mychai's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If I had a car, I wouldn't be so tired. Within 24 hours, I got my home telephone connected to a point where I can actually use the phone located within the walls of my home. I also got the internet connected in my room, which means I can now update regularly once again. This is the first time in over a year that I have had my very own internet connection. If you remember, my last connection was a cable modem. They don't have those here on Sembach. Nor do they have DSL in the enlisted dorms. So, I am on dial-up. And since Germany won't allow private ISP companies to compete with Deutsche Telekom, internet is damn expensive here. They don't have any unlimited plans, so I pay for 30 hours up front each month. This means no more endless porn surfing. Damn. I also got my network password at work. This will allow me much quicker internet and email. But again, no porn. Oh, well. I get to live in Germany for free. I get to live in Germany for free. Better than porn. Better than porn. The pain will subside. This guy I work with and I have been intending to go on a walk-about after work for the past two weeks or so, but every day it is either too cold, too rainy, or karaoke night at the enlisted club. Today was the perfect day for a long walk. And boy, did we walk. We estimated about seventeen kilometers, or just over ten miles. We went looking for one particular town near Sembach, but we ended up in a completely different town called Neuhensberg... or something like that. It's a neat little town that has a big church on a hill overlooking the whole town. It chimes every fifteen minutes, and rings the time on the hour. The town is very typical small German town with narrow, brick roads and cigarette machines on every corner. I was on the lookout for a pub, but those are surprisingly difficult to find in small German towns. We finally spotted a sign for beer, and went down the small road in the direction it was pointing. We found a restaurant, but it looked closed. It was open. We were the second and third patrons in there when we arrived. The waitress didn't speak any English, but I know enough German to order a couple of beers. People started steadily coming in, and after the beers we were feeling a little hungry. The special of the day were schnitzel sandwiches. Imagine a hamberger. Now, take away the meat and add schnitzel. And make the crappy bun a freshly baked roll. Voila, you have a schnitzel sandwich. A beer and the sandwich cost less than 5�. While I was eating my sandwich, a local ordered a hefeweisen (a lighter beer with a ton of flavor) mixed with -- and I'm not kidding -- banana nectar. Not being one to pass up strange flavors, I quickly ordered one. The look alone was different. It had the color of a typical American pilsner, as the hefeweisen does. But it was cloudy and foamy, almost like a milkshake would look. The taste? Wasn't bad at all. It was slightly sweet, and the feel was thicker than a regular beer. It made a fantastic dessert beer. Banana beer. Hm. Who woulda guessed? I'm working my way up to a German treat that mixes Coke and beer. No, I'm not pulling your leg! Germans like to mix weird shit with their beer. The rumor is that you can buy a drink from the market that is premixed Coke and beer. I haven't seen it with my own eyes, but they say it is out there. On the way back, we stopped and wondered if a particular fence was electric. I touched it. It was. We also did some walking in the woods where there weren't any trails. We were looking to get down to a stream that looked like a nice place to soak our feet. In the middle of the woods was a gravesite of an entire family that died in 1941. It was a little bit spooky. It was a little sad, too. We stopped and cleaned off the headstone and made it look a little presentable before we went on. We were probably the first visitors to that grave in sixty years. Ok. I am very, very tired. I have a whole day of nothing to do tomorrow. Except karaoke night. That's tomorrow night. I keep telling everyone I'm going to break out with the JP rendition of "Rhinestone Cowboy." They don't think I'll do it. They don't know the JP-meister. Oh, no. They don't. 9:46 p.m. - Wed., April 21, 2004 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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