Things go from Bad to Worse

I last left you as we headed towards the university.  We had tiny flickerings of hope in our hearts that someone would take pity on us and throw us a bone.

We met with the chap who was supposed to be co-ordinating things from the German end.  I forget his name. This is probably a good thing.  He reminded me of my fourth form tutor, ‘Call me Joseph.’  ’Call me Joseph’ thought he was hip and trendy and down with the kids because he taught sociology.  This was not true. He was a middle aged man in a pakamac who lived with his mother and was unfit for society.  He claimed to be everyone’s friend, except that if you asked him for any assistance whatsoever he would shrug, smile and walk off to leave you firmly on your own.

Call me Klaus was cut from the same cloth.  He just could not see that there was a problem with our homeless state, and did not want to help.  In Germany everyone sorts out their own university accommodation we were told.  All well and good if you’re going to be studying there for three or four years.  Not if you’re only going to be there for four months.

He showed us the notice board that offered accommodation.  We had to translate  all the offers, work out which ones to visit, tour them, apply for rooms, pay for them and move ourselves in.  We had no idea where the bus/tram station was or which parts of town to avoid.  It was a nightmare.

With a little help, not from Call me Klaus, we fixed up a few appointments.  Then we met with our friends at the bank to open our accounts.  This was much needed as we were running short on cash by this point.

There were several important things we learned at the bank. The first was that the opening an account took ages.  It would take several days for our money to come through, and even then it would not be straightforward. At that point there were no national banking chains in Germany like there are here.  Banks were for your town only.  If you needed money because you were visiting another town, you had to plan ahead because you couldn’t get any cash out of bank machines in other towns unless you held an account with the other town’s branch.  Everything was very provincial and hard, hard work.

The most important thing we learned that day was that we had arrived on the day when huge strikes were taking place all over Germany. The bank would be going on strike, which would slow things up. The post would be going on strike, which was bad news for us because it was beginning to look like our parents would have to send us envelopes of cash, and worst of all, the public transport system would be going on strike.

We were tearing our hair out.  We had flats to go and see and no way to get to see them.

We headed back to see Call me Klaus. We asked him what we should do.  He said: ‘Buy a bicycle’.

We pointed out that we had limited funds and no way of getting any more cash for the foreseeable future.  We also pointed out that as we were only going to be living in Germany for four months, we didn’t really want to buy a bike.  He said: ‘That is what you do in Germany.  You can sell it when you leave.’

Eventually we found someone willing to give us lifts to see some of the flats.

The first one was a revelation.

In Germany, when you buy or rent a flat they are all unfurnished. Nobody would dream of renting you a flat with furniture in it.  This was a problem.  Now we had to buy a bike each, and furniture.

Not only that but they even take out the light fittings.  You get a hole in the ceiling with bare wires poking out of it.

You do not get curtains even.

It is just four walls and a floor.

We had not expected this.  We were told that we would have to buy everything we needed and then sell it before we left.  We pointed out that a) nobody had told us we would need enough funds to furnish a flat and b) even if we did this, what would we do about selling our stuff, given that we would need beds and transport etc up to the very last day of our stay, and if we sold it sooner we would be fecked.’

We were told it was our problem and that German students had to deal with it, so we should quit moaning and deal with it too.

By this time I was utterly, utterly despairing and remember having a fierce argument with Kate because I wanted to go home, as it was clear that we were about as welcome as herpes.  She wanted to stay as she firmly believed things would get better.

Short of returning to the gulag to find that someone had nicked all our stuff, she could only be right.  I agreed to give it a couple more days, but on the understanding that if things didn’t pick up by then I was going home, either with or without her.