thanksgiving, fat cash

For all that have been asking me, yeah, the picture is from Hamburg...by the oh so popular lake Alster.  Not the greatest picture if you're lusting for a skyline, but I like boats so you can JUST DEAL WITH IT, you punks.

Speaking of punks, I get to sleep late tomorrow because the ninth graders have to take a test.  Yippee!  And in even better news, I suddenly have a bunch of tutoring jobs.  I'm now also tutoring my little Korean protege in math.  He mostly has issues with word problems because it's all in English.  Being the genius I am, I have a pretty good grasp of fourth-grade mathematics and I'm pretty confident I can provide said tutoring.  So, that's four hours a week for the Koreans in the district of Othmarschen, split between Mondays and Wednesdays.  Then I've got a new one coming up in the district of Bramfeld, for this tenth grader who has dismal grades in English.  There's another 90 minutes on Tuesdays.  Then on Thursdays after school I tutor this kid Nick in Conny's LK 12 class, a pretty charming lad who, according to Conny, won't pass his Abitur (that test German high schoolers have to take in order to graduate) if he doesn't get tutoring in English grammar.  Another two hours.  And THEN I am tutoring (probably short-term unless she decides to continue) this girl Marta from the remedial English course I teach with my British colleague James, because she's got a test on December 17th and won't pass it otherwise.  Another two hours.  So that's...9 and a half hours of tutoring, which will roll in at least another hundred euros a week which would really help me out, especially since Christmas is coming up and I'd really like to bring home a few gifts other than chocolate.

Thanksgiving at Dan's was fun!  Stuffing and gravy and corn and potatoes and rolls and all the fixins', everything veg 'cept for the turkey (I had my "hippie shit" instead).  It was me, Dan, Dan's friend Julika, Amy, Amy's friend Tom, and two Brits, Helen and Kat, who were couchsurfing with Tom last weekend.  It was really fun...Helen and Kat were hilarious and there was lots of wine going around and it was just really cool.  Apparently Europeans are not familiar with the joy that is pumpkin pie.  Well, that got rectified.  We were at the table from around 8:30 till one in the morning.  I have pictures!  I also have quotes but they're pretty inappropriate so I'll share those on a request-only basis.

Happy Thanksgiving, punks.

!!!!

OMG A PICTURE!

yay weekend

Ahh I am such a slacker, I need to remember to post on this thing.  I had a really busy week again because one of the teachers I help wasn't in school this week and I had to teach her class for her.  I also went to a pizza party with other couchsurfers and we all brought different toppings and made homemade pizza.  It was really fun and I'm starting to get to know some of them.  Last night me and Amy rescued two ladies with children!  We were window-shopping and these girls were trapped in a store because the stupid employees locked up while they were still in the baby-changing room.  So we went on an epic search for the security guard and rescued the trapped damsels!  We are heroes.  Then we went to meet couchsurfing friends at a bar called Roosen with cool couches and super cheap Astra beer, and Amy went home after that.  ANNND I learned how to play backgammon!!!!!  And I think I'm obsessed.  I want my own backgammon board :(   Then I went with the others (Corinna, Renaud, Julien, Timon, Thorsten and a girl whose name I can't remember) to Barbarabar, this freaking crazy bar in the awesome dive street of Hamburger Berg with a really good DJ and space to dance.  It was nuts (and free!  since it's a bar you don't even have to pay entrance).  We were dancing for a really long time and Julien (who is one of the craziest people I think I have ever met) and I made up this weird new dance move where we pretend to fight, and it was super crowded and we were dancing on top of black boxes (I hope they weren't speakers...) and throwing around Timon's fun Blues Brothers hat.  We staggered out at like 4:30 and I told off some assholes in the subway because they thought they were cool and said this obscene German word used for short girls (I will not explain the full meaning here, but I will say that I was having none of that shit) when I stood up to exit.  It pays to know some choice German phrases in these situations.  I bounced home around five, woke up at two and now I'm going over to Dan's for THANKSGIVING DINNER YAY!   All that's missing is family, football and rotting jack-o-lanterns from Halloween in the yard.  Le sigh.

yay procrastination

Well, hello there.  I have returned, not because I have anything interesting to write, but because I don't feel like planning a bunch of lessons and would rather procrastinate.  Today I started tutoring this adorable Korean fourth-grader.  I think he understands English better than some of my high schoolers...I'm also tutoring his mom because she wants to learn English too.  They're a pretty cute family, and an extra thirty euros a week means an extra 120 euros a month which means I'll be slightly less poor (yeah, I definitely have to manage money carefully these days, the dollas are currently NOT raining on me).  I did my grocery shopping and came home with a pretty heavy backpack full of broccoli, carrots, onion, persimmons, grapes, kiwi, peppers, and all sorts of yumminess.  I'm like, the only person in this freaking apartment who eats fruits and vegetables.  I also got a loaf of the most delicious bread ever from the bakery across the street...I already ate like a third of it today.  I must've gotten one that was right from the oven or something 'cause this bread was bangin'.  And today I went to Alnatura, a big natural foods supermarket that has all the fixins' my little hippie heart desires.  I was in heaven.  Annnnnd it's closer to my new apartment too!

I haven't posted for awhile because last week I was unusually tired and had a lot to do and not much to say.  I'll post my new address soon, too.  But now I have to get back to work planning words and grammar and shit and grammar and words and grammar and shit.

GRRRR

ARGHHHH I had a new post all typed out and my STUPID INTERNET started being a little punk and the post got lost.  So...maybe I'll get the motivation to write it again in a bit.  Gah.

sporty spice

I started doing capoeira (Brazilian martial arts) again!  I used to do it when I was in Bremen and tonight I started up again.  I missed it, man.  It's so cool.  I like that it has awesome music to go along with the super graceful moves.  Of course I'm hardly a graceful person...but one day I'll get there.  If you don't know what capoeira is, watch videos of capoeira masters do it on YouTube and let them blow your mind.

I do it through this thing called SportSpaß (sport fun)...you pay around 8 euros a month and get to take sport classes all over the city whenever you want.  So far I've done a step class (horrible...I suck at the choreography) and a Pilates class in addition to capoeira, and tomorrow I'm going to play badminton (yay!) and some other fun stuff.  I think that Sportspaß is insanely cheap for all the cool stuff I get to do- every day there's a bunch of different classes I can go to that are pretty close to where I live (and not too far from where I'm moving to) .  I tend to like classes more than going to a standard gym because it's way easier to motivate myself to go, and I get to do something different every day.  Capoeira is definitely the most fun, though.  Except my ass is going to kill me tomorrow...

School is good, I've still got my little eleventh-grade minions and the eighth-graders are still a pain in the ass.  Please just give me the older kids who are past the whole anti-authority phase...

Um...two weeks till I move out!!!!  DELIVERANCE

YAY

Last night at the consulate election party I met a (semi-drunk) guy who worked for the Obama campaign:

Me:  "Oh cool! You worked for Obama?  OMG did you ever meet him?"

Dude: "Oh yeah, I met him at a brunch thing this summer."

Me: (jaw drops)  "!!!!!   What is he like?" 

Dude: "Obama?  Oh, he's pimp."

Pimp, indeed.  I have nothing to say other than that I had a big smile when I turned on my TV at six this morning.  I mean, what can I say?  All the eloquent stuff has been said already.  I guess we were just "biden'" our time...PUN INTENDED!