Welcome to Germany!

Germany

We arrived in Germany a week ago Monday and it’s been crazy since then. The flight went well, the dogs did great and Colin did pretty well too. Right away we got the dogs to the kennel and checked into our hotel room and then Shelby had to run around doing work stuff for a bit. That first week was a lot of appointments and checking in, studying and taking the driving test and renting cars. We have been all over the area house hunting which is fun, interesting and exhausting. German houses are definitely different and I had heard no closets and no kitchens/cabinet space which had me a little worried. Most of the houses we have seen do have some cabinet space and it’s not nearly as bad as people say. There are no closets in the bedrooms for clothes but every house we have seen has LOADS of storage room. The houses are huge and the entire basement area is usually unfinished but is nothing but storage and laundry. There are rooms worth of storage in the basement and then a lot of houses also have some sort of garage or out building with even more storage. Finding a place to put things is definitely not a problem. Finding a house with a yard for the dogs however, is. Some have no yard at all and some have very small yards. We have seen three houses with nice large yards and we will finally decided on one yesterday. It is only three bedrooms, most of the ones we looked at had 4 or more, but the kitchen and living area is humongous and makes up for it. The inside was totally redone and renovated last year so it’s all brand new and nice inside. There are apple, pear, plum and cherry trees out in the back yard plus a garden area and a great patio/balcony off the main floor to overlook the huge yard. We scheduled movers to come in next Wednesday so hopefully that will go as planned.

Colin turned 9 months last week and the day after we got here he took off crawling at full speed. He is in to EVERYTHING and thinks when you say “NO” mean like that it’s absolutely hilarious. He is obsessed with cords of any kind and now has us both on our toes all the time. He is babbling and playing all the time now and he walks all over in his Jeep walker. We have been to the playground and the pool (which is like a water park!) and he had a ball at both. Yesterday morning he woke up with a cold which sucks. Hopefully it passes quickly!

This week Shelby has a few appointments and we are hoping that my car will arrive. At first we rented a car that was 250€ for 2 weeks while we waited for the cheap place to get more cars in. Finally we were able to get one from the cheap place which rents older cars for 300€ a month! It’s an old BMW that has rust and no air conditioning…but for that price you deal with it! The hotel/TLF doesn’t have internet which is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of since the housing office posts new available housing listings online every morning. How do they ever expect you to move out of the hotel when you can’t access the housing list! We have to go to the library to get internet and get the list every day so that is a pain and since you only get 30 minutes that doesn’t leave much time to do anything else online…like update blogs  So here are some things I’ve learned about Germany that I can recall at the moment, there are more but my mind is zapped…

1. Germany is GORGEOUS! It’s green everywhere! Huge hills of rolling green grass and fields with all kinds of trees, the fall will be spectacular. From atop a hill or mountain you look off and see green fields with a village of homes scattered here and there and windmills. It’s awesome!
2. Contrary to popular belief there is a speed limit on the autobahn in many places. However, it’s 130kmh (about 80mph) and Germans don’t pay attention to it. We’ve been going 160kmh (about 96 mph) and been passed like we were standing still. Drivers are fast but courteous and attentive. It’s against the law to talk on a cell phone at any time while driving here.
3. Things are expensive here.
4. They recycle EVERYTHING and it’s a requirement.
5. Cars are smaller and faster.
6. German women do not shave their armpits!
7. German wine is TASTY!
8. There are lots of wild birds here and they are totally different than the ones back in the States.
9. Dogs are much bigger than in the US and furrier too.
10. German bakeries are evil!