My Mannschaft

Don’t worry, I haven’t had a penis transplant. No, ‘Mannschaft’ is the (rather hilarious) German word for ‘team’. And, in my quest to become a fully-fledged German, supporting a football Mannschaft is an important step. Plus, I’m a big fan of any hobby that you can do with a beer or a whiskey in your hand.

Choosing a team was relatively easy – coming from a country that loses at virtually everything, this time round, I was going to pick a winner, and that meant Bayern Munich.

OK, they’re not Bayern Munich but hey, hot Germans with their shirts off… why not?

This would prove to be an unpopular choice at the Offside Bar a few weeks ago. Bayern were playing Dortmund and it was standing room only, with everyone in the bar supporting Dortmund. Oh well, now I’d get to combine being annoying with beer, whiskey and football – perfect.

When one (bad) German stood up to leave, I shot into his seat and found myself at a table with several jovial German men. Dortmund were winning 1-0 for most of the match so I decided to spice things up a little.

Me: I bet you a whiskey that Munich win 2-1.

Knut: No way! 

Me: Yes way. 

Knut: Ha, OK, I’ll take that bet. 

And then Munich scored twice and I got a very nice whiskey out of it. Football is fun.

A few days later I was chatting to my English friend.

Me: I really want to go to a football match. 

Nigel: I have a season ticket for Union Berlin. 

Me: Cool! Maybe I’ll come along some time. 

Nigel: I’m going to a match on Saturday – Union are playing 1860 Munich.

Me: Count me in!

So, I bought a ticket and we hopped on the train to Köpenick. As you have to walk through a forest to get to the stadium, we decided to get a beer for the journey. My first street beer – how German am I?

We joined the queue at the security area, which is where I made the unfortunate discovery that they don’t let men frisk women. Helga Hammer-Hands gave me a rather brutal seeing to – she touched places my most intimate man friends have seldom gone. But then we were in.

The atmosphere was electric and the fans were über friendly. We got chatting to loads of people, including two Japanese guys who didn’t really seem to know what was going on most of the time. Luckily, the Union chant is written on the stands, so I was able to join in immediately. ‘Unsere Liebe. Unsere Mannschaft…’ It sounded great roared in an Irish accent.

Me: I bet you a whiskey that Union don’t score before half-time. 

Nigel: I’ll take that bet. 

One more whiskey for me. Clearly I am excellent at this football stuff. In the end, we lost 4-1 but it was a fantastic day out. I think I’ll stick with Munich Mannschaften in future though – there’s less chance of being schafted.

Wedded Bliss

Amazingly, I’m not bound and gagged on someone’s basement floor, but am, rather, alive and kicking in Berlin.

I’ve settled into my temporary home in Wedding, which I have until the 23rd of September. The old guy who owns it is currently in hospital so, most of the time, I have the place to myself. However, he does pop in every day (colostomy bag in tow) to give me helpful pointers on how to use various household objects in a more German way. For example, this is unacceptable behaviour in Germany:

NEIN!

After my previous lecture on how to hang up a dish towel correctly, I thought I’d just let things dry naturally from then on and avoid the whole dish towel issue altogether. Now Hermann comes in every day (at unexpected times) and puts everything away where I can’t find it neatly. We’re a bit like an Irish-German ‘Odd Couple’ – after I’ve spent the whole of the previous day unintentionally deGermanising the place, he comes round and reGermanises it, tutting good-naturedly at my slovenly ways.

However, fun as this is, the prospect of being homeless in under two weeks is gnawing at me so I’ve lined up a couple of flat viewings for tomorrow. (One woman replied saying she wanted someone ‘god-fearing’ so I ruled that one out.) After chatting to some people, I’ve decided to just go for a room in an apartment for the first few months and look for my own place a bit further down the line.

I thought my luck was in last night. I’d been at an English language stand-up comedy night in JÄÄ-ÄÄR (Estonian for ‘iceberg’) and afterwards headed back to Offside on the off chance my new buddy might be there. He wasn’t but I did meet a red-headed German named Paddy, complete with leprechaun tattoo, who offered me his spare room. It seemed like fate but it turns out I’d have to buy a bed so that’s not going to fly. Moral of the story – don’t get excited over things that happen while drinking green shots that taste like Listerine.

There’s not much to report on the job front yet (but I do have an interview on Thursday) so instead, I thought I’d make a little list of things that I’m looking forward to in Germany.

1. More sausage than I can handle – and just good-quality meat in general. Take that as you will.

Giant sausage

 

2. Order, rules, systems… it’s going to make such a pleasant change.

3. Being surrounded by polite, considerate, helpful, cheerful people – and yes, I do mean the Germans. Except when they’re in Primark on a Saturday afternoon – then they’re just scary.

4. Sex in German – ja, ja, oh mein Gott, schneller, schneller, ja, ja, das ist ausgezeichnet… what a sexy language.

5. Learning German so that I can understand what’s going on during the sex.

And that pretty much brings us up to date!