chips:((

no ruffles, no lays, no doritos in germany....
but why not?

Movie challenge

unfortunatly in Germany the trend in the cinema is to show dubbed movies . this is a problem for me for 2 resons: 1- my german is not enough to get everything, 2- I like to watch movies in original version in whatever language it is with subtitles in any language I feel comfortable. last week I was forced to go with friends to movies and unfortunatly the movie they wanted to see was only in german. I am happy to announce that I could follow all the film and regret to say that Seven pounds (sieben leben) sucked, I assume it would suck in any language.
on the other hand, the curious case of benjamin button was quite nice today in cologne.

beauty challenge

I am getting ungly here. I still couldnt find a proper beauty salon/hair dresser moreover I find the service -which i am not even satisfied with- queite expensive. The maximum I paid was 100 euros for hair dye and cut and an intesive care that I didnt ask for. my hair is growing long out of control and I would like to give it a stylish shape but I cannot explain what I want to the hair dresser. back in Istanbul I didnt even have to explain what I wanted to my guy, he was so creative that I just went there and said "change it". here I am asked what I want and when I say "use your imagination", what I get is a slight cut at the edge of my hair. manicure is even harder since everywhere is full of these "nail studios" that put funny over-length fake nails on your hands. normal manicure and pedicure are considered in SPA concept. trying "home-made" beautification but am not an expert myself. pufff.

drinking sekt before breakfast

The tradition of celebrating stuff in the office with a bottle of sekt (bubbled wine) continues, even if it is before the breakfast!

The water challenge

It is rainning almost every 2 days, but still the drinking water is more expensive than beer. They are serving every kind of beverage (coffee/tee/hot chocolate..) for free in the cantine or in the office floors, but not water. Finding the best taste was also a challenge, trying some unbelievably bad tasting brands, I decided one French brand "Volvic" to be the best for me. Something that makes the water challenge harder is that the boggest amount you can buy water is 1,5 liters. Which forces me to buy a 6 pack and return the bottles later on to the shop.

The bottle challenge

Yes, I have been afraid to buy anything that is sold in bottles since I arrived. Why? Because I have to take the bottles back to the shop!! Almost all the plastic/glass bottles have deposit (pfand) which is around 20/25 ct. This means you are throwing away 25 cents everytime you throw a bottle away. For me (no car no bike yet) it is already a problem to shop groceries (yes I am missing the grocery stores in every corner in Istanbul), so taking the bottles back is another.
It is the same issue in the office: since I have to buy my own drinking water (yes I am missing the water springs serving free water in the offices in Turkey) my desk is sometimes a bottle trash.

Alcohol paradise

I have just learned that the legal age limit to buy alcohol is 16, for the light drinks and 18 for the harder drinks. This explains why the German drink practically everywhere:) on the street, on the bus, in the train... I have no problem with that since it gives me the same freedom, but it also causes everywhere smell beer since the people get careless when they get drunk and the bottles are going all around .

immigrants..

yesterday it was freezing as usual and all I was thinking aboout was to get into the hotel and warm up. it wasnt possible since the air conditioner was not willing to heat the room, but just cool. called the reseption and she sent a guy up to the room, who I was guessing , was arabic. he tried to communicate with his english like "what wrong?" "ok ok!!!" "one minute" and so on.
after 15 minutes of trying he left saying "I come ten minute". he was back like half an hour later with a turkish guy with him, also guessing that I was turkish also. he was happy that at last he could communicate me but we were all confused altogether that, I started to speak english to the turkish one, he started to speak turkish to the arabic one, and the arabic started to speak german with me. at last we figured out that it wasnt working and needed repairing, they gave me an electric heater and left. and I found myself thinking: the power of language!!!