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First of all, yes I know that unbestimmt should have an 'e' at the end, but that is not the way Deutsche Bahn does it. And I was quoting Deutsche Bahn. Also, the online translation software defines this as infinite. My experience is that it is closer, in this usage, to indefinite. But first things first. I just enjoyed a wonderful weekend in Freiburg with friends, but will write about that later (hopefully today) auf Deutsch, so that the friends in question will be able to read it in my own broken-German words. I may make an exception for church, and will make an exception for the unbestimmt Verspätung on the way home. But first let´s go back to Friday, and the opening of Karnival in Köln. Germans are really good at partying, which is no surprise, particularly collectively. The first time I spent an extended time in Germany, in 2001, I thought how lucky we were to happen upon so many festivals. Well it appears to me, that if Germans have two weeks in a row without some kind of festival, they come up with one. (Hence the Festival of Lights in Berlin, perhaps?) Living in a colder, darker climate, they have cold weather licked too; lights, outdoor heaters, and of course Glühwein all combine to make cold weather festivals fun. But with Karnival they have really outdone themselves. Karnival is of course the time just before the fast time of Lent. Like Mardi Gras in New Orleans, only maybe bigger. I've seen the February stuff on TV at the Goethe Institut in Washington, Rosenmontag, Fastnacht, which is of course followed by Ashenmittwoch, which never quite makes TV. :-) But I did not realize that Karnival is not limited to the week of Ash Wednesday, but officially starts in November, yes, November! Heike, from the Zivi-buro here says they don't party nonstop, just have events on and off between the beginning and the end, with the big parties at the beginning and the end. But think about it, for three months no real excuse needed to have a street party, hey, it's Karnival! Karnival starts at 11:11 on November 11 every year and clearly virtually everyone in Köln takes a day off to attend the festivities, because the city is wall to wall people, packed together closer than Washington Commuters during rush hour on the Friday of peak bloom of the Cherry Blossom festival. The Deutsches Rotes Kreuz is there in force, but I have no idea whatever how they would take care of any injuries (and given the amount of broken beer bottles around, I`d guess that there are some). Spirits are high, and beer, sekt and other alcohol begins flowing early. The party begins on the train to Köln, where tons of people in costume fill the car, mostly in groups of identical or associated costumes. Pirates are popular, as are indians and cowboys. Lots of people, already at 9:30 in the morning, were drinking beer. A group of three women sitting with me were sharing a bottle of sekt mixed with a strawberry vodka drink. The party was in full swing. A guy on the other end of the car was singing loudly and leading songs, which I could not understand, as the words were a tad slurred. We arrived in Köln where the train discharged us all, and we headed out into the street. Here we encountered even more elaborate costume groups, including people dressed in blow up cowboy on a horse costumes, where their legs became the back legs of the horse, people in formal dress with interesting, stylized hats who appeared to be part of some kind of club. We headed on down the increasingly crowded streets to a relatively unbusy beer sales table where many of us, including me, bought a Kölsch beer, which is a light beer that is local to Köln. I'll note for Washington DC readers that the Capitol City Brewing company makes a Kölsch as one of their regular beers. It's very light and therefore acceptable to me. We headed on to the main square (no namby-pamby side square with a TV screen for us. We were here to experience the culture - with suds). We joined a Platz full of people, stuffed all together. Moving into this crowd meant pushing people apart. I got lots of video of the crowd. There was a stage, which I could not see, but which I got video of (I guess I'll see it in Virginia. ) There was lots of singing of folksongs, and as we approached 11:11 we did a countdown (from 11 to 0) then they had more entertainment, more popular songs (still some folk songs). At 12:00 I left the group to buy a scarf commemorating both Karnival and Köln, and the 2006 World Cup in Germany. It's great, in German colors and really warm. I caught up with the group, or a part of it (they had become separated) on the way to the Bahnhof. On the train we finally all got together again, which almost seemed a bit of a miracle. The Unbestimmt Verspätung Fast forward to last night. I returned from Freiburg on a relatively late train, and I had a schedule that included three changes. Once on the train, I realized that this train went to Köln, and that I could get there in almost the same time (including the change to the Regional Bahn train back to Bad Godesberg) without having to make three stops and potentially miss connections. So I decided to stay on the train rather than changing trains in Mannheim. Between Mannheim and Frankfurt, actually only about 20 minutes out of the Frankfurt Flughafen station, the train hit someone. I don't know much in the way of details, as they did not say much. But they did say that someone was hurt (the train was going almost 300 KM/hour, I suspect someone was actually killed) and for two hours we sat on the tracks while police came and went, before our trip finally finished. Every few minutes they would come on and tell us that we still had an Unbestimmt Verspätung. At 60 minutes they told us that they would give us 20% off our fare or off another fare, and handed out applications for the discount. Finally 120 minutes later (they told us) they moved on. In Frankfurt Flughafen they moved people for locations beyong Köln to another train that would go to Dortmund more directly, and a little after 23:00 I was finally in Köln. The next train to Bad Godesberg was not till 23:56 so I called Mark from the train station and talked about 20 minutes, before catching it. I took a taxi home, at Mark's insistance, and was in bed just after 1:00. So an exciting end to a weekend I'll start writing about shortly. One more exciting thing while writing this I decided, since this internet cafe has headphones, to listen to my favorite Podcasts The Word Nerds and and I was able to understand SIM the first time through which is a real first for me. Now, it was a really easy one on the dessert 'Mohr in Hemd' but it was still a first, OK? I am thinking a lot about what I'll do, German-wise, when I return, and will talk more on that later. For now I'll say Tschüss! Post a comment in response: |
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