a different country away from home, you encounter a whole lot of things that are just different from what you’re used to. This week it so happened that I have two back-to-back posts about ‘Things you wouldn’t know”. I hope you enjoy those kinds of posts. I am always intrigued by the differences between different cultures and customs. You can find the archives here.


Happy May everybody. Yesterday was a holiday in Germany (don’t you think I should be allowed to observe those? Yeah, me too.). I am not sure what all the traditions and background stories to the May Day festivities are, because there are quite a few. I think it’s our “labor day” and also in the Bundesland (federated state) that I come from, it’s considered the day of “acknowledgement of freedom and peace, social justice, reconciliation between nations and human dignity”. I totally just looked that up (on Wikipedia), but I kinda like it.

Traditionally, the first of May however is celebrated as a spring festival with the custom of putting up a may pole in the center of town and a night of “dancing into May” on April, 30 (and then nursing the hangover on May Day).

May poles can look very different depending on the region. Most poles in the area that I come from look something like this: a very tall pole painted in the local colors and decorated with a big wreath with colorful streamers.

Elmenhorster Maibaum
photo credit: Awaya Legends via Flickr cc

Sometimes there are multiple wreathes in different sizes and sometimes (especially in Bavaria) the poles are decorated with emblems depicting local crafts and industry.

München 2008
photo credit: patrikmloeff via photopin cc

In the Rhineland, where I am from, May 1 is also celebrated by the delivery of a “Maibaum” (a tree or tree branch – usually birch trees – covered in colorful streamers or a heart made out of crepe flowers with the girl’s name or initials) to a girl’s house the night before. It’s usually from an admirer or boyfriend and it’s put on the roof, next to a window or next to the entrance door. You see them all over the city. It’s lovely.

The Maibaum remains in place until the end of the month when the guy who put it up needs to come and get it. Usually he gets some sort of a reward, a case of beer from the girl’s dad and – if he’s not the boyfriend yet – possibly a date with the girl. Those are very loose rules, however. While I mostly got a Maibaum from the same guy (my then-boyfriend), my sister had more admirers and it was fun to figure out who put them up!

Sometimes, after partying, we girls would stay up and try to find out who would come by and put up the Maibaum at our house. It’s a little bit like the Valentine’s tradition here, just with a little bit more effort involved on the guys’ part, cutting tree branches, decorating them, and climbing roof tops and whatnot.

Up High
photo credit: Awaya Legends via Flickr cc

Maibaum FTW!
photo credit: blacktar via Flickr cc

Maibaum tradition
photo credit: lejaclyn via Flickr cc

There is going to be a Maifest (May festival) at the local German Club next weekend. As always, there will be ladies in Dirndl dresses and men in Lederhosen dancing around the may pole. Keeping the stereotypes alive since  1854! Hehe.

If you’re German, are may poles part of your tradition in the area where you grew up?
If you’re not German, have you heard of this tradition or
is there something similar where you live?

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Things you wouldn’t know: The German Postal Delivery

April 29, 2013 filed under: Germany, Things you wouldn't know

I started this series “Things you wouldn’t know” a while back, because as an expat, living in a different country away from home, you encounter a whole lot of things that are just different from what you’re used to. Some things are significant, others barely noticeable. After 10+ years, I am pretty much used to most things in the US and I hardly ever bring up when something is different from back home. Every once in a while though, you strike up a conversation and while you’re talking about something, you realize that your counterpart is giving you this strange look of non-comprehension. Let me tell you about one of my recent experiences.


When I was in highschool and college, I had a bunch of odd jobs. I babysat, I worked for the veterinarian next door (great, but often sad job!), I waited at an ice-cream place (that’s the closest I ever came to waiting tables), ​I was a receptionist and during semester breaks, I worked as a mail carrier.

It was one of the coolest and worst jobs I ever had.

You know how there are certain things that you’re just taking for granted because this is what you grew up with and you don’t even consider that there is another way of doing things? I mentioned in one of my last posts that I had a lovely chat with the lady at the post office the other day. I was buying a bunch of international stamps and she asked if I was mailing something for a special occasion. I said no, I just liked to write and send letters. She smiled. We started talking and I mentioned that I worked as a mail carrier in Germany when I was in college and that, as an avid letter writer, the best part of my day was delivering personal, handwritten letters and packages to people. This was the coolest thing about my job.

I must have mentioned that I delivered the mail by bike, which made her stop dead in her tracks, because she was in obvious disbelief. YOU DELIVERED MAIL BY BIKE?
She couldn’t fathom how that was even possible. I tried to explain that we had special bikes, heavy bikes with build-in front and back storage space for boxes/mail bags to transport the mail. I told her about the kick stand that would hold the bike upright when parked – even with 60 pounds of mail loaded on the bike. I also told her that, since you couldn’t put all the mail of your district on the bike at once, there were locked boxes along your route where you could “re-load” your bike. She was baffled. I quickly googled an image of a German postal bike to show her what I was talking about and her jaw literally dropped to the floor.

Pedalpower in gelb

Photo Credit: Schockwellenreiter via Flickr cc

This is what a German postal bike looks like (well, I personally never head one of those trailers — they might be new or just available in some cities). And yes, we also delivered mail in the snow during the winter months. It’s been a few years since I did this job, so I am sure they’ve come up with a lot of new ways to improve the bikes and ways to get around (I read somewhere that some of the bikes have little motors now that can be turned on when necessary).

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Photo Credit: davidgalestudios via Flickr cc

I know that in bigger cities, mail carriers also use these push carts to deliver mail. They’re more convenient than bikes when you’re literally just walk from door to door.

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Photo Credit: Quan the Pooh! via Flickr cc

I guess, if this is something that you didn’t know about Germany (or other countries), it might be quite shocking. Haha. Who wants to pedal around 60 lbs of mail, you might ask. Well, it’s quite the workout, that’s for sure! And you don’t need to think that they make it “easy” for the carriers by putting the mailboxes conveniently on the street. You literally have to go up to every front door (well, besides apartment buildings which have all mailboxes located  at the main door or in the entrance hall way).

I loved the job, especially during the summer months. You were outside all day, you were able to work at your own pace and get a sun tan and workout in at the same time. I mean, that’s a double win in my book. Getting up early though was hard. I usually started work around 5:30 a.m. and while I love to start my day early (I start work at 7 a.m. right now), that was a little bit too early even for my taste.

Also: in the winter? The job sucked! Being on the bike – snow, rain or shine – was tough. Sometimes when I was handing over mail that had gotten a little wet from the rain and people complained about their mail being wet, I wanted to scream at them: can you take a look at me, please? I am completely soaked myself! But that would have been rude. It might not seem this way, but delivering mail is a physically hard, demanding job. Never forget that.

I really appreciated people who offered me a hot cup of coffee/tea in the winter to warm up or some ice-cold water in the summer as a refreshment. Those acts of kindness went a long way (and it subsequently made me treat the mail carrier that delivers at my house with much more appreciation and kindness in return).

Unless you’re German, did you know that mail was delivered (mostly) by bike over there? Did this piece of information take you by surprise?

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20: Things you wouldn’t know: (not quite) German 101

November 20, 2012 filed under: Germany, NaBloPoMo, Things you wouldn't know

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I am a language nerd, I appreciate good grammar, spelling and punctuation.  And idioms are awesome. I am always intrigued to find  new idioms in English and then try to find the closest translation in German. Or vice versa. It’s not always that easy. Not all idioms translate well…. but I’ve been trying to teach J as many idioms (and also colloquial phrases) in German as possible, because nothing really beats a foreigner using some colloquial expressions that nobody expects from him when visiting the in-laws (as he will this Christmas!).

Here’s a list of my favorites:

“Du hast nicht alle Tassen im Schrank“. (J’s favorite!) Literally, it translates to “you don’t have all your cups in your cupboard“. You can probably figure out what it means? Right, something along the lines of “you don’t have all your marbles”.

“Du hast eine Schraube locker.” You have a screw loose. Ha! surprisingly, this is one of the (few) idioms that works in both languages. I am always surprised when that happens. 

“Du hast einen Knall” . You have a bang.  Basically, it means “you are nuts” .

I swear, it’s a total coincidence that the first three idioms that came to mind have to do with calling someone a little crazy (but aren’t we all a little crazy?).

“Erstens kommt es anders und zweitens als man denkt“. First, it turns out different and second, than you thought. Yeah, this one is a little screwed up grammar-wise (even in German), but you get the picture: things never turn out the way you expect.

“Ich habe einen Bärenhunger“. I’m hungry as a bear” . Mmmh, so you explain to me why you say “to be hungry as a horse” in English. Are horses hungrier than bears? I doubt it.

“Das hat er sich jetzt gerade aus den Fingern gesaugt.” He sucked this out of his fingers just now. I have no idea where this expression originally comes from, but it basically means to make something up out of thin air or (it can also mean ‘to come up with something’).

“Das ist ein Kinderspiel“. That is a children’s game. It’s a piece of cake.

“Er hat mir eine Frikadelle ans Ohr gequatscht“. He talked a meatloaf into my ear. Also one of J’s favorites. It simply means that someone kept talking and talking and didn’t shut up.

“Halt die Klappe.” Hold the flap.  This means: shut up! It can be used jokingly or when you’re real serious.

“Das kannst du laut sagen“. You can say that loudly.  I use that a lot. It means: Amen to that.

Does your significant other speak a different language? Do you like to teach each other idioms? Do you know any in other languages?  It makes for some funny misunderstandings sometimes, but it’s also pretty awesome to know the ins and outs of a foreign language better than any school could teach you!

 

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6: FOUR MORE YEARS!

November 6, 2012 filed under: Things you wouldn't know, yes!

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This morning, we got up early and went to the polling place right at 7 a.m. Here in CA, there was only a short line of maybe 10 people ahead of us and I breathed a sigh of relief that I didn’t have to spend a big part of my day standing in line like I had seen all weekend during early voting in other states.

I’ve been voting in (German) elections for a long time and while I’ve always taken my right to vote seriously, I have never felt so excited about being able to vote and take part in the democratic process as I have today. I was excited and a little too giddy this morning to be able to vote for my president.

Some of you probably have wondered if voting in the US is any different from voting in Germany. At first glance, the voting process is pretty similar, but there are some differences. I am not going to give you the complete run-down between the different political systems (J would be much better at this than my measly try). All you need to know is a few key differences.

In Germany, you automatically get “registered” (if you want to called it that) to vote when you turn 18.  As soon as you hit legal age, you’ll receive a voter card in the mail before every election. There is no registering for a specific party. This is due to the fact that in Germany, you register with your city of residence and therefore you’re always ‘registered’ and they’ll take care of your voter mail.

The process then is pretty similar over all. We also vote every four years, but by law the election day in Germany MUST fall on a Sunday or public holiday, to ensure that people are free and able to go out and vote. There is also the possibility of voting by mail, which has to be requested prior to the election.

The ballot that I filled out this morning looked pretty similar to the ballots I have cast in Germany. The only difference, however, is that in Germany you mark a circle with an “x” while in the US, you have to completely fill in the oval next to your selected vote.

There are NO propositions (ballot measures, referendums, whatever you may call it) on ballots in Germany. The propositions that are managed on a state-by-state level in the US do not exist. In general, decisions about new laws and amendments are always handled by the elected representatives. There can be occasional non-binding ballot question, which can be taken into consideration by the elected officials, however, they have no direct impact on any pending laws.

Germany is a federal parliamentary democracy (as opposed to the presidential democracy in the United States) and the Chancellor, elected by the parliament and not directly by the people, is the head of government. The President of Germany is the head of state, which however has more of a representational role than a governing one.

Germany has a true multi-party system (with multiple smaller parties represented in the parliament) that has been dominated by the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Both of those two main parties are ideologically to the left of even the democratic party of the United States. Yeah, can you believe that? Our conservatives are more left than your lefties (that’s why we have universal healthcare, gay marriage, unions, and such. Go figure.) In recent years, as no one party is strong enough to achieve a majority in the parliament on its own, they engage in coalition talks with the smaller parties after the election to form a government.

The United States is a presidential democracy, in which the President is the head of state AND head of government.

There are major differences between the political system of the United States and that of most other democracies. These include greater power in the upper house of the legislature, a wider scope of power held by the Supreme Court, the separation of powers between the legislature and the executive, and the dominance of only two main parties. Third parties have less political influence in the United States than in other developed country democracies (Wikipedia).

There is more to the political system of both countries, but I don’t want to get into the nitty-gritty details. I just want to mention that I personally am not a fan of the Electoral College. It seems counterproductive to have the people vote for the president, then have their votes reduced to the majority vote of their state and then award all the delegates to only candidate (but I guess that’s a post for another day after I have taken another PoliSci lesson from my husband).

If you have any more questions about the differences to the German election system, ask away. I’ll try to answer to the best of my knowledge.

Oh, and also: FOUR MORE YEARS! He did it! So proud.

13

Things you wouldn’t know: German Sandwiches

November 6, 2011 filed under: food, NaBloPoMo, Things you wouldn't know

A while back, I had started a series that was called “Things you wouldn’t know”, addressing life as a German expat, living in a country far away from home, where one encounters a whole lot of things that are just different.

Some things are significant, others barely noticeable.

Recently, we had one of those situations again where I was told that “we Germans eat weird things”. Well – according to my husband,  that is. And he eats equally “weird” things in my opinion; just for the record. While this is one of the less noticeable examples, it’s still something that we did notice.

So, here it goes : when J (and I am sure a whole lot of you guys!) thinks of sandwiches, he thinks of toast (at worst, ciabatta or baguette at best), lettuce, roastbeef or ham (or some other kind of deli meat), cheese, tomatoes, mayo and mustard.

When I think of a sandwich, I think of this:

 

German (wheat/rye) bread, butter, natural ham, mayo and pickles.

Yum!

 

Not so different, but still different.

 

P.S. I dare you to try it; it’s really good.

 

 

 

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Things you wouldn’t know… about baking

October 26, 2010 filed under: food, Germany, Things you wouldn't know, USA

Baking has been a very frustrating undertaking here in the US for me. You might be wondering, how so?

The thing is that cakes and muffins never turned out to be quite right. The taste usually was a-okay, but the texture was completely off. A marble cake, which is supposed to be spongy and dry, always turned out sticky and very dense.

I blamed it on the gas oven, the different variety of ingredients that are available here, even on a lost ability to create decent baked goods. And all of these things might have played a minor role in my not getting the results that I wanted.
But, never in a million years would I have thought that the flour, more specifically the kind of flour I was using, was the real culprit.

You see, in Germany the standard flour available is wheat flour, type 405.
So, obviously, one would assume that the very common all-purpose wheat flour here would be the same type of flour as the type 405 in Germany, right?

Wrong.

This is where the whole problem started.

You need to know that German flours are categorized differently from American flours ( (I know, that’s why I blogged this as “things you wouldn’t know”, because who would think about something like that?).

German flours are sold by “Type” (Mehltyp in German) with a corresponding number which indicates the amount of ash (measured in milligrams) obtained from 100 grams of the flour (I don’t want to go into the details of it, you can read more about this on Wikipedia or this or this page if you are interested). But here’s a list of the closest American equivalents to the German types of wheat flour.

I had been using the all purpose flour for my baking the whole time and just recently found out that I actually should have used pastry flour all along, which, of course, is not necessarily easily available at any supermarket. Why would it be, right? Argh. However, I found pastry flour (and very similar cake flour, which is somewhere between pastry and all purpose flour) at the local Co-Op.

So today, I finally baked the perfect Lemon Poppyseed Muffins.

Lemon Poppyseed Muffins

85/365 Lemon Poppyseed Muffins

They were spongy inside and developed a decent “crisp” crust.
They turned out exactly the way I had anticipated. This truly opens up a completely new realm of baking possibilities for me. And more baking will ensue for sure this fall and winter!

Did you know about the different flour types?

17

Things you wouldn’t know: Long division does not equal long division

April 8, 2010 filed under: Expat stories, FYI, Germany, Things you wouldn't know, USA

Ok, ok, just bear with me for a minute here, before you all run away screaming because I am picking a topic for my today’s blog post that most people don’t really have a loving relationship with: math!

One thing you probably don’t know – and have never thought about – is that long division is taught in different ways in different countries.

Why yes, you didn’t expect that one, did you?

I mean, granted, long division is not something that easily comes up in a conversation with a foreigner and unless you sit down and write it out, nobody would ever figure that you might have learned the written long division in a completely different way. After all, the results are – surprise! – the same everywhere!

Still, I find it fascinating that there are different ways of notation.

As a little reminder, “Long division is the standard procedure suitable for dividing simple or complex multidigit numbers. It breaks down a division problem into a series of easier steps. As in all division problems, one number, called the dividend, is divided by another, called the divisor, producing a result called the quotient.” (from Wikipedia.org )

In the U.S., long division does not use the slash (/) or obelus (÷) signs, instead displaying the dividend, divisor, and (once it is found) quotient in a tableau. An example is shown below, representing the division of 500 by 4 (with a result of 125). In Europe, however, long division uses the obelus (in Germany, we actually use a colon (:) sign) and the notation is written out in one line.

longdivison copy

Obviously, the results and calculations are the same, but J got me really confused when I saw him write down a long division for the first time.
I was like, What the hell is this?

I mean, I never knew that he thought about writes down long division so differently, you know? I mean, in the end it really doesn’t matter, the most important thing is that you understand the concept of division, but still. It’s little things like that that you usually never talk about and only learn through pure coincidence.

Weird, right?

18

Things you wouldn’t know…

March 31, 2010 filed under: about me, Expat stories, Things you wouldn't know

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… if it wasn’t for me! YOU’RE WELCOME!

As an expat, living in a different country away from home, you encounter a whole lot of things that are just different from what you’re used to. Some things are significant, others barely noticeable.
Still, in many regards you really don’t expect for things to be different and there are a whole lot of things that we completely subconsciously take for granted to be the way that we know them to be, not wasting a second thought on the slightest possibility that things might be different some place else.

This might – or might not – become a new weekly feature post here on this blog (I haven’t decided yet if I am really that dedicated and/or if I might run out of things to write about sooner than you can say “I told you so”), but it might be entertaining and you actually might learn something, too.
Because unless you have traveled to Europe (which some of you have and I’d be especially interested in your opinion on the matter!), you wouldn’t really know about all the little things that I’ve been encountering on a daily basis since I set foot on American soil that are just not the way I used to know them (although I am pretty used to them by now!).

Today I’ll entertain you with something that pretty much bothers me on a regular basis. Maybe you can already take a guess on what I might be talking about from the images at the top of this post.

Indeed. Restrooms.

There are two distinct peculiarities that instantly struck me when I first used a public restroom (with multiple stalls) in the US.

a) Why is there always a (huge) gap between the door and the door frame? This makes it highly awkward and almost impossible to get some temporary privacy while you’re doing your business. You know, I honestly believed that people could pretty much see everything that I was doing through those gaps (and HELLO?, maybe I am not imagining this, maybe they really can, which means I can, too. And that is TMI!)

b) Why aren’t there any “vacant” or “occupied” signs (they don’t have to be as pretty and colorful as on the images above, mind you.) on the outside of the bathroom stalls? Is that some sort of conspiratorial exercise setup, to have to bend down to see if somebody is using the stall (or, alternatively, trying to peep through the gaps around the door)?

In Germany, bathroom stalls in public restrooms might not always have walls and doors that go completely down to line up with the floor, though in many places that is pretty much the case (pay attention next time you use a restroom at a European airport!), but there are definitely no gaps between the doors and the door frames and it is very, very likely that you’ll see a vacant/occupied sign integrated with the door lock.

Since using a public bathroom is not the most pleasant thing that comes to mind, wouldn’t it be nice to have at least the most privacy humanly possible in this situation? Raise your hand Leave a comment if you agree.

Before I leave you to your own thoughts regarding this matter, I thought it would be nice to describe my approach to the dilemma and then you share your tactics in the restroom, mmkay?

So, whenever I need to use the restroom at work (oh, which is only about 8x per day, because of all the coffee/tea/water that I (try to) drink), I usually enter the restroom listening for any noise coming from the restroom stalls.
If there is somebody there, I usually fall into a brisk walk and make for the second stall, lightly tapping my finger on stall No. 1 in passing to see if the door gives way. (Thank God, the doors open inwardly; contrary to the restroom doors in Europe).
If it does, I stop abruptly mid-movement and slide into stall No.1. Otherwise I repeat the same on door No.2. I’d imagine for somebody watching, it would look kind of awkward, but this is better than banging on the door and better than peeping through the gaps or bending down to count feet.

What’s your approach?
Do you peep through the cracks? Do you bend down?
Do share!

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Hi, I am San – German native, dual-citizen living in beautiful Northern California. Runner. Knitter. Crafter. Reader. Writer. Proud aunt, sister, and friend.

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