It’s been about six months since I left Germany, but it seems like some German habits are quite hard to shake off.

In Germany, as well as some other European countries, have a useful system when it comes to recycling bottles. When you buy a bottle of drink, you pay about 10 – 15 cent extra. This is called ‘Pfand’, it works as a deposit on your bottle basically. So when you take your bottle back to the supermarket (or wherever you purchased it), you get your Pfand back. This was a particularly handy thing for house parties, where people tended to leave their beer bottles. After my leaving party, we got about 40 Euros worth of Pfand back!

I tended to collect my bottles and take them all back at once when I went shopping; this is what most people do! So upon cleaning my room in Swansea the other day I found that this habit of collecting bottles has yet to leave me…

I guess you can take the girl out of Germany, but you can’t take the bottle-collecting German out of the girl!

I just wanted to write a quick post to express my condolences for anyone involved in the Love Parade stampede that went down this weekend. It’s thoroughly bizarre to see Duisberg, a stone’s throw away from Dortmund, in the news here in the U.K, and I wish it was for something that wasn’t so sad.

I’ll be shouting for Deutschland in half an hour! Come on my German babes, Italy are out and you’re my only hope!

*sigh*

Don’t get me wrong. I adore Wales – I love how we’re never in the World Cup so everyone supports ‘Anyone But England’, I’m loving the weather right now and I especially love occasionally hearing a bit of Welsh while walking through Cardiff town centre… but my goodness, I miss Germany terribly. Family and friends time has been great, but I’m really feeling a bit of the old Heimweh* right now.

Part of it may be that I’m being a little bit lazy now I’m at home and have far too much time to overthink things. Perhaps it’s also a case of reality hitting me, hard, since I’ve arrived back in Wales. A lot of people I started Swansea University with are leaving and heading either to their respective home towns or to completely different places where they’ll embark on their ‘grown up’ life. It’s made me realise that I need to make some decisions about where I want to be this time next year, whereas this time last year I knew that I’d be in Germany in a few months.

What a depressing post this is turning out to be!! Any of you just back from a Year Abroad and feeling the effects?

*That would be homesickness. Even though Germany’s not my mother country, I feel that’s an appropriate word.

I can’t believe it. My year abroad has come to an end! Is it bad that I miss Germany a little already? It’s been six months since I was last in the U.K; Gordon Brown was still Prime Minister, the snow was being a pain in the arse and the frustrated statuses about dissertations on Facebook hadn’t quite started yet. It feels as though those six months have gone past in the blink of an eye, in fact, it doesn’t feel so long ago since I was standing in Cologne Hauptbahnhof meeting the other assistants for the first time.

Right now I’m adjusting to the language change around me; clearly not as difficult a task as I’m switching to my native English instead of to the really-not-native German, but I’m still saying ‘Danke’, ‘bitte’ and ‘Hallo!’ to anyone I interact with. It’s weird to hear English all around me! Not to mention that I keep expecting to see my  favourite bakery haunts and Bratwursts on offer in the train station. When I picked up my train tickets, I searched for the option to print my journey itinerary and of course found none, because I’m not dealing with Deutsche Bahn anymore! No instances of anyone noticing my newly acquired German stare… yet.

Now I’ve been home just under a week, it’s crazy how quickly you can settle into your old routine. As for what’s in store for me this Summer, well that  mostly depends on whether or not I’ll get a job! For now I’m enjoying the gorgeous weather and looking forward to Swansea on Sunday. It feels good to be back.

Well, well, well, look what just turned up on Spiegel.de’s international section :

The Germanic Stare-Down : Whatcha Lookin’ at Granny?

You jump into the subway on your way to work in the morning and plop down in the nearest seat. Glancing up from the morning paper, you can’t help but notice that the person across from you is staring at you for all he’s worth. You break the gaze, but each time you look back, he’s still staring. Is it a challenge? A come-on? Do you have food on your face? You look away, but can’t help squirming.

Welcome to Germany, the land where a bit of intense eye contact is a daily occurrence — so much so that many expats and visitors have dubbed it the “Germanic Stare Down.

This article offers some interesting explanations for the stare, such as Germany’s past concerning the Staatssicherheit, more commonly known as Stasi. For those not in the know, the Stasi were the secret police of the GDR (East Germany) and were highly efficient in their spying methods, from wiring houses to even coercing civilians into becoming unofficial spies, sometimes having them gather information on their own family. Though I wouldn’t say that this was the case in NRW, being in the West of Germany.

I’ve come to love the German Stare anyway. My tactic is to stare back, though I’ve seen the old grin, wave and ‘HIYAAA’ employed to great effect. The article suggests the old ‘take a photo, it’d last longer’ route – when I first visited Augsburg, we challenged one another to actually do this auf  Deutsch. So : ‘Mach ein Foto, es wird laenger dauern’!’

I wonder if I’m more of a Starey Marey after nine months in Deutschland?