May 23, 2010

Sorry this has taken so long:

We got to the Gerald Ford Int’l airport at 2:45pm, after Tim’s open house and met with Joe and Marc’s families. On the way up to the gate, we saw Robin! Unfortunately he had to get a different flight back to L.A. for his Jubilee Fellowship. I hope he made it. At 4:00pm we were able to go through customs and board our flight on time at 4:30pm. It was a quick and uneventful flight to Chicago, where we had to wait until 7:30pm for our Frankfurt flight. We played a few too many games of B.S., then boarded on time. On the flight I sat in the aisle seat, next to a couple of older Turkish men. For the longest time I was trying to understand what they were saying, as practice of course, not to be a snoop . It turned out that they didn’t speak English or German; the one next to me understood enough German to tell me that he was from Ankara, Turkey. The only way I really ever figured out that there was a language barrier was when he “asked” me by saying Frankfurt and pointing to the map, that he wanted to know where Frankfurt was on it. I suppose any German or English speaker would be able to read the name Frankfurt on a map (or maybe his eyes were bad, who knows). The flight passed uneventfully; Joe and Marc sat behind me, surrounding a serviceman who was stationed in Germany (not Heidelberg though). It was kind of strange when we got to Frankfurt though because the map and all instructions switched directly to Spanish, which was fine with me, but strange. We were able to have our passports checked very quickly, and found our bags with ease. Of course none of us really knew where we were going, but we followed the crowd out well enough and made it out. Both of our people were there to pick us up. Joe and Marc had two TRW employees, and I had my driver, Herr Mika. Unfortunately, Herr Mika seemed in a hurry, so we left without saying goodbye at all. We’ll catch up later, probably next weekend though. Mr. Mika drives a nice Mercedes station wagon (don’t remember the model), and drives quickly, which was fun. Maybe that was an understatement; it was fantastic to fly along the highway like that, just shooting past cars as fast as you like. I think we were averaging around 180 km/h. I was a happy camper. On the way, I spotted a Chevy, Malibu maybe, but was pretty surprised: why would you buy American when you can have a Beamer, Benz or Bentley? During the course of the ride to Ingelheim, I asked him some questions about Germany and cars; his English was of course very good. I think I might have offended him though. I said, “Die Landshaft ist sehr schön,” which he didn’t understand at first (expecting English), so I said, I’m sorry, my German is terrible. Then he said, something to the effect of “my English is good,” making it sound like I insulted him for speaking German. I’m pretty sure he wasn’t insulted, but it should at least be noted that my initial attempts at conversation have failed (Turkish men and driver). In Ingelheim we stopped to get the key to my apartment, at Tor (gate) 1, before heading over. I signed his paper that said he had completed his task, and he was off. Apparently he works for whomever, but most of his jobs are for Böhringer. It took me entirely too long to figure out that the doors open inward and how to figure out the key situation, but eventually I got through three doors and into my third floor apartment. It is quite small, but very nice, clean, and bright because it was very sunny and warm today. Apparently yesterday had less than wonderful weather. They furnished me with some food because of the Sunday (no shops open) and Monday being a holiday (still not open) situation. Nutella, bread, cereal, milk and fruit! Yes please! I got to unpacking pretty quickly after surveying the place and taking some pictures. From my apartment windows I have wonderful views of the valley, known for its red wine production. Instead of exploring like I thought I might, sleep suddenly sounded like a better idea, and was a very good choice. After sleep and some relaxing reading of the finest magazine to grace the earth (Wired), I heard a buzz. Now, having not lived in an apartment before, I didn’t know quite what to do. It was far enough away that it wasn’t necessarily for my apartment. I went outside to the balcony and looked down, to see a man in a red shirt looking at the door and peering inside. I looked for a bit longer before deciding to go inside and find some sort of way to let them in. Very luckily I was able to figure out what to do, because it turned out that the man was my boss/supervisor Dr. Heckmann. I like him already; he has an easy demeanor, is modest and very intelligent. He showed me around a bit of the area, where the train station was, and how to get to work on Tuesday. We tried to find an internet café or something, and ended up with a T-Mobile payphone because that café that was there had closed...sad day. I am very thankful to Karla Veldink at this point, for the Euro she changed for me and the converter I am renting from her . Those coins came in very handy, and I was able to talk very briefly with the family (Papá, Mamá and Grandma P). I think on Tuesday I should be able to buy a phone to use here. Tomorrow Dr. Heckmann is going to pick me up for dinner at his apartment with his wife and 8-month old. He is a very nice man and I’m sure will be great to learn from. On a side note, my alarm clock that I have plugged into the converter is moving at between 1.25-2x speed likely because of the frequency difference in the current here. Probably going to have to rely on the cell phone alarm, which might not work either because it has no service and the wrong time. We’ll see how this goes; I might just have to buy a cheap alarm.